There are a variety of tests and challenges involved in the life cycle of power semiconductors. From designing a new power device to bring it to market, engineers face huge measurement challenges in every stage. In many cases, engineers with expert level knowledge can have less understanding of power management tests. And this is when the problem arises. Here is a list of a few challenges faced across the life cycle of power semiconductors from the perspective of the power management test.
Table of Contents
Evaluation of Existing Devices
Engineers tend to work with customers who are continually testing and stressing a design to attain maximum efficiency. These are the customers who need details other than the one mentioned in the specifications. And for this, you need applications with a versatile set of test capabilities with a pulse, dc, and C-V. This will help in simplifying the measurements.
Designing Devices
To design devices that meet customer satisfaction and requirements, engineers must know how to tweak processes that lead to desired device performance. The machines intended must be sufficiently accurate and should produce changes in device measurement parameters. Hence the engineer must verify the critical device parameters in advance.
Identifying Performance
Identifying the performance of the device plays a vital role. Here, the characterization engineer provides the required measurement expertise and anomalies to understand the effect of non-targeted areas of the device. It is essential to get results fast in order to enable different changes with devices and quickly change measurements to device parameters. Optimizing the accuracy of other measurements needs sufficient expertise.
Production Preparation
To prepare the device for production, the production test engineers are supposed to prove under the power management test that the device can be produced correctly. For such applications, instruments with multi-functions offer the best way to get measurements quickly.
Meeting Standards of Reliability
Power management tests include reliability standards too. To know whether a device meets the reliability standards, engineers must determine if they can continue to meet specifications under different environmental stresses. Engineers are also supposed to answer all the questions from customers about the device and provide critical insight for whether a device fits in the high-reliability applications or not. Such systems are kept in control by using software that has stress measure loop cycling with inbuilt decision making.
Implementation
After the device gets validated, it is all set for commercial use. The purchaser of the device should verify that the device remains within tolerance for their application. This is done to ensure expected power gains that will be achieved in the end product.
Diagnosing Failures
Failure diagnosis is made to ensure whether the failure is caused due to a design flaw or end product use. After this is determined, awareness should be made about the cause of failure so that solutions can be implemented and future failures can be prevented. It is because of software tools and power management systems that such loss in devices can be replicated, and performance degradation can be ceased.
