SEMICAPS began in 1988 when lecturers from the National University of Singapore (NUS) founded the holding company to commercialise products based on technologies that were developed at the Centre for Integrated Circuit Failure Analysis and Reliability (CICFAR). Back then, this Singapore high technology company specialises in electron, ion, photon, and X-ray beam technologies and associated techniques for the failure analysis (FA) of semiconductor devices. We commercialised the image capture and enhancement accessory for a scanning electron microscope and sold about 400 units of these worldwide.

Our technical staff has strong backgrounds in these technologies, computer hardware and software; complemented with an in-depth appreciation of the application requirements of the industry. Currently, we have about 30 staff in offices located in Singapore, Taiwan and USA.

Presently, SEMICAPS is the world’s leading company in the area of high resolution infra-red laser scanning microscopes. These microscopes are used by advanced semiconductor companies for:

a) design-debug analysis of new integrated circuits (ICs)

b) yield improvement analysis for early semiconductor wafers, and

c) failure analysis of customer returns.

Our key advantages over our competitors include:

a) the ability of our microscopes to resolve linewidths below 100 nm, thereby producing the highest resolution images, and

b) the ability of our analytical wafer prober (SEMICAPS 5000) to allow hard-docking and direct-probing with standard commercial testing equipment; catering for probe-cards of over 5000 pins and testing speeds of more than 1 Gbps. Have fun with more chilli pokies

SEMICAPS celebrated its 25th Anniversary in 2014. Singapore’s Minister for Trade and Industry graced the occasion and in his speech said that Singapore needs more companies like SEMICAPS. The company’s R&D work has resulted in awarded 7 patents with 2 more pending. For their significant achievements the SEMICAPS team has been awarded the President’s Technology Award in 2009.

The SEMICAPS Group consists of:

1) SEMICAPS Corporation Pte Ltd – the holding company,

2) SEMICAPS Pte Ltd – our R&D company which designs and manufactures our equipment, and

3) Inscope Labs Pte Ltd – a service laboratory that exploits the equipment developed by SEMICAPS.

The main shareholders of the company are Mrs Jennifer Phang (wife of our late founder, Professor Jacob Phang), staff and management, and private individuals.

The design and manufacture of semiconductor failure localisation microscopes is our core business. We sell these internationally to large customers like Intel, AMD, Qualcomm, TSMC, Micron, UMC, NXP and GlobalFoundries. Half the top 20 semiconductor companies use our machines. Our subsidiary, Inscope Labs also provides a wide range of laboratory services using our equipment.

SEMICAPS has its R&D, manufacturing and HQ in Singapore. It typically generates yearly revenues of around $10 million which leads to profits of between $0.5 million and $3 million. This is expected to improve in the future as our equipment become more widely accepted internationally and as the semiconductor technology node progresses towards 14 nm and 10 nm.