Integrated circuit testing for quality assurance in manufacturing: history, current status, and future trends

Integrated circuit (IC) testing for quality assurance is approaching 50% of the manufacturing costs for some complex mixed-signal ICs. For many years the market growth and technology advancements in digital ICs were driving the developments in testing. The increasing trend to integrate information acquisition and digital processing on the same chip has spawned increasing attention to the test needs of mixed-signal ICs. The recent advances in wireless communications indicate a trend toward the integration of the RF and baseband mixed signal technologies. In this paper we examine the developments in IC testing from the historic, current status and future view points. In separate sections we address the testing developments for digital, mixed signal and RF ICs. With these reviews as context, we relate new test paradigms that have the potential to fundamentally alter the methods used to test mixed-signal and RF parts.