Product Briefing Outline: Hach Ultra has introduced the MET ONE 6000 Series Remote Airborne Particle Counters, which offer accurate and reliable continuous particle monitoring. With a sensitivity range of 0.2 to 5.0µm at 0.1 cfm flow rate and 0.5 to 10µm at 1.0 cfm flow rate, the MET ONE 6000 series is designed to meet the specific needs of cleanroom operations within the semiconductor, hard disk drive and flat panel display industries. 

Product Briefing Outline: Numetrics Management Systems has launched ‘NMX-ERP’ 3.0, its next-generation suite of enterprise resource planning (ERP) software for integrated circuit (IC) development organizations. The new software significantly extends the company’s top-down project planning and risk measurement capabilities, handling chips designed in nodes down to 45nm. 

Product Briefing Outline: Aquest Systems has introduced its new ‘FabEX’ No-Wait-Productivity (SM) Improvement (NPI) solution that is designed optimize material movement in an existing fab by eliminating bottlenecks and congestions that impact IC manufacturers' fab productivity.  The solution is claimed to connect without any changes to the IC manufacturers' existing automated material handling systems (AMHS). Aquest has integrated the FabEX 'highway' into Powerchip Semiconductor's current AMHS, which is designed to provide additional capacity to move 8,000 FOUPS per day at high speeds between their two fabs, 12A and 12B, with average delivery times of less than 140 seconds, the company said. 

Product Briefing Outline: A real-time, visual predictive and preventive maintenance (PPM) system that could save semiconductor fabs thousands of dollars annually per tool has been developed by Quality Wise Knowledge Solutions (QWiKS) in cooperation with ATDF, the Austin-based R&D foundry. The PPM system, called QWiKS CBM/PHM, combines condition-based maintenance (CBM) with prognostic health monitoring (PHM) to monitor and maintain semiconductor process equipment more effectively. 

Product Briefing Outline: Factory Physics Inc., a management consulting company, has launched its proprietary software application ‘LeanPhysics' Support Tools. LeanPhysics Support Tools enable enterprises to apply ‘Factory Physics' principles and optimize design, planning and execution of operations. The software complements continuous improvement initiatives such as Lean and Six Sigma and work with existing IT systems to maximize these investments by standardizing a practical, scientific framework in an IT solution that makes managing operations easier.