Thomson Lab Services performs Failure Analysis on the full range of electronic components from active components such as diodes, transistors and IC’s to passives such as resistors, capacitors and electrical mechanical devices.
The analysis is performed with a disciplined approach to gain as much information as possible about the failure before committing to a destructive analysis step.  The failure mode, symptom in application and electrical continuity degradations, is fully examined as part of the analysis.
Lab equipment from Semiconductor Curve Tracers, power supplies and meters, to an IC I-V curve continuity relay box for characterization of high pin count BGA and QFP IC’s are available to electrically characterize the failure.
The component can be opened with various techniques utilizing Nitric and Sulfuric acids, depotting solvents and plasma etching.   Thomson Lab Services has a full range of microscopes for internal inspection from 40x to 1500x optical, a Laser Scanning microscope and two Scanning Electron microscopes.	Component Opening with Nitric Acid
Failure Analysis Techniques and Instrumentation
·   Electrical Parametric & I-V Characterization ·   Real Time X-Ray & Film Radiography ·   Macro Photography and Documentation ·   Stereo / Compound Optical Microscopy ·   Laser Scanning Microscope – LSM ·   Light Emission Microscopy ·   Optical Beam Induced Current – OBIC ·   Liquid Crystal Hot Spot Detection ·   Mechanical Electrical Microprobes		·   Scanning Electron Microscope – SEM ·   Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy – EDS ·   Elemental Dot Maps ·   SEM Voltage Contrast ·   Electron Beam Induced Current – EBIC ·   Mechanical / Chemical Deprocessing ·   Semiconductor Strip-back and Staining ·   Cross-sectional Analysis ·   Hermeticity / Gross Leak