Rudolph Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ: RTEC), a worldwide leader in process characterization solutions for the semiconductor manufacturing industry, today announced the sale of an NSX® inspection System and Discover™ in-line defect analysis and data management software to Micronas, a leading supplier of integrated circuits (ICs) and sensor system solutions for consumer and automotive electronics. Rudolph’s complete inspection solution—the NSX System with the Discover server and sof
tware—is scheduled for shipment in June 2008.
The NSX 115 joins an existing NSX 105 system in Micronas’ Freiburg, Germany-based fab to provide additional inspection capacity demanded by the 100 percent inspection requirements of Micronas’ customers in the automotive market. Rudolph’s Discover software will link the systems to provide intelligent sampling strategies and fast, efficient identification of actionable events and trends.
Martin Molan, General Manager of Rudolph’s European business states, “Discover software has been particularly valuable for the automotive device makers, having demonstrated overall throughput enhancement of over 20 percent for the inspection and review step necessary to achieve zero defects.”
“This purchase was driven by rapid growth in demand for our automotive products,” commented Nikolaus-Viktor Kaeppeler, Vice President Operations at Micronas. “Our customers’ requirements for 100 percent inspection made throughput our top purchase decision criteria. Our selection also reflects the excellent experience we have had with our first NSX system, and we believe the analysis and reporting features of Discover will help us understand and act on defect issues in a timely manner. High quality is a no-compromise area for our customers, as well as for us.”
“The NSX 115 System with our