ADVANCED MATERIALS & PROCESSES | NOVEMBER 2026 41 In 2018, the board of the Electronic Device Failure Analysis Society (EDFAS), an ASM affiliate society, directed the establishment of a Failure Analysis (FA) Technology Roadmap. The mandate included two goals: 1) to leverage the technical expertise captured throughout the industry to identify both current and future FA challenges as part of an annual industrywide gap analysis and 2) to engage with both equipment providers and academic labs in an effort to review and pursue potential solutions to these technical challenges. The result is the International Roadmap for Failure Analysis (IRFA) initiative, previously known as the Electronic Device Failure Analysis Technology Roadmap. The document addresses those two goals; focusing on improving failure analysis in electronic devices within the semiconductor industry. By collaborating with industry partners, equipment makers, research institutions, and universities, IRFA actively recognizes emerging technology challenges and gaps in current and future electronic devices and helps develop innovative solutions to meet those needs. As process technologies shrink to sub-3nm nodes, device architectures diversify, and packaging complexity explodes, electronic device failure analysis (EDFA) has become essential—to resolve technical issues and also to guide design improvements, boost yields, and enhance overall device reliability and performance. VISION AND MISSION The IRFA leadership team has INTERNATIONAL ROADMAP FOR FAILURE ANALYSIS With the goal of identifying key challenges and solutions across the electronic device failure analysis landscape, EDFAS has created a resource now used to guide research and development dollars. established a clear vision and mission. The vision: To be the leading international authority in electronic device failure analysis for proactively identifying the evolving technology challenges and gaps and influencing potential solutions to advance semiconductor industry. IRFA’s mission: 1. Identify key gaps, challenges, and technological needs for the FA of both current and next-generation electronic devices. 2. Influence industry, scientific equipment manufacturers, research institutes, and universities to co-develop innovative solutions and strategies for the identified gaps. 3. Elevate global FA awareness by participating in conferences, workshops, and collaborative forums, share knowledge, and foster dialogue within the broader semiconductor community. 4. Advocate strategic investments in FA research and development and actively influence global policy and funding initiatives to strengthen semiconductor developments. 5. Deliver actionable roadmaps that guide FA stakeholders in building robust capabilities and addressing future challenges. DELIVERABLES The IRFA initiative has identified four key outputs: • FA Roadmap Gaps Technical Report (Published in 2022; major revision planned for 2027) • IRFA Solutions to Gaps Report (Published in 2025) • Strategic engagements with wider international roadmap bodies. • IRFA sessions at conferences and workshops including the International Symposium for Testing and Failure Analysis (ISTFA), International Symposium on the Physical and Failure Analysis of Integrated Circuits (IPFA), CAM Workshop, NIST, and other relevant design/process/ packaging conferences. COUNCIL STRUCTURE The current roadmap framework is established around three councils: a Die-Level Roadmap Council (DLRC), a Package Innovation Roadmap Council (PIRC), and an FA Outreach Council (FAOC), as outlined in Fig. 1. To incorporate a common FA workflow, the DLRC includes two separate domain teams: Isolation and Post-Isolation. The councils execute the roadmap, making strong leadership essential for advancing the IRFA mission. These councils have been fully staffed with expert volunteers from logic, memory, integrated device manufacturers, foundries, and research organizations who have invested significant time and energy into accurately detailing the relevant technical challenges their respective teams are facing.
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