Open system, or competitor?
Rick Nelson, Chief Editor -- Test & Measurement World, 8/1/2005
The Semiconductor Test Consortium chose Semicon West last month to tout its progress since its debut at Semicon West 2002. That progress has been significant, as the STC has pursued its goal of supporting the development of its OpenStar architecture, which defines hardware and software standards that compliant semiconductor test products must meet.
Specific goals range from the release of the original specification and Advantest's T2000 test system to the recent introductions of instruments such as Apria Technology's OpenStar-compliant arbitrary waveform generator and digitizer modules and a 6.5-Gbps Serdes test module from Advantest itself. As a measure of the platform's growing acceptance, the consortium announced in June that Toshiba is installing T2000 systems for wafer and package test. As for STC membership, the recent additions of OptimalTest and PX Instrument Technology have swelled the roster to 38 companies.
STC chairman Bill Price, who represents member company Philips, told a Semicon West audience that vendors with open-architecture offerings will be well positioned to profit from what he sees as a shift in revenue away from ATE platforms and toward instruments, software, and services.
But John E. Bearden, who became an independent test consultant after retiring from IBM, told the audience that based on surveys he has conducted, major users now see open-architecture approaches as "nice to have, but not must have." Their concerns, he said, center on instrument-module availability and price. He also mentioned concerns of the third parties who are considering building OpenStar instruments—these companies, he said, would be more likely to participate if they had a good way to estimate demand.
The ultimate test of OpenStar success would be an embrace of the standard by big-iron ATE vendors in addition to Advantest. But ATE makers are actively pursuing their own approaches, such as Teradyne's OpenFlex initiative, under which GuideTech has qualified its Femto 2000 continuous timing interval analyzer for the Teradyne Flex ATE platform. Credence Systems is pursuing its own open-
architecture efforts with its Sapphire platform and has designed its Sapphire D-10 to work with off-the-shelf CompactPCI instruments.
It's worth noting that major semiconductor manufacturers have yet to insist that all future test-equipment purchases be OpenStar-compliant. Even STC chairman Price of Philips won't go that far.
Consequently, OpenStar systems are shaping up to be worthy competitors to the 93000s, Flexes, Fusions, and Sapphires out there, but the dream of an industry-wide single test platform remains just that.
Contact Rick Nelson at rnelson@tmworld.com.
