Alliance focuses on fab integration

Wonderware and ILS Technology are working on an integration strategy to enable secure remote equipment data acquisition and analysis by semiconductor equipment suppliers.

Wonderware and ILS Technology are working on an integration strategy to enable secure remote equipment data acquisition and analysis by semiconductor equipment suppliers.

As a leading supplier of e-manufacturing applications to the semiconductor market, ILS Technology will work closely with Wonderware to implement a strategy for Interface A and Interface C to securely gather and analyse fab operation data.

Wonderware and ILS Technology will present an Interface C demonstration this week on Booth 2826 in the South Hall of Moscone Centre at the Semicon West trade show.

Wonderware will also demonstrate the ArchestrA application platform's ability to provide APC and EES functionality that directly leverages its wide range of real-time data connectivity, integrated database and analysis tools.

The integration strategy combines Wonderware's ArchestrA application platform and ILS Technology's family of secure remote monitoring applications including eCentre, ServiceNet and Flexible Security Wrapper.

The combined strengths of the two companies provide a secure remote access solution that enables service engineers at tool suppliers to remotely and securely access tools in any fab worldwide for diagnostic and repair analysis.

"ILS Technology has combined efforts with Wonderware to provide a robust system combining its applications with a platform that provides Interface A connectivity and a real-time database", said Joe Cestari, President of ILS Technology.

"ILS Technology provides a single, universal solution that enables equipment suppliers, manufacturers and service providers to securely use the Internet to monitor, manage and service factory-floor equipment remotely".

"This offering has been optimised and proven at many toolmakers and fabs around the world".

The combination of secure remote access with Interface C and high-speed tool data acquisition via Interface A allows a toolmaker to diagnose tool performance trends and obtain statistics using detailed historical data stored in the real-time database of the ArchestrA application platform.

Specialised equipment engineering systems (EES) or advanced process control (APC) applications may store the results of tool data analysis in this database for later access by tool service engineers.

The result is improved tool performance for the fabs and reduced service costs for the toolmakers.

"Wonderware's work with ILS Technology brings together an established company with valuable semiconductor specialisation and the ArchestrA application platform, which provides essential connectivity, data storage and application support tools", said Kevin Tock, Wonderware Vice President of Advanced Applications and Alliances.

"The ArchestrA application platform enables ILS Technology to focus on its specialty of providing secure connectivity between fabs and their tool suppliers while enabling the company to quickly build and deploy systems without having to invest in application system architecture".

The combination of ArchestrA technology and Interface A enables semiconductor fabs to move tool data directly into a real-time SQL database within a robust application platform, which has been proven in hundreds of manufacturing applications.

Wonderware's ArchestrA application platform uses a plant-centric object model that captures, encapsulates, deploys and manages wafer fab process knowledge as software objects.

It enables a disciplined and economical approach that fits the growing need for semiconductor manufacturers to broaden successful EES and APC stand-alone applications into fab-wide solutions.

"This project is another example of the realisation of e-manufacturing that ISMI and its member companies have been working toward", said Brad Van Eck, Programme Manager at International Sematech Manufacturing Initiative (ISMI).

"This sort of co-operation, where two companies bring their complementary skills together, adds richness to the maturing commercial solution space".

ILS Technology's offerings are focused on providing secure connections between fabs and their tool suppliers.

eCentre improves a fab's productivity with a secure collaborative environment direct from the equipment on the factory floor to engineers located virtually anywhere in the world.

Flexible Security Wrapper enhances the control of data access based on real-time situational and context factors by filtering a user's data access based on a defined role regarding use of that data.

ServiceNet creates a cost-effective private Internet connection between a fab and its tool suppliers by permitting each user to create a VPN with access defined by the user privileges where each user is isolated from others by firewalls.

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