Demo and test facility for 300 mm wafer handling solutions to be built by PRI

San Francisco

At SEMICON/West, PRI Automation announced it had added two additional buildings to its current facility at its corporate headquarters in Billerica, MA. The buildings, expected to be completed this month, were acquired for use as additional manufacturing space and to house a state-of-the-art demonstration and testing facility for the company`s 300 mm wafer handling solutions. The two buildings will bring PRI`s total space to more than 37,000 sq. ft., an increase of approximately 20 percent. Because of the changeover from 200 mm to 300 mm processing, fab managers are concerned about how to successfully integrate factory automation with many different types of process tools, says Tyson. The new demo and test facility will allow customers of its fully-integrated automation system to see the entire product line in action, schedule individual testing, and get data on how the system will perform in a fab prior to installation. — SES