About Us
Northwave Technology, Inc. was formed in 2001 and began development of the EM 1 Test Handler Emulator in early 2004. Our proof-of-concept machine was introduced to the marketplace at Semicon West in July of 2004 where it was described by Jim Mulady, editor of The Final Test Report, as follows:
“Northwave Technology unveiled one of the most unique new products at SEMI-CON/West in July”
In July 2005 we returned to Semicon West with an early production version of the EM 1 and were honored by Semiconductor International magazine with their “Editors’ Choice Best Product 2005” award. Since then we have gone on to successfully install Emulators at many of the world’s leading semiconductor manufacturers.
Although Northwave is a relatively new company, we are anything but new to the semiconductor equipment industry. We are a team of highly qualified and motivated individuals, each possessing many years of experience in the semiconductor test handling business. Our members have successfully designed, developed, marketed and supported test handlers for a number of companies, both private and publicly traded. Those companies include Aseco, Delta Design, and MCT
By listening to customers, we recognized an emerging trend and, therefore, a need in the test handling market. The trend is for semiconductor manufacturers to move more and more final package test to low labor rate areas of the world, such as Asia while maintaining design and development capabilities in the US and Europe. The need is for a low cost, very flexible machine that can be used for test process development and short run test handling. Thus was born the EM 1 Test Handler Emulator.
The Emulators value proposition is:
- Reduce time to market for new semiconductor designs by automating debugging of final test hardware and software.
- Help maximize yields in final test by assisting in the development of robust test processes.
- Maximize the efficiency and utililization of existing production capital equipment by freeing it up for manufacturing applications.
Our idea has quickly taken hold and we can now count almost twenty individual companies, including many of the world’s largest, among our customers.
For additional information about the EM 1Test Handler Emulator or about Northwave in general, please contact us.
