Expert Systems with Applications 36 (2009) 3712–3719

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Expert Systems with Applications

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A fuzzy logic approach to the selection of the best silicon crystal slicing technology
Doraid Dalalah *, Omar Bataineh
Industrial Engineering Department, Jordan University of Science and Technology, P.O. Box 620476, Al-hai Al-Janoubi, Irbid 21162, Jordan

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Keywords: Silicon wafer slicing is considered an intricate manufacturing process due to the high level of precision
Fuzzy Logic and stability required. The different machining and control factors involved in such technology may cause
Decision making
slicing precision to drift or result in defects in the produced wafers. The modern times impact of more
Multi-criteria
accurate and efficient manufacturing has made it essential to understand and optimize this abrasive
Slicing
Silicon wafers slurry cutting process. As a consequence to this understanding, we present a multi-criteria decision mak-
ing model that assists in selecting the best slicing technology of silicon ingots in integrated circuit chips
industry. Fuzzy reasoning is used to model the experts’ comprehension and uncertainty in the factors
used in the decision criteria. The factors were rated according to each alternative slicing technology using
qualitative statements. The criteria factors were divided into two categories, namely, static and dynamic.
Different fuzzy rules were summarized from the two categories and then used as an input to the model to
calculate the competencies for the different alternatives. The alternative with the highest competency
score represents the best choice. In this study, three alternative technologies were considered in the deci-
sion analysis, particularly, A-WD-300, DFD600, DFD6000 series. Although they cost more than the others,
it was found that the 6000 series technology scores are the highest. The results of the analysis indicate
that human-related mistakes and lack of expertise can be one of the main causes that negatively affect
silicon wafer production. The proposed fuzzy model significantly contributes to the improvement of
manufacturing quality in silicon wafers. Specifically, the model can assist semiconductor manufacturers
in solving similar multi-criteria problems by offering a quick objective assessment and systematic model
for selection of the optimal performing alternative.
 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Literature review
The process of dicing silicon wafers off the large silicon ingots
has received a noticeable interest in the past few years due to its
complexity and the numerous quality defects associated with such
process. Quality characteristics and control parameters of the sili-
con wafer slicing process were investigated by Lin, Chang, and
Chen (2004) Pai, Lee, and Su (2004), who also provided a concise
description of the process. Cunningham, Spanos, and Voros
(1995) applied and investigated traditional statistical techniques
such as design of experiments (DOE) to improve the silicon wafer
slicing process in terms of process yield. However, Braha and
Shmilovici (2002) showed that these techniques were not effective
in improving process yield significantly.
Recently, Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) techniques have
been employed to study the silicon wafer cutting process (Chang,
Wu, Lin, & Chen, 2007). AHP is a multiple-objective decision mak-
ing method which was developed by Saaty (1980). Because it can
* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: doraid@just.edu.jo (D. Dalalah), omarmdb@just.edu.jo (O.
Bataineh).
deal with qualitative expert-opinion data, many researchers have
adopted and used this method for various engineering applications
for the last two decades. Vaidya and Kumar (2006) presented a lit-
erature review of the applications of AHP based on a selected 150
most referred-to papers in the literature. Their work showed a
wide spectrum of applications of AHP in the literature such as re-
source allocation (Badri, 1999), maintenance (Bertolini & Bevilac-
qua, 2006), performance evaluation (Forgionne & Kohli, 2001),
forecasting (Korpela & Tuominen, 1997), decision making (Beynon,
2002; Khalil, 2002), and in medical and other special fields (Isßıklara
& Büyüközkanb, 2007; Ravisankar, Balasubramanian, & Muralidha-
ran, 2006; Rossetti & Selandari, 2001; Singpurwalla, Forman, & Zal-
kind, 1999). Manufacturing processes including the silicon wafer
cutting process are a popular application of AHP. Yurdakul (2004)
used AHP and the Analytic Network Process (ANP) for machine tool
selection by calculating the contributions of machine tool alterna-
tives to the manufacturing strategy of a manufacturing organiza-
tion. Fuzzy reasoning was used in multi-criteria decision making
problems as well. Fuzzy sets and fuzzy logic are powerful mathe-
matical tools for modeling and controlling uncertain systems.
Many decision problems have been addressed using fuzzy multi-
criteria approaches such as the selection of material (Liao, 1996),

0957-4174/$ - see front matter  2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.eswa.2008.02.020
 D. Dalalah, O. Bataineh / Expert Systems with Applications 36 (2009) 3712–3719
equipments (Hanna & Lotfallah, 1999), robotic systems (Cengiz,
Sezi, Nüfer, & Atesand, 2007), medical practice (Lunci, 2000), mo-
bile phones (Isßıklara & Büyüközkanb, 2007), and many other fields.
In this paper we present a fuzzy reasoning scheme for the selection
of the best slicing machine to make silicon wafers. In this approach,
different alternatives are evaluated against some criteria using
qualitative and linguistic comprehension. The scheme will result
in normalized scores of each alternative which can help the deci-
sion maker in identifying the preferences.
2. Introduction
The processing of silicon wafers involves a good deal of chemis-
try, physics, vacuum systems, clean environment and complex
manufacturing processes. In order to alter the surface conditions
and properties of silicon wafers, it is necessary to use both inert
and toxic chemicals in highly precise, explicit and unusual condi-
tions. Starting from big silicon ingot, special slicing machines are
used to cut off wafers from these gigantic silicon crystals in the
form of thin round disks of 150–300 mm in diameter. In order to
build a succession of layers of materials and geometries to produce
thousands of electronic devices at tiny sizes, which together func-
tion as integrated circuits (ICs), the wafers have to be sliced in
exceptional environment and accuracy so as to provide clean
atom-level crystal defect-free base. The devices which now occupy
the surface of a square inch IC would have occupied the better part
of a medium-sized room 20 years ago, when all these devices
(transistors, resistors, capacitors, and so on) were only available
as discrete units. The conditions under which the microelectronic
manufacturing process can work to successfully transform the sil-
icon into ICs require a crystal clear structure and an absolute ab-
sence of contaminants.
The silicon chip making involves several high-precision produc-
tion processes, namely, Czochralski crystal growth, slicing, edge
grinding, lapping, etching, packaging, inspection, cleaning and pol-
ishing. The first step in the wafer manufacturing process is the for-
mation of a large, perfect silicon crystal. The crystal is grown from
a perfect defect-free seed crystal. The silicon is supplied in granular
powder form, and then melted in a crucible. The seed is immersed
carefully into the crucible of molten silicon, and then slowly with-
drawn. While slowly pulling the seed out of the liquid bath, perfect
crystals will build up on the seed. Named after Jan Czochralski, this
process is capable of producing silicon crystals as big as 2 m in
length and 12 in. in diameter. After the growth of the single crystal
is complete, every inch of the ingot is evaluated for deviations in
size, shape, resistivity and level of impurities. Both ends of the in-
got are then removed along with any imperfections that may be
found during the evaluation.
In order to convert the shape of the ingot from its rough, non-
uniform diameter into a perfect cylinder, a grinding operation is
performed. Using an industrial grade diamond edge saw, excess
material is removed from the outer edge of the ingot to form the
necessary cylindrical shape. Once completed, the grinding opera-
tion is followed by an etching step which removes the work dam-
age associated with the grinding saw. Up to a full centimeter of
material may be removed after both the grinding and the etching
steps are completed. Next, in order to identify the orientation of
the crystal structure, at least one side of the cylinder is flattened
by running a grinding saw along the length of the ingot.
Before the ingot can be sliced into individual wafers, it must
first be mounted on a sawing machine in the correct orientation
found by the flats. This step is critical for the sawing process since
slicing along an incorrect axis could damage the final wafer. Once
mounted, the ingot is typically sliced into individual wafers with a
disc or wire saw and sometimes with an inner diameter (ID) saw.
3713
Table 1
Multi-criteria factors
Machine-related
F1 Cost of machine
F2 Knife life cycle
F3 Machine precision
F4 Parameters setting
Human-related
F5 Establish adjusting standard procedures
F6 Engineer’s experience
F7 Adjusting time
Management
F8 Color management
F9 Online education
F10 Multi-response
Measurement
F11 Test methods
F12 Measure characteristic
Nevertheless, the saw must be continually monitored throughout
the slicing process to assure that the quality of each wafer is main-
tained. Consequently, produced wafers should have clear surfaces
with no atomic defects which emphasize the level of precision in
such cutting operation. Wafers are frequently labeled once they
have been separated so that they can be identified and, if needed,
traced back to the manufacturer.
The 12 in. wafer slicing is currently the most challenging pro-
cess in semiconductor manufacturing in terms of controlling the
yield. Highly precise cuts are the key point for the success of such
operation. Since Silicon wafer slicing directly impacts the produc-
tion cost, monitoring and controlling as well as understanding
the factors that contribute in improving the production of wafers
are key concerns among the semiconductors manufacturers. Such
factors may include: type of machines, precision of the machines,
experience, quality, rework, defective rate, testing, and many other
factors. Due to the investment put into buying new dicing saw ma-
chines, the choice of which machine technology to use becomes a
critical decision. Silicon cutting machines are not of wide varieties
owing to their cost and limited manufacturers. Essentially, the pre-
cision and critical qualities of such manufacturing processes
emphasize the impact of which cutting technology to use.
In this paper, we present a schematic approach to help draw a
decision on which slicing machine technology to implement using
fuzzy logic reasoning. The set of available technologies are studied
against standard factors that have been collected through surveys
from 13 wafer manufacturers (Chang et al., 2007). The criteria/sub-
criteria were delivered through preliminary questionnaire in
which four evaluation criteria and twelve sub-criteria were incor-
porated as shown in Table 1.
The above listed criteria are evaluated using qualitative terms
against three alternative commercial cutting technologies, namely,
A-WD-300, DFD600 series, DFD6000 series. In this paper, we dem-
onstrate an innovative fuzzy reasoning to draw a conclusion on the
best technology to use with the aid of the linguistic evolutions of
the criteria.
3. Fuzzy set concept
Since its introduction in 1965, fuzzy set theory has founded
applications in a wide variety of disciplines. Modeling and control
of dynamic systems belong to the fields in which fuzzy set tech-
niques have received considerable attention, not only from the sci-
entific community but also from industry. One of the reasons for
this is the capability of fuzzy systems to integrate information from
different sources, such as physical laws, empirical models, or mea-
surements and heuristics. Fuzzy sets can be seen as logical models
3714 D. Dalalah, O. Bataineh / Expert Systems with Applications 36 (2009) 3712–3719
which use logical rules to establish qualitative relationships among
the used variables. Fuzzy sets serve as a smooth interface between
the qualitative variables involved in the rules and the numerical
data at the inputs and outputs of the model. The rule-based nature
of fuzzy models allows the use of information expressed in the
form of natural language statements and consequently makes the
models transparent to interpretation and analysis. At the computa-
tional level, fuzzy models can be regarded as flexible mathematical
structures that can approximate a large class of complex non-lin-
ear systems to a desired degree of accuracy. They build on a set
of user-supplied human language rules. The fuzzy systems convert
these rules to their mathematical equivalents. This simplifies the
job of the system designer and results in much more accurate rep-
resentations of the way systems behave in the real world.
Fuzzy logic models, called fuzzy inference systems, consist of a
number of conditional ‘‘IF-THEN” rules. For the designer who
understands the system, these rules are easy to write where as
many rules as necessary can be supplied to describe the system
adequately. In fuzzy logic, unlike standard conditional logic, the
truth of any statement is a matter of degree. For example, consider
the rule IF (machine is old) THEN (precision is poor), both vari-
ables, ‘‘old” and ‘‘poor”, map to ranges of values. Fuzzy inference
systems rely on membership functions to explain how to calculate
the correct values between 0 and 1.
4. Fuzzy set operations
The universe of discourse of a fuzzy set is defined by the range
of all possible values of an input to a fuzzy system. A fuzzy set is
any set that allows its members to have different grades of mem-
bership in the interval [0, 1]. We call the sets in the classical biva-
lent sense crisp sets in contrast to fuzzy sets.
A crisp set can be considered as a container and the elements
that belong to this set as the objects contained in it. For example,
we can define a membership function lA of an element x for a crisp
set A as follows:
lA : X ! f0; 1g
Thus, a membership function of a crisp set A is defined as

1 if x 2 A
lA ðxÞ ¼
0 otherwise
In case of fuzzy sets, since the set A is just a function, we can de-
scribe this function by a set of order pairs {x, lA(x)}, thus, if we were
to sample the universe of discourse by the vector X ={x1, . . . , xn}, then
the set A can be represented by its fuzzy values:
A ¼ ½lA ðx1 Þ; . . . ; lA ðxn Þ
Likewise, a fuzzy relation between two different worlds, say, X and
Y, can be defined by the matrix R which consists of the elements
lR(xi, yi). For instance let X = {x1 < x2 <    < xn} and Y = {y1 <
y2 <    < yn} then for a certain operation between X and Y, R may
be described by the matrix:
2 3
lR ðx1 ; y1 Þ lR ðx1 ; y2 Þ    lR ðx1 ; ym Þ
6 l ðx2 ; y Þ l ðx2 ; y Þ    l ðx2 ; y Þ 7
6 R 1 R 2 R m 7
Rðx; yÞ ¼ 6 6 .. .. .. ..
7
7
4 . . . . 5
lR ðxn ; y1 Þ lR ðxn ; y2 Þ  lR ðxn ; ym Þ
Similarly, we can define the membership functions for the fuzzy set
operations like union, intersection and complement as follows,
respectively:
lA[B ðxÞ ¼ maxðlA ðxÞ; lB ðxÞÞ
lA\B ðxÞ ¼ minðlA ðxÞ; lB ðxÞÞ
lA ðxÞ ¼ 1  lA ðxÞ
The product operation between fuzzy sets can be defined as a direct
product of sets. Specifically, the Cartesian product of two sets A and
B, denoted as A  B, is the set of the minimum entries of the possible
ordered pairs whose first component is a member of A and whose
second component is a member of B:
lAB ðx; yÞ ¼ minflA ðxÞ; lB ðyÞg ð1Þ
The Cartesian product will play an important role in interpreting
the fuzzy IF-THEN rules. In our approach, we will also consider
the Max–Min composition of fuzzy sets. Assume that X-to-Y is de-
scribed by the relation R1 and Y-to-Z by the relation R2, then the
max–min composition of the two fuzzy relations describes X-to-Z
by the following operation:
lR1R2 ðx; zÞ ¼ maxfminflR1 ðx; yÞ; lR2 ðy; zÞgg ð2Þ
y2Y
Thus, using the matrix representation of R1 and R2, we can view the
max–min composition as a matrix multiplication with the number
addition and multiplication are replaced by max and min
operations.
5. Linguistic variables
Contrary to computers reasoning, humans can base their deci-
sions on imprecise, non-numerical information. Computers usually
need precise mathematical equations to make decisions. Fuzzy lo-
gic is the emulation of human reasoning on computers. Since it was
introduced it has become popular in various applications, ranging
from space shuttle control to industrial process control.
The key concepts in fuzzy logic are the linguistic variables and
membership functions. A linguistic variable is a variable whose va-
lue is not a number but a word. (i.e., The linguistic variable ‘‘tem-
perature” might have the values ‘‘hot,” ‘‘cold,” ‘‘freezing,” and so
on). A membership function describes these linguistic values in
terms of numerals. The linguistic variables and their membership
functions are what allow fuzzy logic to perform the imprecise,
non-numerical reasoning.
In this paper, linguistic variables are used to interpret the hu-
man comprehension. We discretize the universe of discourse over
a normalized range from 0 to 1, where at each discrete value the
linguistic variables are rated. Thus, the linguistic value ‘‘good” is
then defined by the fuzzy set of ‘‘good” that lives in the universe
of discourse, say X. In essence, the fuzzy set ‘‘good” can be defined
as
\good" ¼ ½0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0:1 0:2 0:3 0:4 0:5 0:6 0:7 0:8 0:9 1
where each element of the above membership function corresponds
to a discrete value of the universe of discourse X, where
X ¼ ½0; 0:05; . . . ; 0:95; 1
Conversely, the contradictory of ‘‘good” is ‘‘poor” which can be rep-
resented as
\poor" ¼ ½1 0:9 0:8 0:7 0:6 0:5 0:4 0:3 0:2 0:1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
In the meantime, a moderate variable can be given as
\moderate" ¼ ½0 0:1 0:2 0:3 0:4 0:5 0:6 0:7 0:8 0:9 1
0:9 0:8 0:7 0:6 0:5 0:4 0:3 0:2 0:1 0
Note that the combination of such typical fuzzy sets highlights the
properties of Normality, Unimodality, Complimentarity and Parti-
tion of Unity. We may notice that the potential different linguistic
variables are almost infinite. For instance, the linguistic variable
‘‘not fair” means ‘‘poor” while ‘‘not good” may turn out to be ‘‘fair”.
Similarly, ‘‘short”, ‘‘bad,” and ‘‘difficult” all may be streamed to the
same values. It is left to the reader how linguistic compositions can
 D. Dalalah, O. Bataineh / Expert Systems with Applications 36 (2009) 3712–3719 3715

be interpreted to typical forms. In addition, we may emphasize a set [

k

by taking the squared values of its elements if it was appended by R¼ Ri ð3Þ

i¼1
the word ‘‘very”. For example, ‘‘very good” may be represented as
[0, . . ., 0 0.01 0.04, . . ., 0.81 1]. Likewise, ‘‘very poor” may take similar Therefore, if X takes the linguistic set A, assuming some consistency
values from the left side. we can infer that Y takes the linguistic set B defined by the following
max–min operation:
6. Fuzzy reasoning B¼AR ð4Þ

To perform fuzzy logic reasoning, a set of IF-THEN rules that

emulate human reasoning needs to be specified. An ‘‘IF-THEN” rule
is a simple statement that expresses cause and effect. When an in-
put is given, each ‘‘IF” statement is evaluated to a degree of truth.
This then determines the extent of which the ‘‘THEN” statement
will be enacted. If we were to formulate such rules they can be
put across as follows:
If X is A; then Y is B
Here, X and Y are linguistic variables and A and B are the corre-
sponding linguistic values. For instance consider the rule:
If the \knife life cycle" is\short" THEN the \cost" is \high"
Here, the ‘‘knife life cycle” is a linguistic variable and ‘‘short” is a
fuzzy subset of the universe of discourse ratings. Likewise, the
‘‘cost” is the name of universe of discourse and ‘‘high” is a linguistic
variable used to rate such universe. Mamdani and Assilian (1975)
proposed that such fuzzy ‘‘IF-THEN” rules can be mathematically
represented by the Cartesian product R of the fuzzy sets A and B,
i.e. R ¼ A  B, therefore, the set of rules can be formulated as
If X is Ai ; then Y is Bi
Thus, the above rule is basically Ai  Bi. Assume that the fuzzy val-
ues of Ai "i = 1, . . . , k are complementary, where k is the total num-
P
ber of available sets, then ki¼1 lAi ðxÞ ¼ 1, hence, we can aggregate
all these rules into one rule R defined by their union
7. Methodology of fuzzy selection of silicon slicing technology
The goal of this paper is to use fuzzy concept and reasoning to
pick the best possible silicon wafer slicing technology. There are
several factors that affect the proper selection of the slicing ma-
chines. Some of the factors may be static meaning that they do
not depend on a particular manufacturing environment. For in-
stance, the cost factor of a slicing machine is a static characteristic
because it has been already setup by the machine manufacturer.
Consequently, the cost of a machine is considered as static factor.
Contrary to cost, the knife life cycle of a machine can be considered
as a dynamic factor in view of the fact that there are plenty of knife
types with different quality and excepted life cycles to choose
from. The factors consist of four major criteria and 12 sub-criteria
as listed below:
1. Machine-related factors: Each machining technology will exhi-
bit certain characteristic which can be rated accordingly. The
sub-criteria of this category are:
a. Cost of the machine: High cost may diminish the competency
of a specific machine.
b. Knife life cycle: The knife life cycle has serious influence on
its processing capability. As the knife is still used under the
state of scrap item, it tends to increase chip defective rate.
c. Machine precision: The accuracy of machine influences the
chip quality and the yield after processing.

Table 2
Linguistic ratings of static and dynamic factors

Factors Factor status A-WD-300 DFD600 DFD6000

Cost of machine Static Not expensive Moderate Expensive
Knife life cycle Long Good Good Very good
Moderate Poor Good Good
Short Poor Fair Good
Machine precision High Fair Good Good
Fair Fair Fair Good
Low Poor Poor Poor
Parameters setting Simple Good Fair Good
Moderate Good Good Moderate
Complicated Fair Good Fair
Establish adjusting standard procedures Easy Good Fair Poor
Fair Fair Fair Fair
Difficult Poor Fair Fair
Engineer’s experience Reasonable Fair Poor Good
Moderate Fair Fair Good
Highly qualified Poor Good Good
Adjusting time Short Fair Fair Poor
Moderate Good Good Fair
Long Fair Fair Good
Color management Static Fair Fair Fair
Online education Static Fair Good Good
Multi-response Static Fair Very good Fair
Test methods Static Poor Fair Good
Measure and formulate quality characteristics Straight forward Fair Fair Poor
Moderate Good Good Fair
Advanced Good Good Very good
3716 D. Dalalah, O. Bataineh / Expert Systems with Applications 36 (2009) 3712–3719
d. Parameters setting: A bad setting of the machine parameters
would influence the process capability.
2. Human-related: Human factors may affect and interfere with
the production process resulting in more or less slice defective
rate.
a. Establish adjusting standard procedures: Establishing a suite
of management procedures and standard processes would
make the staff deal with problems, troubleshoot and diag-
nose systematically.
b. Engineer’s experience: An engineer has to accept the whole
in-service training before working and has to possess the
related technical knowledge so as to operate the machine
with perfect and sensible setup and settings.
c. Adjusting time: Proofreading regularly could guarantee the
process capability.
3. Management: Identifying the goals can ensure the process yield
of the wafer slice.
a. Color management: The color of the wafer is dependent on
the thickness of the oxide and surface microstructure. Man-
agement of silicon color charts can help the staff to conduct
control on the raw material as well as poor yield.
b. Online education: On-line training could enhance profes-
sional knowledge and engineering expertise as well as reduc-
ing the errors of the artificial importation and increase
productivity.
c. Multi-response: Adequate control should be available for the
multiple quality characteristics, which could effectively
determine the optimum factor-level combinations and raise
the proficiency of the wafer slicing process.
4. Measurement: Balancing the technology used in wafer slicing
using relevant measurement procedures will decrease the
defective rate and increase productivity.
a. Test methods: A verification method to achieve the most reli-
able measurement would effectively promote the ability and
proficiency of the process.
b. Measure characteristic: Formulating the quality measure-
ment characteristics and control charts could reduce engi-
neering errors and the error characteristics can be easily
identified.
Table 2 provides a list of all the factors and shows where each tech-
nology stands in regard to every factor.
8. Alternatives competency with respect to static factors
The competency of each slicing technology with respect to sta-
tic factors is simply translated into linguistic value in the compe-
tency space Y. Fundamentally, if F is a static factor and T is the
slicing technology, then from Table 2 we can read a statement of
the form:
With respect to the factorF : IF the Technology is type T THEN the
Competency is C
where the competency takes a linguistic rate of the typical values
‘‘good”, ‘‘fair, ‘‘poor,” and so on. We represent the competency of
the above rule as CF,T(y), where for every combination of F and T
there would be a single linguistic result. For instance, take the cost
factor and the ‘‘600 series” technology; we could draw the following
statement:
With respect to ‘cost’ : If the Technology is‘600 series’ then the
Competency is ‘fair’
The above can be represented as C‘‘F1”,‘‘600 series” (y) = [0, 0.1, . . . , 1,
. . . , 0.1, 0]. Table 2 shows the ratings with respect to the three slic-
ing technologies and the static as well as dynamic factors.
9. Alternatives competency with respect to dynamic factors
Dealing with dynamic factors involves working with fuzzy rules
rather than fuzzy sets. Denote the competency rule of some tech-
nology T and a factor F of the status SF by RsF;T we can read different
rule statements from Table 2 as follows:
RsF;T : If the factor F is SF then the technology T is C
where SF is a linguistic variable that belongs to some universe X and
C is the competency indexed by CF,S,T for each rule. For example,
considering the ‘‘knife life cycle” and the ‘‘600 series”, we can read
this rule:
IF the \knife life cycle" is \short" THEN the technology
\600 series" is \fair"
where in such rule the competency can be represented as
C‘‘F2”,‘‘short”,600 series”(y). Table 2 shows the different ratings of the
competency for each dynamic factor. From Section 6, we know that
the set of rules RsF;T can be represented by the Cartesian product
SF(x)  CF,S,T(y), where both S and C are now considered as fuzzy sets
living in different universes, namely, X and Y, thus we have:
RsF;T ðx; yÞ ¼ SF ðxÞ  C F;S;T ðyÞ ¼ minfSF ðxÞ; C F;S;T ðyÞg
Now for each dynamic factor F and slicing technology T, the set of
rules RsF;T can be aggregated into one rule RF;T as illustrated in Sec-
tion 6:
RF;T ðx; yÞ ¼ [S RsF;T ðx; yÞ ¼ [S fSF ðxÞ  C F;S;T ðx; yÞg ð5Þ
For example, we can read the following when considering the factor
‘‘Adjusting Time” and the ‘‘600 series”:
long
RF7;\600 series" ðx; yÞ ¼ Rshort moderate
F 7 ;600 ðx; yÞ [ RF 7 ;600 ðx; yÞ [ RF 7 ;600 ðx; yÞ
¼ \short"  C F7;short;600 series [ \moderate"
 C F7;moderate;600 series [ \long"  C F7;long;600 series
The above can be read off Table 2 as follows:
RF7;\600 series" ðx; yÞ ¼ maxfmin½\short"ðxÞ; \fair"ðyÞ;
min½\moderate"ðxÞ; \good"ðyÞ;
min½\long"ðxÞ; \fair"ðyÞg
Table 3 shows the fuzzy rule RF7;\600 series" ðx; yÞ using a matrix nota-
tion. For instance, if x = 1 and y = 0.3, by definition we will get the
following:
RF7;\600 series" ð1; 0:3Þ ¼ maxfmin½\short"ð1Þ; \fair"ð0:3Þ;
min½\moderate"ð1Þ; \good"ð0:3Þ;
min½\long"ð1Þ; \fair"ð0:3Þg
¼ maxfmin½0; 0:6; min½0; 0; min½1; 0:6g
¼ maxf0; 0; 0:6g ¼ 0:6
This result is shown in the last row entry under the corresponding y
value in Table 3. Now, in a particular project, the property SF (x) of
each dynamic factor F has to be described by an expert using the
familiar linguistic values. The competency CF,T of each slicing tech-
nology with respect to this dynamic factor is then computed by
C F;T ðyÞ ¼ SF ðxÞ  RF;T ðx; yÞ ð6Þ
For example if the adjusting time factor (F7) was initialized by
‘‘long”, using the matrix in Table 3 and Eq. (6) we can calculate
CF7,600 series to get the following result:
 D. Dalalah, O. Bataineh / Expert Systems with Applications 36 (2009) 3712–3719 3717

Table 3
Competency rule for the ‘‘600 series” with respect to ‘‘Adjusting Time” factor

Adjusting time (x) Competency rule of 600 series (y)

0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2 0.25 0.3 0.35 0.4 0.45 0.5 0.55 0.6 0.65 0.7 0.75 0.8 0.85 0.9 0.95 1
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0.05 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1
0.1 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2
0.15 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3
0.2 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4
0.25 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5
0.3 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6
0.35 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7
0.4 0.8 0.8 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.8 0.8
0.45 0.9 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 0.9
0.5 1 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
0.55 0.9 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 0.9
0.6 0.8 0.8 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.8 0.8
0.65 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7
0.7 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6
0.75 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5
0.8 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4
0.85 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.3 0.3 0.3
0.9 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.8 0.8 0.8 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.2 0.2
0.95 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 0.9 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0.1
1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0

C F7;600 series ¼ ½0 0:1 0:2 0:3 0:4 0:5 0:6 0:7 0:8 0:9 1: 0:9 0:8
0:7 0:6 0:5 0:5 0:5 0:5 0:5 0:5

To illustrate, let us calculate CF7,600 series(0.3), using the max–min

composition we get:
C F7;600 series ð0:3Þ ¼ SF7 ðxÞ  RF;T ðx; 0:3Þ ¼ maxf0 ^ 0; 0 ^ 0:1; 0 ^ 0:2;
x

0 ^ 0:3; 0 ^ 0:3; 0 ^ 0:3; 0 ^ 0:3; 0 ^ 0:3; 0 ^ 0:3;

0 ^ 0:3; 0 ^ 0:3; 0:1 ^ 0:3; 0:2 ^ 0:3; 0:3 ^ 0:3;
0:4 ^ 0:4; 0:5 ^ 0:5; 0:6 ^ 0:6; 0:7 ^ 0:7; 0:8 ^ 0:7;
0:9 ^ 0:7; 1:0 ^ 0:7g
¼ f0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0; 0:1; 0:2; 0:3; 0:4;
0:5; 0:6; 0:7; 0:7; 0:7; 0:7g ¼ 0:7;
which corresponds to the 8th
Fig. 1. Center average defuzzifier of the 600 series competency.
raw entry ofC F7;600 series above

Noticeably, if F is a static factor, CF,T(y) can just be read off Table 2.

10. Aggregate competencies
The aggregate competencies CF,T(y) of each slicing technology
need to be computed into one overall competency vector CT(y).
To do so, a weight of each factor has to be assigned to express its
importance in our decision. If no contrast between the factors is
observed, we can just assign similar weights for all. The weights
may vary form one wafer manufacturer to another in view of the
fact that they reflect the management targets and factory status.
Thus, the overall competency of each slicing technology can be de-
fined as
 F [ C F;T g
C T ðyÞ ¼ \F fw
where the total competency is defined on the discrete space
0, 0.1, . . . , 1. Thus, if wF is small, the complement of this term ðw
will be large hence eliminating the effect of the fuzzy set CF,T on
the overall competency CT. Generally, the minimum operation indi-
cates the worst case scenario. Fig. 1 presents the overall compe-
tency of the ‘‘600 series”. Now that the overall competency is
calculated for each technology type, we use the center average
defuzzifier to calculate the competency center C T
P
 y2Y y  C T ðyÞ
CT ¼ P
y2Y C T ðyÞ
The final decision is then to choose the technology with the highest
competency value. In the following section, we present a case study
to demonstrate the proposed decision making approach.
11. Case study
In this case study, the mentioned three slicing technologies are
considered, particularly, A-WD-300, DFD600 series, DFD6000 ser-
ies. The goal is to decide on which technology to use based on
the linguistic comprehension provided in Table 2. The status of
the dynamic factors has to be determined because they may well
change according to the wafer manufacturers’ perspectives. For
this case study the dynamic factors are given as follows:
ð7Þ
SF:
 FÞ
 Knife life cycle: Good
 Machine precision: Fair
 Parameters setting: Fair
 Establish adjusting standard procedures: Good
 Engineer’s experience: Fair
 Adjusting time: Long
 Measure characteristic: Fair.
ð8Þ Following the presented fuzzy analysis and using Eq. (5) the
case study will result in 12 aggregated rules RF;T . Table 3 presented
3718 D. Dalalah, O. Bataineh / Expert Systems with Applications 36 (2009) 3712–3719

Table 6
Final competency scores

Slicing technology type C T

A-WD-300 0.418
600 series 0.627
6000 series 0.678

hard data to subjective interpretations, from certainty about deci-

sion outcomes (static factors) to uncertain outcomes (dynamic fac-
tors) represented by fuzzy membership. This diversity in type and
quality of information in a decision problem will enhance the deci-
sion modeling where ultimately, the model may lead to a better
decision.
Fig. 2. The rule RF7,‘‘600 series”(x, y).
12. Conclusions

a single rule that corresponds to RF7,‘‘600 series”(x, y). Fig. 2 views this
rule as a function of x and y. Similarly, following equation (6) there
would be a total of 12 competency vectors for each technology
type where each vector corresponds to a single factor. Table 4 pre-
sents the competency matrix of the 600 series.
Now by performing the min–max operation of Eq. (7) we get the
total competency vector of each technology type. The resulting
competencies are given in Table 5. Likewise, to calculate the ulti-
mate competency of each technology type we use Eq. (8). Table 6
gives the final score of each type. Remarkably, the scores of the
600 and 6000 series are significantly higher than A-WD-300. The
6000 series score the highest competency among the three alterna-
tives, therefore it should be selected for this case study.
The decision analysis in this paper looks at the paradigm in
which an individual decision maker contemplates a choice of ac-
tion in an uncertain environment out of linguistic experts’ compre-
hension. The proposed decision analysis approach using fuzzy sets
is designed to help the individual make a choice among a set of
pre-specified alternatives. The decision making process relies on
information about the alternatives and their specifications as well
as the decision maker needs. The quality of information in this
decision model can run the whole scale from scientifically derived
A multi-criteria decision making model was presented in this
paper to aid in selecting the best slicing technology of silicon ingots
in integrated chips industry. Three alternative technologies were
considered in the decision analysis. Fuzzy reasoning is used to
model the experts’ comprehension and uncertainty in the factors
used in the decision criteria. The study includes twelve factors that
have been collected through surveys from different wafer manu-
facturers. The factors were rated according to each alternative
technology using linguistic statements. The model splits the factors
into two categories: static and dynamic where different fuzzy rules
can be drawn from each category. The fuzzy rules are then used as
an input to the model to calculate the competencies between the
alternatives. The alternative with the highest competency score
represents the best choice.
Although they cost more than the other two alternatives, it was
found that the 6000 series technology scores are the highest. The
study shows that the competency of DFD600 and A-WD-300 ma-
chines currently is poor as compared to the 6000 series, meaning
that engineers will spend more time examining and monitoring
the first two alternatives. The results of the analysis indicate that
human-related mistakes are one of the main causes that nega-
tively affect the rank of the three diamond cutting technologies.

Table 4
Competency matrix of the 600 series

CF,T(y)
y 0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2 0.25 0.3 0.35 0.4 0.45 0.5 0.55 0.6 0.65 0.7 0.75 0.8 0.85 0.9 0.95 1
F1 1 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
F2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.64 0.81 1
F3 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
F4 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5
F5 1 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0
F6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
F7 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
F8 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0
F9 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
F10 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0
F11 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
F12 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 0.9 0.8 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.49 0.5 0.5 0.5

Table 5
Competencies per technology type

CT (y)
0 0.05 0.1 0.15 0.2 0.25 0.3 0.35 0.4 0.45 0.5 0.55 0.6 0.65 0.7 0.75 0.8 0.85 0.9 0.95 1
A-WD-300 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.1 0
600 series 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.2 0.2
6000 series 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4 0.4
 D. Dalalah, O. Bataineh / Expert Systems with Applications 36 (2009) 3712–3719
Therefore, makers should reduce human-related mistakes through
education and the inheritance and documentation of experience to
promote the manufacturing process yield.
Multi-criteria decision making technique using fuzzy reasoning
can merge quantitative and qualitative factors to handle different
groups of actors and opinions of experts. In general, since adminis-
trators and engineers in semiconductor manufacturing lack objec-
tive decision making procedures and clearly defined evaluation
criteria, selecting a silicon wafer manufacturing quality system is
enormously intricate, and often relies on the subjective assessment
of decision makers. The proposed fuzzy model significantly con-
tributes to the improvement of manufacturing quality in silicon
wafer slicing. Specifically, the model can assist semiconductor
manufacturers in solving similar multi-criteria problems by offer-
ing an objective and systematic method of selecting the optimal
performing machine.
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