Industry overview
What is shaping semiconductor
The semiconductor and electronics manufacturing ecosystem is expanding, bringing new fabs, design centres and suppliers. Talent, supplier readiness and policy support decide its pace.
- New manufacturing capacity needs a local supplier base
- Design and fab talent is in high demand
- Policy incentives shape investment decisions
Client background
A semiconductor equipment service provider, working in Taiwan & Japan. Client identity is withheld to protect confidentiality.
- Organisation
- A semiconductor equipment service provider
- Sector
- Semiconductor
- Team engaged
- IT & Development
- Services
- CRM development, Mobile app development, Data analytics & dashboards
Client challenge
Service calls, preventive maintenance and spare parts were managed by email, making it hard to meet uptime commitments to customers. Each hour of unplanned downtime on these tools was costly for customers, so missed preventive maintenance quickly damaged relationships.
Research objectives
- Deliver on the brief: a service management system for semiconductor equipment.
- Design around the real needs of installed tools.
- Define requirements and success criteria the solution would be tested against.
- Deliver a reliable, secure solution the team can run and extend.
Target audience
The work focused on 150 installed tools.
- installed tools150
Audiences we typically reach in semiconductor
Design and manufacturing companiesComponent suppliersEngineers and studentsB2B buyersIndustry bodies
Geographic coverage
Coverage: Taiwan & Japan. Markets: Taiwan and Japan.
- Taiwan
- Japan
Research methodology
An iterative delivery approach: discovery, design, build and test in short cycles, with the client reviewing each step.
- 1Brief
- 2Service process mapping
- 3Technician app
- 4Uptime dashboard
- 5Insight
We built a service management system with ticketing, preventive maintenance schedules, spare-part tracking and a technician mobile app, with dashboards for uptime by customer. Engineers were involved in designing the mobile app so that recording work, uploading photos and ordering parts fitted naturally into a service visit.
CRM developmentMobile app developmentData analytics & dashboards
Sampling strategy
- installed tools
- 150
- Users and stakeholders from every affected team took part in discovery workshops and acceptance testing.
Data collection
- Requirements were gathered through workshops, process walk-throughs and a review of existing systems and data.
Data quality & validation
- Peer code review on every change
- Automated and manual testing
- User-acceptance testing with the client
- Release checklist and rollback plan
Data analysis
- Usage and performance monitoring after launch
- Defect and support-ticket trends
- Process time before and after
Key findings
- Response times and preventive maintenance compliance became visible, and the provider met uptime commitments more consistently.
Structured service data turned uptime commitments into something manageable.
Recommendations
- Build on the core insight: structured service data turned uptime commitments into something manageable.
- Track adoption and support tickets, and plan the next release from real usage.
Business impact
- Customers also received regular uptime reports, which strengthened service contract renewals and helped plan spare-parts stocking.
Impact is described qualitatively.
Deliverables & next steps
- Interactive dashboard
- Deployed solution with documentation and handover
- Support and maintenance plan
- Repeat the measure after changes are in place to track progress.
- A natural follow-on question: how effective are policy incentives?
Client identity is withheld to protect confidentiality.