Mission profile aware robustness assessment of automotive power devices

Mission profile aware IC design - A case study

“…A mission profile aware design flow must thus ensure that the backannotation information of all components is correctly transferred to the next higher module level. These validation results are then used to calculate the robustness parameters of the module [8]. The transformation, design and validation process continues as long as subcomponents that can act as local top-level modules or components are available.…”

“…The operating state definitions of the mission profile and the specification requirements are used to derive a set of simulation stimuli for each operating state [8]. These stimuli are subsequently used to obtain all effective terminal currents within the electrical circuit for each operating state.…”

“…2). This includes the worst-case distance (WCD) and spread of performance parameters with regard to the specification (functional and parametric robustness) [8]. In addition, it also includes the socalled "Robustness Indication Figure" (RIF) values of the most critical failure mechanisms in the module or component [5]- [7].…”

“…Validation hereby defines a set of tests and analyses to demonstrate that the module or component is suited for its intended use according to the given mission profile. In order to account for parametric and functional robustness of a module or component, its WCD parameters are calculated according to [8]. The RIF values of the module/component are calculated according to [5]- [7].…”

“…For components, this includes the identification of dominant failure mechanisms, such as corrosion, electromigration (EM), hot carrier injection (HCI), negative/positive bias temperature instability (NBTI, PBTI), stress voiding (SV), time-dependent dielectric breakdown (TDDB) and others. In addition, functional and parametric robustness require the worst-case distance (WCD) and spread of performance parameters to be considered with respect to the specification [8].…”