AAA: Automated, On-ATE AI Debug of Scan Chain Failures

Abstract

Debug of failing tests during new product introduction is a human-time-intensive task, requiring the focus of domain experts to develop and execute fact-finding experiments. With the increasing size and complexity of modern integrated circuit products, and the increasing size of company product portfolios, it is challenging and taxing for these few experts to support all required debug. To overcome this bottleneck of limited expertise, we propose AAA, a rule-based expert system to perform automated, on-the-tester debug of failing tests. The system is designed to replicate the typical procedure followed by an expert, including the dynamic creation and application of targeted debug tests, collection of on-tester silicon failure results, and analysis of the results to improve root-cause understanding. AAA performance is demonstrated on industrial chips with scan chain failures.