Methodology of estimate reliability of highly reliable components by monitoring performance degradation

Degradation analysis is an important method of assessing the reliability of highly reliable components and especially microsystems. Its application constantly increases due to the continuous efforts to produce increasingly reliable electronic products. The presented methodology is an effective way to estimate the component's reliability by monitoring performance degradation. The main advantage is that the time-to-failure is not directly observed but the degradation can be accurately measured. Consequently, the test time can be significantly shorter than if the times-to-failure are recorded.