Spreadtrum Shifts to Verigy Port Scale RF Solution

Tag : Low Volume Production
Verigy (NASDAQ:VRGY), a leading semiconductor test company, todayannounced that Spreadtrum Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ:SPRD), oneof China's leading wireless baseband chipset providers, hasselected the Verigy Port Scale RF solution for production testingof its devices in Suzhou, China. After evaluating multiplecompetitive solutions, Spreadtrum chose Port Scale RF for itshigh-throughput and multi-site test capability which deliver lowercost-of-test (COT), higher performance results, and superior teststability. Since adopting Port Scale RF, Spreadtrum has lowered itscost-of-test for a high-volume RF device over the incumbentsolution by about fifty percent.

Spreadtrum develops a range of highly integrated basebandprocessors with robust multimedia functionality and powermanagement for mobile wireless products. Port Scale RF is effectivefor testing the full range of RF devices, from low-integrationchips such as RF transceivers, to the latest high-integrationsingle-chip devices for next-generation wireless standards. Thisgives Spreadtrum flexibility as they implement their RF deviceroadmap, with performance that covers both next generationtechnologies and varying levels of integration. This is achieved inconjunction with faster test times and higher parallelism, whichsupport the dramatically lower cost-of-test.

"Verigy's Port Scale RF solution is unique in the market today forits ability to deliver consistently stable test results, whichtranslates into improved yield. It will help us continue to meetour customers' growing demand for wireless devices," said BrianChen, Senior Director of Operations, Spreadtrum. "Since 2001, wehave been dedicated to growing the wireless communications marketin China. We expect to grow our business in RF applications andbelieve that working with innovative technology leaders like Verigywill be an important factor in our ability to do so."

"Spreadtrum has highly-developed expertise in wireless technology,and is clearly one of China's foremost suppliers of mobile phonechips as shown by the many awards they have won recently (1)," saidPascal Ronde, Vice President of Sales, Service and Support, Verigy."We're very pleased that the Port Scale RF solution can provideboth the technology for performance and high quality but also theflexibility and unique parallelism that should allow Spreadtrum tocontinue to produce devices at a low cost-of-test."

About the Verigy V93000 and Port Scale RF

The Verigy V93000 provides a scalable platform architecture fortesting SoCs, systems-in-package (SIPs) and high-speed memorydevices. The V93000, with nearly 1,800 RF-ready systems installedworldwide, meets the industry's demanding performance and costchallenges, whether for at-speed engineering characterization orhigh-volume production. The test system provides low cost-of-testwith massive multi-site capabilities and data rates up to 12.8Gbps. It supports a full range of digital, mixed-signal, RF andwireless applications, such as cellular, WLAN, WiMAX, and UWB.

The Port Scale RF solution provides the cost-effective, reliablemeasurement capability required to test emerging high-integrationsemiconductor devices containing integrated RF, mixed signal,digital, power management and embedded or stacked memory - all withone test system. Port Scale RF is the only solution for 3G, 4G andhigh-integration RF devices qualified for high-volume manufacturingtoday that meets the high multi-site parallel efficiencyrequirements for these high volume devices.

About Spreadtrum

Spreadtrum Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ:SPRD)("Spreadtrum") is afabless semiconductor company that develops baseband and RFprocessor solutions for the wireless communications market.Spreadtrum combines its semiconductor design expertise with itssoftware development capabilities to deliver highly-integratedbaseband processors with multimedia functionality and powermanagement. Spreadtrum offers terminal manufacturers acomprehensive portfolio of highly-integrated baseband processorsolutions, as well as multimedia chips, RF chips, protocol softwareand software application platforms. Spreadtrum has developed itssolutions based on an open development platform, enabling itscustomers to develop customized wireless products that arefeature-rich and meet their cost and time-to-market requirements.