3-D Design and Data Collaboration of New Technology SIP

ABSTRACT With the ever increasing complexity of today's IC packaging designs and new packaging technologies of tomorrow, coupled with the increasingly global nature of design and manufacturing / assembly, traditional 2-D EDA packaging tools and design collaboration capabilities do not have the required feature subsets nor controlled and seamless design sharing integration needed to support 3-D design technologies. These current solutions cannot adequately meet advanced packaging's current and future needs. New generation 3-D EDA tools and design collaboration systems that integrate 3-D design and global data collaboration are required to meet these expanding technologies. The conventional 2-D IC package design process flow begins with top-down design and layout, and utilize software tools that only have the ability to verify 2-D design rule checks (DRC). These limited rules, while sufficient for lead frame, single tier Ball Grid Array (BGA), and other single level package types, do not take into consideration advanced System in Package (SiP) stacked die configurations with multi-die advanced bond wire and other connection technologies with accompanying manufacturing variables and tolerances. The lack of tools that accurately model these 3-D manufacturing parameters result in substantial trial and error in the assembly set up process, increasingly poor yields as complexity increases, and in some cases, eventual package / substrate redesign after costly time and resources in manufacturing have already been expended. In addition, the design and manufacturing and assembly departments tend to be organizationally as well as geographically separated with little or no real data transfer or feedback between the departments. The result is evident in current package designs that are completed according to basic rules without the benefit of, nor the ability to incorporate optimal manufacturing data. These designs are completed “successfully” (from a 2-D design standpoint) and then sent to manufacturing and assembly. These “successful” designs are then evaluated from a manufacturing and assembly viewpoint, and real world manufacturing parameters are utilized to “redesign” the assembly of the package to attempt to make the package manufacturable. The optimization of the design for manufacturing can take days or weeks to accomplish through a long process of trial and error. Many iterations of the assembly prototype are made until it is deemed manufacturable, or if not, the design is sent back to the design department for re-design. In order to increase reliability, increase yields, and decrease time to market for advanced SiP and other stacked technologies, a 3-D design collaboration system is required to integrate the design, verification, manufacturing, and assembly processes into a seamless system that is globally accessible in real time by all departments. This system must provide data access to the designer from all related departments, including engineering, simulation, manufacturing, assembly, etc. in order for the designer to be able to optimize the design for maximum performance as well as the highest yield and shortest time-to-market. This system will accurately verify 3-D assembly parameters during the design process. Manufacturing, engineering, and assembly departments will be able to input manufacturing parameters into the design, thereby eliminating much of the trial and error prone in the package design and assembly process today, and the design can be shared by multiple users and departments for true collaboration. This paper explains the role and manufacturing benefits of a 3-D package design and global data collaboration system.