Reliability Testing: A Solution to Discard Fake/Counterfeit/Non-Reliable Devices

Aug. 16, 2012 - PRLog -- Environmental, Physical-Electrical reliability testing of electronics not only provides data for quality analysis, but also can assist in determining if a electronic item is fake or genuine.  

Reliability is ability of products to perform specific function(s) at standard technical conditions for a specific period of time. Reliability is measured as failure probability, failure rate, and maintainability of products. Based on projected/actual technical specification of products and customer requirements, different reliability tests are performed as per different reliability testing standards via. MIL-STD, JEDEC, IEC, JESD, AEC, and EIA.
Website for Reliability Testing Services: http://www.ma-tek.com/service_detail.php?path=50
Contact Window = Sean Lu, Tel：+886-3-6116678 ext：6601
Email：ra@ma-tek.com, sales@ma-tek.com

Our press release is supported by following two articles published online.

Semiconductor market growth rate to double
Ref: http://www.electronicsweekly.com/Articles/10/08/2012/54319/semiconductor-market-growth-rate-to-double.htm
David Manners reported in Electronics Weekly that  "The CAGR of the semiconductor market for 2011-16 will be double that of the preceding five years, says IC Insights.

Memory will drive the accelerated growth rate. NAND flash is forecast to grow at a CAGR of 16.6% until 2016 and DRAM is expected to grow 9.6% CAGR till 2016.

The NAND and DRAM growth rates are enough by themselves to double the CAGR for 2011-16 compared to the CAGR for 2006-11.


Other key markets like microprocessors and analogue are forecast to enjoy a modest increase in average annual market growth through 2016.

Market growth for optoelectronics, sensors, and discrete (O-S-D) devices is forecast to out-perform the IC market by averaging 10.6% annual growth compared to 7.4% for ICs.

Tablet computers, smartphones, and the wide array of other portable wireless devices will keep semiconductor units growing at a steady pace through 2016, but strengthening ASPs will be the main driver behind improving market conditions.


With many semiconductor companies closing their doors and others that are merging or being acquired (e.g., Micron's pending acquisition of Elpida), fewer players have the capital resources required to build new 300mm wafer fabs.

Consequently, the chance of an overcapacity situation throughout the industry (and the associated steep price declines it often creates) will be reduced. The outcome is expected to be steadily upward-trending average selling prices through 2016, compared to the 3% annual decline that ASPs averaged between 2006 and 2011.

Since Moore's Law mandates a halving of cost every 18 months, a rising price means high profitability for the semiconductor companies.

For this year, the most optimistic forecaster is Semico with a 6-8% growth forecast.

IDC is forecasting 4.6%; IHS expects 4.3%; while Gartner and Future Horizons plump for 4% and IC Insights goes for 3%."

Counterfeit Chips on the Rise

Ref: http://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/hardware/counterfeit-c...
Celia Gorman reported in IEEE Spectrum that "Making semiconductors is a big business—and, so it seems, is counterfeiting them. Just how big is becoming clearer than ever, thanks in part to the candor of the U.S. military, and it will become even clearer as new laws in the United States come into effect later this year.

In 2011, over 1300 counterfeit incidents were reported from around the world to Electronic Resellers Association International (ERAI), a private company that tracks counterfeit electronics for the industry. That’s more than double the number reported in 2010 and 2008, and quadruple the number reported in 2009. ERAI’s partner company, IHS, reported a slightly higher figure for 2011 by including data from the Government-Industry Data Exchange Program, a not-for-profit organization that, among other things, tracks counterfeits and component failures in the United States and Canada. 

The fear is that these counterfeits—including used and relabeled commercial gear or components falsely labeled as military grade—will fail more quickly than the parts they’re standing in for. And because semiconductors are an integral part of everything from cellphones to nuclear reactor controls, the failure of a counterfeit chip in the wrong place could have deadly consequences. 

“That’s what we’re all afraid of, ” says Jack Stradley, an expert on the U.S. government’s semiconductor supply chain. 

The new legislation, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2012 [PDF], aims to fight counterfeiting by requiring government contractors to track and report counterfeits and to be held accountable for replacement costs. 

Until now, companies rarely reported fraudulent chips, says Lawrence Hurst, product fraud prevention manager at Intel. “We haven’t been doing that,” Hurst says. “In fact, most of the industry hasn’t.” In the past there was simply no financial reason to do so, he says. But with a new legal responsibility, Intel is now in the process of creating a database of counterfeit parts it encounters. 

The U.S. law is in response to a 2010 U.S. Government Accountability Office report on counterfeits in the military and a 2011 congressional hearing on the dangers of counterfeit electronics. A report introduced in the hearing based on a mandatory survey of producers, dealers, and military contractors, estimates that 9356 fake parts were found in 2008 alone. 

Those same counterfeits are sold internationally. Both the Japanese Ministry of Defense and the U.S. Navy bought electromagnetic interference filters from Raytheon electronics, later found to contain counterfeit versions of Fairchild semiconductors. The United Kingdom subsidiary of military contractor General Dynamics also bought counterfeit semiconductors, though it discovered the fraud before including the components in its products, according to the 2010–2011 annual report by the U.K.’s IP Crime Group [PDF, 3/12 MB]. 

The few prosecuted cases of counterfeit goods distribution show that it’s easy to sneak products into the increasingly complicated supply chain. Between its point of manufacture and its use in an action-ready missile, a semiconductor is often bought and resold many times. Overworked purchasers rely on brokers, who in turn buy from relatively anonymous online forums. In theory, chips are tested at multiple points in the supply chain, but shady companies have lied about tests, authenticity, and origins. The majority of counterfeit chips can be traced to China, but the primary fault lies in the industry’s purchasing practices, Stradley says.

Stradley believes that the new law won’t do enough to force reform of the semiconductor supply chain. It may take a fatal disaster to do that. “It’s always that way,” says Stradley. “That’s part of the problem—we haven’t had any serious accidents we can point to.”