Apple Inc.

Mohamed H Abu-Rama

Keith Alan Cox

Norman Jay Rohrer

John Gregory Dorsey

Antonietta Oliva

Sribalan Santhanam

Ashish R Jain

Sung Wook Kang

In an embodiment, the amount of supply voltage guardband to prevent incorrect operation due to aging effects may be modeled using an IC-specific age model generated early in the product life cycle of the IC. For example, high temperature operating life (HTOL) testing may be performed at multiple temperatures and/or voltages to develop the IC-specific age model. The IC-specific age model may be more accurate then the calculations used to develop guardband voltage as discussed previously, which rely on the aging of a single transistor. The IC-specific age model may be used along with monitoring of the aging effects during operation of the IC to predict an amount of increased guardband voltage that is currently desirable to apply to the IC. The predicted amount may vary from about zero when the IC is new to the full amount of guardband voltage when the IC is nearing end of life.

Reliability guardband compensation

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Mountain View, CA, United States of America

Mohamed H Abu-Rama