Aehr Test Systems Announces Order For Multiple ABTS-Pi™ Individual Temperature Control Test Systems For Taiwan Test Lab

FREMONT, Calif., May 28, 2014 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Aehr Test Systems (Nasdaq:AEHR), a worldwide supplier of semiconductor test and burn-in equipment, announced today that it has received an order for multiple production-capacity ABTS-Pi systems and an ABTS-Pi Engineering Workstation from a leading test lab in Taiwan.

The ABTS-Pi Advanced Burn-in and Test System features 256 unique I/Os with per-pin test electronics, 16 independent programmable device power supplies and individual temperature control on up to 64 devices per burn-in board. The ABTS-Pi system can dissipate 36,000 watts of heat in a single test system chamber and can be configured with up to 72 Burn-in Boards. Both of these capabilities are the largest capacity in the industry.  The ABTS-Pi Engineering Workstation is a single burn-in board position system used for developing and troubleshooting programs to be run in the production ABTS-Pi systems.

“We are very pleased to see that our ABTS system is being chosen by an increasing number of IDMs and fabless companies who are outsourcing their device reliability qualifications and production test during burn-in needs to test labs and subcontract manufacturers in Taiwan,” said Mark Allison, vice president of sales at Aehr Test Systems.

“We see two trends in the market that are leading customers to choose the ABTS-Pi system over other systems available at test labs,” said Carl Buck, vice president of marketing at Aehr Test Systems. “The first is the increasing number of channels required to fully exercise processors for mobile and automotive infotainment devices, which is addressed by the ABTS systems’ configurations of 128, 256 and 320 I/O channels per burn-in board. The second is the need for individual temperature control of the devices being tested in the system, due to their wide range of power caused by variations in state-of-the-art fab processes. The ABTS offers a unique combination of these capabilities in a very cost-effective solution.

“Test during burn-in of higher-power devices used in high-growth applications such as tablets, smartphones and automotive infotainment is an important market growth opportunity, with an increasing amount of this testing being done in Taiwan,” continued Buck. “According to SEMI, Taiwan has purchased approximately 25% of the total worldwide semiconductor capital equipment over the last several years.”

The ABTS family of products is based on a new hardware and software platform that is designed to address not only today’s devices, but also future devices for many years to come. It can test and burn-in both logic and memory devices, including resources for high pin-count devices and configurations for high-power and low-power applications. The ABTS system can be configured with up to 72 burn-in boards and with up to 320 I/O channels each and 32M of test vector memory per channel. The ABTS system is optimized for use with the Sensata iSocket* Thermal Management Technology, which provides a scalable cost-effective solution using individual device temperature control for ICs up to 75 watts or more. Individual temperature control enables high-power devices with a broad range of power dissipation to be burned-in simultaneously in a single burn-in chamber while maintaining a precise device temperature. The ABTS system also uses N+1 redundancy technology for many key components in the system to maximize system uptime.

*iSocket is a trademark of Sensata Technologies, Inc.

About Aehr Test Systems

Headquartered in Fremont, California, Aehr Test Systems is a worldwide provider of test systems for burning-in and testing logic and memory integrated circuits and has an installed base of more than 2,500 systems worldwide. Increased quality and reliability needs of the Automotive and Mobility integrated circuit markets are driving additional test requirements, capacity needs and opportunities for Aehr Test products in package and wafer level test.  Aehr Test has developed and introduced several innovative products, including the ABTS and FOXTM families of test and burn-in systems and the DiePak® carrier. The ABTS system is used in production and qualification testing of packaged parts for both low-power and high-power logic as well as all common types of memory devices. The FOX system is a full wafer contact test and burn-in system used for burn-in and functional test of complex devices, such as leading-edge memories, digital signal processors, microprocessors, microcontrollers and systems-on-a-chip. The DiePak carrier is a reusable, temporary package that enables IC manufacturers to perform cost-effective final test and burn-in of bare die. For more information, please visit the Company’s website at www.aehr.com.

Safe Harbor Statement

This release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties relating to projections regarding customer demand and acceptance of Aehr Test’s products. Actual results may vary from projected results. These risks and uncertainties include, without limitation, acceptance by customers of the ABTS technology, acceptance by customers of the ABTS systems shipped upon receipt of a purchase order and the ability of new products to meet customer needs or perform as described. See Aehr Test’s recent 10-K, 10-Q and other reports from time to time filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission for a more detailed description of the risks facing our business. The Company disclaims any obligation to update information contained in any forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances occurring after the date of this press release.

Contacts:
Aehr Test Systems
Vernon Rogers
EVP Sales and Marketing
(510) 623-9400 x215
vrogers@aehr.com
MKR Investor Relations Inc.
Todd Kehrli or Jim Byers
Analyst/Investor Contact
(213) 277-5550
aehr@mkr-group.com