Implementing Y2K compliance for production equipment in an IC manufacturing industry

Abstract

This thesis is the study, Implementation and recommended contingency plan of Implementing Y2k Compliance for Production Equipment in an IC Manufacturing Industry or Wafer fabrication. in the manufacturing environment nowadays is utilizing a lot factory automation and computer control systems, which containing date storage and calculation. With the existing problem of year storage in 2 digits make the computer and human to misinterpret the meaning of the date when the system clock rollover to year 2000 (00). This is so called ‘Millennium Bug’. As a result of this problem, the IC Manufacturing Industry which has high product value, aware and put its effort to solve and minimize impact as much as possible. Facing the problem and prevent it happening is inevitably. The problem itself is consider simply, since it only involve just fixing the system clock, however, the scale and complexity of the project is making it tough to complete before Millennium Crossover. The impact to IC Manufacturing Industry is significant to organization not just operation but the long term business strategic image of the organization to comply with the international standards. In order to ensure the impact of Year 2000 is minimize certain remediation were made by utilizing the knowledge of Date Computation and Management skill to ensure the completion IS achievable before Millennium Crossover, including the contingency plan to reduce the impact in case the organization fail to completely eliminate the problem. From the preparation and prevention effort, as well as the coordination between supply chain, resulted in the achievement of the Year 2000 readiness of 100% for all of production equipment within two and a half year from unknown Year 2000 readiness status. As a result of equipment function analysis, the upgrade cost for Implant module were significantly reduced from US1.2 million to US 8,000. The contingency plans are developed and ready to handle the crisis that might happens for all of the individual production equipment. The exposure of Millennium Bug are significantly reduced, substantially compliant and “Y2K Ready” commented by Hewlett-Packard, our partner and customer’s audition. Business continuity and Y2K contingency plans look very strong in our customer’s perception.