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【2020 Application Example】 AI Helps Establish the Best AOI Parameter Model for Passive Components, Reducing Production Costs of Over-Screened Components, Saving NT$2.5 million Annually

Traditional AOI uses limited sample images for inspection, facing the problem of high over-screening rates

In the electronic component manufacturing industry, AOI (Automated Optical Inspection) equipment is often used to measure defects in product appearance. For a long time, AOI measurement equipment has used limited sample images in image processing to compare the appearance of products from different external light sources and angles.

This comparison method can automatically screen for defects in product appearance. However, due to current technical limitations, there are often problems with light source parameter adjustment between product batches. If an inexperienced technician handles these adjustments, it will lead to a decrease in machine utilization rate and high over-screening rates.

The maturity of AI image machine learning has brought new opportunities for the AOI process

In terms of Taiwan's passive components, chip resistors and MLCC currently rank in the top two worldwide in terms of market share in 2019. In the long term, various car manufacturers have launched electric vehicles and smart vehicles, and various countries have also developed 5G-related equipment, which will further increase future shipments of passive components. Therefore, besides expanding new product lines, how to help existing products enhance their competitiveness will be the key to the industry's future international competition.

AOI inspection is one of the common stations in the passive component process, limited sample images are used in the current stage to compare the appearance. However, when switching between product batches, there are often problems with light source parameter adjustment, and the condition of these adjustments will affect the over-screening (mis-screening) of good products in each batch. In each batch of defective products in the industry, on average over-screening (mis-screening) occurs 20% of the time.

Relying on the guidance capabilities of the Southern Taiwan Industry Promotion Center, which has been deeply involved in Southern Taiwan for more than a decade, the company was matched with the AI image recognition technology unit of the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) to address the pain points of the passive component industry, reducing over-screening in the AOI process and also reduce errors caused by manual adjustment.

Using image recognition technology to reduce the occurrence of AOI over-screening

The technical unit of the ITRI that participated this time used image recognition technology to develop AOI technology for passive component processes in the establishment of AI modules.

In the development process, the company in this case first provided product appearance images and corresponding adjustment parameters, and then used the adjustment logic of current production line personnel to construct a product data set and further establish an AI model. When planning the production line test, the first priority is image recognition rate. Image detection and tag search are combined with comparison by an AI module to output AOI adjustment parameters for reference by online personnel.

Image analysis diagram

▲Image analysis diagram

In the future, we also hope to use the help of machine learning to complete the AI learning curve for machine parameter adjustment, further reduce the over-screening rate of product appearance defect detection, simultaneously solve the gap in on-site professional and technical talent, and increase product yield.

Before and after scenario of incorporating machine learning

▲ Scenarios before and after implementing machine learning

Implementing AI applications in processes to lay the foundation for developing unmanned factories

In the future, we hope the guidance of AI HUB will accelerate the application of advanced process technology and establish AI indicators for each station of the passive component process, which will help domestic production of high quality passive component products and increase product yields and prices. It will use innovative thinking to increase the added value of the industry and continue to lead the passive component industry forward.

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這是一張圖片。 This is a picture.
AI-Based PCBA Surface Defect Detection Improvements

With the introduction of theAOIAIWith the introduction of the system, we can improve product yield, reduce costs, and from a business perspective, increase customer trust and sales revenue Moreover, AIit has advantages that are difficult to imitate, unlike other equipment that can be bought with money, making it hard for our competitors to catch up with us Our company's current development We are committed toIOTsmart manufacturing our systems already include smart materials systems, environmental humidity control systems, anti-miscarriage systems, smart procurement computation systems, smart inventory systems, solder paste management systems, and production management systems We have asked other manufacturers about the possibility ofAIinspectingPCBAsurface defects, each hoping that we would purchase their equipment, but none were effective upon verification After discussing with IT service providers, we defined it asAOIAIa feasible operational model Tzuhong Technology has invested inAOIAIan inspection plan to checkSMTtext on components, solder joints, polarity, missing partsand usingAIto replace manual learningAOIand define the 'potentially defective' parts, enhancing productivity and reducing misjudgment rates Industry pain points Taiwan faces a severe labor shortage, especially those willing to perform visual inspections are few and typically older, increasing the frequency of missed inspections Thus, the most critical bottleneck in the pursuit of high-quality electronics has become post-production inspections Previous consumer products with undetected anomalies were acceptable within a certain ratio However, in the automotive industry today, undetected defects could lead to fatalities hence, the automotive industry has extremely high quality demands To survive in the automotive supply chain, we must address the issue of undetectable anomalies Moreover, as wages in Taiwan continue to rise, we can only endeavor toAIreplace traditional manpower with technology, otherwise, even if the anomaly leakage problem is resolved, the relatively high labor costs will still prevent competitiveness in this industry Application technology and explanation Initially,Figure 1,PCBUpon emerging,Reflowsystem, it will undergoAOIwill undergo inspection, dividing into 'suspected defective' and good products At this point, the 'suspected defective' portion accounts for20manual review for these20parts, further classifying the 'suspected defective' portion into good and defective products With We aim to leverageAItechnology, to shift from manual re-inspection of these20technology, we aim to replace manual review of 'suspected defective' products withAIand after review, the results still yield 'good' and 'suspected defective' products, but now 'suspected defective' comprises only3thus reducing the workload of Tzuhong's employees from20down to only3In theory, it isAOIIn theory, after inspection, it is further reviewed byAIbut it appears to go throughAOIonly, so we call this technologyA0IAIDetectionFigure 2。 The original AOI inspection process The operator will place the testPCBboard intoAOIthe inspection equipment, outputtingAOI information on defective products, then manually re-inspect one by one to determine if they are defective AOIAI inspection process The operator will place the testPCBboard intoAOIthe inspection equipment, outputtingAOIinformation on defective products after, then proceed byAIfirst performingAOIre-assessment of defective products, outputtingAIinformation on defective products afterward, then manually re-inspect one by one to determine if they are defective Process differences By introducing theAOIAIsystem, not only can we enhance the efficiency and yield of visual inspection personnel, we also have this timeAIexperience in system introduction, we will also incorporateAIthe use of big data into Tzuhong's existing smart manufacturing systems, further enhancing the performance of our smart manufacturing systems and reducing the pressure on employees Difference between pre and post-introduction Promotion strategy 1 Similar field diffusion allSMTmanufacturers face bottlenecks in inspections leading to shipment delays introducing this system can solve the severe labor shortage issue and enhance shipment speed and quality, allowing self-promotion to customers or through equipment dealers to cater to relevant needs 2 Cross-industry expansion plans negotiate withAOImanufacturers to directly integrateAIthe system intoAOItheir systems, enhancing their market competitiveness Profit strategy 1 In collaboration withAOImanufacturers, collect licensing fees 2 Direct sales toSMTthe manufacturing industryAIsystems 3 ProvideSMTmanufacturing industryAOIAIsystem subscription model「Translated content is generated by ChatGPT and is for reference only Translation date:2024-12-09」

【解決方案】佐翼科技無人機導入高爾夫球場域 可節省一半人力
Droxo Tech Applies Drones in Golf Courses to Reduce Manpower by Half

For most golf courses, the operations and management is a headache "Golf courses are selling turf and need to be properly taken care of," a golf course manager bluntly pointed out Facing the market pain points of labor shortage, aging population and high cost, the use of AI drones for pesticide spraying and pest control will reduce labor costs by more than half and greatly improve the overall operational efficiency At noon in early summer, an AI drone is slowly taking off at the Taipei Golf Club in Taoyuan Its main task is to test AI drone fertilizing and pesticide spraying on the golf course In fact, drones of Droxo Tech, the company performing this task, are widely used for fertilization, pesticide spraying, and pest and disease control for rice, bananas, and tea trees For golf courses with turfs that often cover tens to hundreds of hectares, AI drones are needed to assist in turf maintenance Data collection, development of pesticide spraying AI models, and multispectral image analysis and testing will be carried out in the current stage In the future, large-scale technology implementation and verification will be carried out to set an example for applying drones to golf courses Using AI drones to fertilize and spray pesticides can reduce the manpower required by half The traditional way of maintaining the turf in golf courses is to carry spray buckets or drive spraying vehicles to spray areas one by one "Domestic golf courses began to plant ultra-dwarf Bermuda grass in 2001 This grass species prefers a cool climate and is not suitable for Taiwan's hot and humid weather" Droxo Techrsquos CEO further pointed out that to prevent turf from pests and diseases, pesticide spraying is necessary For an 18-hole golf course, it is equivalent to spraying pesticides once a week, and the T-ground and fairways are sprayed every two months For golf courses, spraying pesticides is time-consuming and labor-intensive It is important to note that large-scale spraying will increase the risk of personnel poisoning and increase the amount of pesticide used Benefits of applying agricultural drones to golf courses According to Droxo Techrsquos research, golf course pests include Spodoptera litura, which comes out at night to look for food, so pesticide spraying must be carried out in the evening According to the traditional method, pesticide spraying requires two vehicles and three personnel for a total of 45 hours If AI drones are used for fertilizing and pesticide spraying, it only takes one operator to spray 08 hectares of land in 20 minutes, saving about two-thirds of the manpower and reducing operating costs by about 30 Using AI drones to fertilize and spray pesticides on golf courses can reduce the manpower required by half In addition to the significant benefits of using agricultural drones for golf course turf maintenance, Droxo Tech also specially introduced AI multispectral image recognition for NDVI Normalized Difference Vegetation Index analysis "The so-called multispectral is to direct light with different wavelengths on the turf, and the reflected images are collected for analysis" Droxo Tech CEO Liu continued to explain that each plant absorbs light with different wavelengths, so multispectral imaging can determine the growth status of grass species At the same time, combined with AI image recognition, the distribution of pests and diseases can be accurately detected, and the amount of pesticide used is determined on this basis Cross-domain collaboration to build a multi-source turf image databasenbsp Using AI multispectral image recognition technology, Droxo Tech will collect visible light, multispectral, thermal images, and hyperspectral images to establish a multi-source turf image database to fully understand the growth cycle of Bermuda grass Droxo Tech has accumulated rich experience in agricultural AI drone pesticide spraying , but there are still many problems that need to be overcome to implement AI solutions in golf courses For example, it is necessary to establish a new pesticide spraying model and test flight methods, especially the application of multispectral image recognition PoC is not difficult, but actual implementation requires more test evidence, repeated inferences, and collaboration with plant experts This part must rely on the cross-domain integration of legal entities such as the Institute for Information Technology III, gathering more fields for verification, and creating a paradigm before it can be more widely adopted by golf courses There are not many international cases on the application of AI drones in golf courses During the verification process, it is not yet known whether it can be quickly copied to the next golf course However, Droxo Tech CEO Liu believes that through cross-domain collaboration, clearly defining the problems and listing them one by one, supply and demand parties can reach a consensus, propose solutions to each problem, and seek cooperation with internal and external resources Only then will we be able to gradually achieve the goal of making golf courses smarter and smoothly assist the industry with transformation Zuoyi Technology's CEO, Liu Junlin 「Translated content is generated by ChatGPT and is for reference only Translation date:2024-05-19」

【導入案例】赫銳特科技VCSEL封裝元件瑕疵導入AOI檢測 提升產能效率20
HRT Technology Improves Production Efficiency by 20% Through AOI Detection of Defects in VCSEL Packaging

In 2017, the launch of the iPhone X made 3D sensor technology used in Face ID highly popular, which drove the development of VCSEL, a core component in the 3D sensor module In the detection of defects in incoming packaged VCSEL, the use of AI inference models can solve the industry's issue with low yield and improve reliability to 95 VCSEL technology currently can be used in many applications and various end consumer markets, including robots, mobile devices, surveillance, drones, and ARVR VCSELs are a good solution in applications that require high-speed modulation capabilities, such as cameras and biometrics VCSEL technology has a wide range ofnbsp applications, including in drones Pictured Zoyi Technology's Agricultural Drone VCSEL technology has a wide range of applications, AI technology assists in defect detection HRT Technology stated that the packaged VCSEL market is also facing strong price competition from competitors, and needs to further reduce costs and enhance product competitiveness One of the key problems is the replacement of glass lens with epoxy resin lens The production of traditional glass lenses has high yield, but the cost is higher than that of epoxy resin lenses Due to the cutting process of epoxy resin, the side wall of cutting lines can easily have rough edges, causing it to be oversized The release of stress caused by heat during the mounting process will directly cause the optical lens to break HRT Technology pointed out that the incoming inspection of VCSEL epoxy resin lenses is very important Under the constraints of packaging space, the space for fitting the package and optical lens is limited Moreover, the optical lenses will be confined to a metal frame If the dimensional tolerances are properly controlled, stress release due to heat during mounting can easily cause the optical lens to break, resulting in a yield loss of up to 10 in the VCSEL package reliability verification, resulting in an increase in production costs In order to solve the problems above, HRT Technology hopes to use AI to monitor the size and appearance defects of epoxy resin components in the VCSEL epoxy resin lens incoming stage, verifying whether their dimensions meet specifications, whether the cutting edges are smooth, and whether there are any defects in their appearance Since traditional incoming material inspection requires a rough visual inspection by humans to distinguish the quality The problem of image collection needs to be solved first to successfully collect image data Therefore, HRT Technology first developed an Automated Optical Inspection AOI device, which includes X, Y, Z three-axis motion, high-resolution cameras, and related control software to automatically record images After collecting the image data, opencv aligns the test image and a normal image to determine differences between the two images, and then pixel mapping is used to compare the pixel area to complete initial screening Manual labeling is carried out according to the image classification above, including samples that are normal, have defects in appearance, or have different shape characteristics, and then algorithm training and verification is carried out Residual neural network ResNet or other related algorithms are used for deep learning to identify the quality of lenses Implementation of AOI inspection improves production efficiency by 20 and above Comparing the differences before and after the implementation of AI image inspection, the incoming VCSEL lens inspection before implementation only involved manual inspection of the appearance The lens is packaged on the VCSEL package that has completed die bonding After passing the general light up test, the final reliability test high temperature reflow is performed Failed samples go into the rework process However, after the implementation of AOI inspection, it can screen defective lenses sooner and reduce the cost of subsequent materials input, it can also reduce the need for rework due to failure, improving yield to 95 and above in the reliability verification This is expected to help companies reduce production costs by 10 and increase production efficiency by 20 and above The difference before and after implementing AI image detection HRT Technology pointed out that this technology is an AI application developed based on tiny images It uses deep learning algorithms to identify defects in the images The trained network automatically classifies image data to predetermined categories Defect categories can be determined through reference images, so cumbersome programming is not required In the industrial machine vision environment, deep learning is mainly used for classification tasks in applications, such as inspection of industrial products or identification of parts In the future, with the development of IoT wearable devices and the trend of energy saving, the size of optoelectronic components will continue to shrink This technology can be applied to the detection of defects in the appearance of other tiny optoelectronic components in the future