Measures against electrostatic destruction of electronic devices at electronic equipment assembly shops

With the recent rapid growth of the population of portable phone users, higher importance is being placed on product compactness, weight and lifetime. In the product development sector in particular, it is becoming more important to achieve further reduction both in size and weight through routine use of large scale integration (LSI) components and new mounting technologies. The need for continued size reduction has required the use of semiconductor devices with lower electrostatic potential endurance than previous designs. In the production environment, establishing clearer handling rules and precautionary measures against electrostatic discharge (ESD) is all the more imperative, without which the maker's corporate competitiveness would be greatly reduced. Thus, we implemented a project to improve the overall level of our precautionary measures against ESD. We incorporated the "issue of improvement of ESD problems" into our qualitative environment rearrangement activities for 1997, and carried out practical improvement activities including the initial planning, proposal and studies, and implementation of the measures in liaison with other related sections.