Anomaly Detection in Time Series Data and its Application to Semiconductor Manufacturing

Anomaly detection is essential for the monitoring and improvement of product quality in manufacturing processes. In the case of semiconductor manufacturing, where large amounts of time series data from equipment sensors are rapidly accumulated, identifying anomalous signals within this data presents a significant challenge. The data in question is multivariate and of varying lengths, with an often highly imbalanced ratio of normal to abnormal signals. Given the nature of this data, traditional data-driven methods may not be appropriate for its analysis. This paper proposes a novel unsupervised anomaly detection model for the analysis of multivariate time series data. The model utilizes a unique recurrent neural network architecture and a special objective function to detect anomalies. Furthermore, a relevance analysis method is introduced to facilitate the interpretation and analysis of the detected anomalous signals. Our experimental results indicate that this deep anomaly detection model, which summarizes sensor data of different lengths into a low-dimensional latent space, enabling the easy visualization and distinction of anomalous signals, can be applied in real-world semiconductor manufacturing factories and used by on-site engineers for both analysis and execution purposes.