IEC TR 62240-2

Abstract

This part of IEC 62240, which is a Technical Report, focuses on original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) using commercial off the shelf (COTS) semiconductor microcircuits for high performance, high reliability and long duration applications. This document supports OEMs in the preparation and maintenance of their semiconductor electronic component management plan (ECMP). This document describes a process and a method for selecting digital semiconductor microcircuits by ensuring that their lifetime is compatible with the requirements of aerospace, defence and high performance (ADHP) applications (generally in connection with functional environments). Methods and guidelines are provided to assess the long term reliability of COTS semiconductor microcircuits in such applications; they mainly apply during the electronic design phase when selecting semiconductor microcircuits and assessing the application reliability. Moreover, the document focuses on the intrinsic wear-out and the lifetime of COTS semiconductor microcircuits processed of less than or equal to 90 nm feature size (also called deep sub-micron (DSM) semiconductor microcircuits) and puts aside, at this time, packaging wear-out and random failure mechanisms. In this view, physics of failure (PoF) is at the heart of the approach. NOTE 1 IEC 62239-1 can assist OEMs in the creation and maintenance of ECMPs. NOTE 2 SAE ARP6338 can also help the OEM with regard to assessment and mitigation of early wear-out of life-limited semiconductor microcircuits. NOTE 3 With the evolution of electronic technology and semiconductor microcircuits processed of less than or equal to 90 nm feature size, the current MIL-HDBK-217 handbook or FIDES guide become inappropriate as they are based for the time being on the assumption that the semiconductor electronic component exhibits a constant (random) failure rate and does not have life limits or exhibit wear-out. Moreover, silicon itself has fundamentally very low failures in time (FIT) rates and the major failure modes are often in the packaging (for example housing, bond wires, etc.).