WHY 'MODERN ICS FAIL ‘SILENTLY And Solution To The Problem

When failure margins shrink to a few volts, ioniser performance reveals why ESD risks go unnoticed and how they can be addressed.

- - AKANKSHA SONDHI GAUR

Unexpected electrostatic discharge (ESD) losses often hide in plain sight. Production lines pass audits, operators follow every protocol, ionisers hum reassuringly in the background, yet devices still fail quietly, leaving engineers chasing ghosts inside an otherwise compliant setup. For many factories, the widening gap between visible control and invisible damage is driven by a single factor: today's electronics are far more sensitive than the standards designed to protect them.

Across global manufacturing environments, ESD specialists are now drawing attention to two ionisation parameters that were once treated as minor details: decay time and offset voltage. As device architectures shrink, these parameters have moved from the margins to the centre of unexplained yield loss.

Why ioniser performance matters more than ever

For years, ionisers were treated as install-and-forget equipment. However, ionisers can become silent liabilities when key parameters drift or go unmeasured. Two metrics determine whether an ioniser is genuinely protecting sensitive electronics:

Decay time. The speed at which a + 1000V or -1000V charge is neutralised to within ± 100V.

Offset voltage (ion balance). The residual voltage left after neutralisation, essentially the ioniser's own bias.

In environments dominated by ultra-dense semiconductors, compliance with these limits no longer guarantees safety. Industry data illustrates how dramatically device sensitivity has shifted. Charged-device model (CDM) tolerances have collapsed for many advanced components.