UKRI-2434 SemiProbe PS4L FA12 Probe Station

The ATLAS UK ITk community presently uses a semi-automatic probe station, located at RAL, to test wafers of Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) used in production of the ITk Strip detector. Approximately 250 wafers remain to be tested over the course of the next year. The maximum throughput of this system is approximately two wafers per day, and this requires working times to be staggered such that one wafer may be loaded in the morning, and one in the early evening. Just as the Strip work starts to wind down, deliveries of Pixel wafers will begin, potentially another two years of work.

We wish to reduce the effort burden associated with this process by moving to a fully automatic system, capable of running unattended wafer tests for a batch of up to 50 wafers. As the system will now be able to process wafers 24/7, throughput will be increased by 80%.