Software solution for automated validation of power management integrated circuits

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master_Herath_Iroshana_2024.pdf (5.25 MB)

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Sähkötekniikan korkeakoulu | Master's thesis
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Date

2024-08-19

Department

Major/Subject

Smart Systems Integrated Solutions

Mcode

ELEC3064

Degree programme

Master’s Programme in Smart Systems Integrated Solutions (Erasmus Mundus)

Language

en

Pages

72

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Abstract

Power Management Integrated Circuits (PMICs) have become essential semiconductor devices due to their widespread use across various technological domains. Given the increasingly demanding specifications, these PMICs must be highly reliable, accurate, and power-efficient under a wide range of stress conditions. Therefore, post-silicon validation is a critical step in the PMIC design lifecycle to ensure robustness under real-world scenarios. However, the growing complexity of PMIC designs has made post-silicon validation a time-consuming process that requires various hardware tools, significant engineering hours, and high costs. Moreover, limited time-to-market requirements add further pressure, making the validation process even more challenging. This thesis aims to develop a fully automated post-silicon validation solution to ensure the robustness of PMICs while saving time and resources required for the validation process. This was achieved by developing a Python-based software solution with two main components: a Device Controlling Application capable of controlling and communicating with the device under test (DUT) and a Validation Sequence Automation Solution capable of executing the validation sequences by controlling the instruments and DUT. Furthermore, the proposed software solution can log measurements from instruments, and this measurement data can be used to generate various plots to evaluate the silicon and identify potential issues. Finally, the results obtained from the new solution were compared with those from an existing solution to evaluate and validate the new approach. The newly developed solution was able to reduce time by one-third and significantly cut resource usage compared to the existing solution. Based on the results, the proposed software solution can serve as a reference for further development to improve the efficiency of the post-silicon validation process of PMICs while automating the tasks involved.

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Supervisor

Vujaklija, Ivan

Thesis advisor

Partanen, Ossi

Keywords

post-silicon validation, IC design, test automation, python automation, power management integrated circuits, measurement and characterization

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https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:aalto-202408255755

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