Consortium Contact: Press Contact:
Fred Bode Ellen Van Etten
Semiconductor Test Consortium MCA
619.297.1210 650.968.8900
fbode@semitest.org evanetten@mcapr.com
STC HIGHLIGHTS SIGNIFICANT GLOBAL PROGRESS OF
OPENSTAR ECOSYSTEM AT SEMICON WEST 2006
Consortium to Showcase Members’ OPENSTAR-Compliant Mixed-Signal Test Modules
SAN DIEGO, Calif., July 6, 2006 — The Semiconductor Test Consortium, Inc. (STC), the leading proponent of global adoption of the Open Semiconductor Test Architecture (OPENSTARâ) standard, today announced it will showcase OPENSTAR-compliant modules from member companies Apria Technology and Advantest Corp. during SEMICON West 2006, July 11-13, at booth #7659 at San Francisco’s Moscone Convention Center. Offering cost-effective, flexible solutions to meet the diverse and stringent requirements for mixed-signal test, these modules are examples of the STC’s proven ability to create and implement a common test architecture that is completely open, documented and supported via solutions available from vendors throughout the automated test equipment (ATE) sector.
Since its inception in May 2003, the consortium’s global roster has rapidly grown to 45 corporate members, a key success factor in the STC’s evolution into a fully functioning ecosystem of worldwide semiconductor industry leaders. This year STC elected three new board members, including Woodrow Beckford of Analog Devices, Kevin Fetterly of Apria Technologies and Klaus Luther of Infineon Technologies. Hideyuki Aoki of Renesas was re-elected, and the three steering board members—Rudra Kar of Advantest, Don Edenfeld of Intel Corp. and Maverick Brown of Tokyo Electron—remain an integral part of the leadership team.
Recent successful STC events include the first annual Global OPENSTAR Conference (GOC), created in direct response to industry-wide demand for open-architecture test solutions. Kicked off in Monterey, Calif., on March 6, the OPENSTAR-focused conference attracted 126 attendees from 59 companies, and offered 54 technical and business related sessions. The GOC succeeded in its main objective to further understanding and development of the OPENSTAR ecosystem, while bringing together many of STC’s worldwide members to learn more about both vendor capabilities and user needs.
“Three years ago, the STC was a concept of an open architecture for semiconductor test driven by a small core group of forward-thinking companies who envisioned a different, open view of the semiconductor test world,” explained STC Secretary and Administrator Fred Bode. “Today, as we celebrate our third anniversary, OPENSTAR has become a significant ATE architecture because the end users have realized its technical and business benefits are crucial to solving their dynamic test requirements. The remarkable attendance at our first GOC, combined with the outstanding level of expertise represented by our newly elected STC board, is just another indication of the mass appeal and validation of the OPENSTAR ecosystem.”
In conjunction with SEMICON West, the STC will hold its annual dinner event on July 10, at 6:30 p.m. at the Argent Hotel in San Francisco. The next STC general meeting is scheduled for August 15–16 in Boston, Mass.
STC Exhibits at SEMICON West 2006
Apria Technology will be showing its OPENSTAR-compliant OC800 arbitrary waveform generator (AWG) module, which cost-effectively meets the diverse and stringent mixed-signal test requirements for baseband products such as Gigabit Ethernet, DVD, digital TV and I-Q applications. It has sufficient capability to span high-swing applications, such as 100base-T, to high-bandwidth applications, such as ultra-wideband (UWB) signals.
Advantest will feature the PXI carrier, which allows vendors to slide any of the already available 1,000+ PXI modules into an OPENSTAR-compliant module form factor. Advantest demonstrated this quick-turn design capability by developing a radio-frequency (RF) solution in just a few months using AeroFlex RF PXI cards.
To learn more about STC and its products during SEMICON West, visit the consortium’s booth #7659 at Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco. Editors interested in meeting with STC during the show may contact Ellen Van Etten by phone: 970.778.6094, or email: evanetten@mcapr.com.
Designed to enable open-architecture test solutions that offer true hardware and software interoperability with unparalleled technical and economic benefits, the OPENSTAR platform is now supported by a total of 84 global members, comprised of semiconductor, equipment and instrumentation companies, universities, standard test interference language (STIL) users, and individuals. With its STC-outlined standard specifications, the architecture is accessible to all test-product vendors, enabling them to offer best-in-class, fully OPENSTAR-certified test solutions. In addition, the highly scalable and flexible OPENSTAR platform provides inherent extendibility in performance to meet emerging test requirements.
About the Semiconductor Test Consortium
The Semiconductor Test Consortium was founded in 2003 to develop a common test architecture that is completely open, documented and supported via solutions available from all ATE vendors. Open to all companies throughout the semiconductor supply chain with a vested interest in the test sector, the consortium is focused on the following goals: driving the direction of OPENSTAR; publishing the architecture and providing training programs and workshops to ensure it is truly open; and defining and managing validation procedures to ensure full vendor interoperability. Today, 45 semiconductor, equipment and instrumentation companies worldwide and 27 universities in Europe, Japan, China and the United States, in addition to eight STIL users and four individuals support the STC. More information can be found at www.semitest.org
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OPENSTAR is a registered trademark of the Semiconductor Test Consortium.