Purpose-built Automation Platforms

Soliton provides consulting and development services to help product lines / organizations develop purpose-built automation platforms and tools to substantially increase their engineering productivity in applications like semiconductor test and validation automation, device GUI development, and inspection automation solutions.

Our platform approach has three main components:
    • Modular lightweight reusable components that can be assembled quickly to build new solutions. These are primarily software modules, but on occasion also encompass COTS or custom designed hardware.
    • Underlying infrastructure that encodes the workflow and core elements of the automation solutions; the modular reusable modules plug into this infrastructure.
    • Training, maintenance and support to enable the users to develop their solutions on the platform, to keep extending and improving the platform, and a support desk to provide ongoing support for the users.
    Some of the platforms that we have developed, deployed, and support are listed below.
    • Standardized Automation Platform for Semiconductor Validation

      A major semiconductor company wanted to standardize and promote the use of a LabVIEW and TestStand based automation platform for chip characterization / validation across product lines and geographies. Soliton was chosen as the development partner to help realize this goal. Starting from the initial pilots to the successful roll out of the infrastructure across the organization, Soliton’s engineers worked closely with the thought leader in the company to architect, develop, deploy, train and support this software infrastructure.

    • Platform for Automated Inspection Solutions for a Process Industry

      A major manufacturer of industrial films wanted to build a rapid application development platform for the in-process inspection of industrial films. A team of engineers from Soliton worked with a senior architect from the company to design and develop the platform using LabVIEW and cRIO. The inspection systems required for their different products are being developed substantially faster using this platform.

    • HTML5 based GUI development Platform for IC Evaluation

      A major semiconductor company wanted a HTML5 based platform for the development of feature-rich cross-platform device GUIs. Soliton started with a pilot project to prove out the concept and then added a team of engineers to built out the framework working alongside a team of engineers from the customer’s side. Using an Agile development approach, the framework was developed along with GUIs for a set of devices. This ensured that the apps engineers tried out the GUIs and provided feedback that was incorporated into the framework as it evolved. The framework has been largely completed and the sprints are mostly focused on adding GUIs for new devices. The feedback from the users (apps engineers and the customers) has been very positive.