Project Partners / Consortium

Robert Bosch GmbH

The Bosch Group is a leading global supplier of technology and services. It employs roughly 428,000 associates worldwide (as of December 31, 2023). According to preliminary figures, the company generated sales of 91.6 billion euros in 2023. Its operations are divided into four business sectors: Mobility, Industrial Technology, Consumer Goods, and Energy and Building Technology. As a leading IoT provider, Bosch offers innovative solutions for smart homes, Industry 4.0, and connected mobility. Bosch is pursuing a vision of mobility that is sustainable, safe, and exciting. It uses its expertise in sensor technology, software, and services, as well as its own IoT cloud, to offer its customers connected, cross-domain solutions from a single source. The Bosch Group’s strategic objective is to facilitate connected living with products and solutions that either contain artificial intelligence (AI) or have been developed or manufactured with its help. Bosch improves quality of life worldwide with products and services that are innovative and spark enthusiasm. In short, Bosch creates technology that is “Invented for life.”

CADFEM Germany GmbH

Since its foundation, CADFEM has been one of the pioneers in the application of numerical simulation in product development. CADFEM Germany GmbH is a subsidiary of CADFEM International GmbH, which has holdings in 21 companies in 14 countries. CADFEM distributes the entire product portfolio of Ansys, the world's largest independent manufacturer of simulation software. However, because software alone does not guarantee simulation success, CADFEM has consistently positioned itself as a system house, engineering service provider and training and information provider in one.

The main contribution in e²Lead is to develop a method for creating reduced order models of high quality to describe the non-linear thermo-mechanical behavior of electronic components on board and in their system. The target is to use those reduced order models instead of full order FEM-Models to speed up the calculation times for the assessment of the solder balls contained in the system.

Nexperia BV

Headquartered in the Netherlands, Nexperia is a global semiconductor company with a rich European history and over 15,000 employees across Europe, Asia, and the United States. As a leading expert in the development and production of essential semiconductors, Nexperia’s components enable the basic functionality of virtually every electronic design in the world – from automotive and industrial to mobile and consumer applications.

Nexperia contributes to the global sustainability goals by developing products that enable our customers to design energy-efficient solutions. We prioritize research & development (R&D) investments to continuously expand our broad portfolio – consisting of diodes, bipolar transistors, ESD protection devices, MOSFETs, GaN FETs, and analog & logic ICs - with innovative, energy efficient and high-quality products. Efficiency is at the heart of everything we do, which has made us the supplier of choice for many world-leading technology companies.

Nexperia serves a global customer base across automotive, industrial and power, computing, consumer, and mobile and wearables industries. To meet our customers’ growing demands, we have established a highly efficient supply chain management process that enabled us to ship more than 100 billion products annually. These products are recognized as benchmarks in efficiency – in process, size, power and performance.

IWO Institute for Science & Development

IWO combines a foundation (St. Institute for Science and Development, St. IWO ) and an SME (IWO Project bv, IPbv). Together they form an NGO to valorise expertise for public beneficial developments. St. IWO is recognized as private research organization and as a public benefit organization by the Tax Authority. IPbv adds a project organization to the foundation, committed to sustain the foundation by covering organizational costs. IPbv employs mostly senior experts for IWO projects and is the partner in the e²LEAD project.

IWO activities cover reliability, asset management, electric mobility, superconductivity, power electronics and development aid. At present, most emphasis is on reliability in the electric power supply as well as power electronics. In e²LEAD, IWO focuses on the reliability track with performance assessment methods for k-out-of-n systems, test validity methods and prognostics for maintenance alerts.

Technische Universität Chemnitz

The TUC professorship "Materials and Reliability of Microsystems" focusses on material-technological, technological, thermal and reliability aspects of microelectronic systems. The group has many years of experience in studies on reliability and thermal management of heterogeneously integrated micro- and power electronic systems by multiscale simulation and experiments on bulk, interface and system level. In the context of heat dissipation solutions, the group specializes in the development and testing of highly reliable cooling concepts from silicon to system level, including thermal material and interface characterization, multi-scale heat transfer, heat storage and the latest thermal technologies.

Chemnitz University of Technology (TUC) is contributing to the project with the following work: Together with the project partners, integration at module and system level as well as testing and characterization will be demonstrated and carried out. TUC's main focus here is on thermal key invention: a special new, patent-pending thermal connection technology (CoolStar).

CARIAD SE

We are a software and technology company for the automotive industry, combining and expanding the Volkswagen Group's software capabilities, building on our tradition of making automotive innovation accessible to all.

Founded in 2020, many developers, engineers, and designers worldwide combine their knowledge at CARIAD to transform the group not only into a software-driven car company, but to transform the car into an automotive experience that integrates seamlessly into our digital lives. Our home base is Germany, but we are in the process of building campuses in different locations of the world. Currently, more than 6000 international software developers and engineers from over 88 different nationalities work in the software competence centers in Wolfsburg, Ingolstadt, the Stuttgart area, Berlin and Munich. We also work closely with Volkswagen's development teams in Seattle and Silicon Valley, as well as in China.

CARIAD is building the leading tech stack for the automotive industry with the aim of creating a new automotive experience and increasing the Volkswagen Group's speed of innovation to make the car a sustainable, safe and seamlessly connected mobility companion in a digital world.

CARIAD is a 100% subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group. With around 10 million vehicles sold per year, it is one of the largest automotive groups in the world and brings together popular car brands such as Volkswagen, Audi or Porsche and many others. CARIAD's mission is to build a unified software platform and technology stack for all of these brands so they can delight their customers with ever-evolving digital experiences.

Fraunhofer ENAS

The Fraunhofer Institute for Electronic Nano Systems ENAS is the expert and development partner in the field of Smart Systems and their integration for various applications. We offer innovative solutions and support customer projects along the whole value chain of smart systems.

Fraunhofer ENAS is a reliable innovation partner for start-ups, SMEs or large enterprises and offers R&D services from the idea to the design, technology development or realization based on existing technologies to the tested prototype and technology transfer. In addition to technology development as well as smart sensor systems, the institute increasingly focuses on the setup of application demonstrators as part of an upstream product development.

In e²LEAD Fraunhofer ENAS focuses on the research of Digital Twins for a virtual assessment of chiplet assemblies. The incorporation of thermo-mechanical reliability demands and appropriate compact modeling strategies plays a major role. In addition, ENAS is responsible for the coordination of the e²LEAD innovation track „Reliability and functional safety“.

AUDI AG

Audi AG is a German automotive manufacturer of luxury vehicles headquartered in Ingolstadt, Bavaria, Germany. A subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group, Audi produces premium vehicles in many production facilities worldwide. In 2023 Audi delivered around 1.9 million cars and more than 178,000 fully electric models were delivered.

Audi stands for sporty vehicles, premium workmanship, and progressive design – for “Vorsprung durch Technik”. Founded in 1909 by August Horch, the Audi Group – which also unites the Bentley, Lamborghini and Ducati brands under one roof – is currently one of the most successful manufacturers of automobiles and motorcycles in the premium segment.

Audi is involved in the e²LEAD funding project as an associated partner. We deliver our inputs from the OEM side in the project. This includes e.g., reliability requirements, lifetime information and mission profile.

ILFA GmbH

ILFA GmbH is a provider of microelectronic product and service solutions for aerospace, defence, medical and industrial applications with headquarters in Hanover. The owner-managed company with around 190 employees has been producing innovative ultra-fine and microfine conductor solutions in the high-tech segment for over 40 years. With a logistics centre in Kirchheimbolanden near Frankfurt am Main and its own office in Shenzen, China, the company serves both national and international customers. Consistent material quality can thus be guaranteed worldwide. ILFA's success is based on the first-class quality of its products and their continuous optimisation at the highest level. Partners and customers are accustomed to driving forward ideas and innovations with ILFA and to being able to rely on the company and its competent contact partners at all times.

Berliner Nanotest und Design GmbH

The Berliner Nanotest und Design GmbH is German engineering company with scientific lab that provides services and products for failure analysis and thermal characterization and to measure, improve and maintain reliability. For all facets of the electronics industry, from RF to high power, from automotive to space applications, NANOTEST supplies solutions that empower material and system manufacturers to improve their products’ quality, performance, and reliability. NANOTEST products are highly scientific, yet convenient stand-alone systems that offer a wide range of features, from simple single measurements to partly automated inline testing, aging investigations, and failure analyses. By staying active in research and keeping a close link to various institutes, universities, and industries, NANOTEST solutions are always up to date with latest scientific and methodological developments and offer the edge over other comparable solutions.

TU Delft

With more than 25,000 students and over 3,000 PhD students, Delft University of Technology (TUD) is the biggest technical university in the Netherlands. The Electronic Components, Technology and Materials (ECTM) group focuses on developing novel engineering solutions and technologies in the fields of MEMS technology, analogue and power integrated circuit design and micro/nano system integration and reliability among others. Intensive collaboration with several research partners and capacity for sub-micrometre resolution lithography in one of the biggest class 100 cleanrooms in the Netherlands allow full fabrication and characterisation within the ECTM group. Besides semiconductor fabrication, designing for reliability with multi-physics simulations and digital twinning for diagnostics and prognostics are also within the research scope of ECTM and are part of TU Delft’s contribution to the e²LEAD project.

JIACO Instruments

As a market leader in plasma decapsulation, JIACO Instruments envisions a future that demystifies the complexities of atmospheric plasma, striving to make this advanced knowledge accessible within the semiconductor industry. JIACO’s microwave induced plasma decapsulation machine is known for fully automated localized etching while preserving all inorganic materials, specializing in uncovering potential failure mechanisms. Our advanced microwave induced plasma machine is a testament to our commitment to safeguarding device integrity through thorough yet gentle examination. JIACO's ethos is rooted in a drive for excellence and a shared goal of advancing the semiconductor field with robust failure analysis and reliability engineering.

Boschman Technologies BV

Since the 90thies Boschman delivers encapsulation equipment to the semiconductor industry and the discrete industry. Boschman develops new processes for the encapsulation and pressure sintering of  the packaging of advanced semiconductor and power electronic devices  from small volume to high volume production.  The “basic “technology of encapsulation with film started more than 20 years ago and is also the ”base”  for the pressure sintering technology which  started about 10 years ago. The semiconductor industry looks with favor on the advanced processes of encapsulation and sintering Boschman develops. Boschman  has designed a family of encapsulation equipment and Ag Sinter equipment which are delivered to the worldwide semiconductor and electronic industry. Boschman has a unique-stop-shop for innovative packaging solutions, supporting the customers from concept design  up to small volume production