Substrate processing congestion management apparatus and semiconductor processing system including the same

A substrate processing congestion management apparatus comprising:

• at least one processor configured to:
• receive data associated with a process sequence of a substrate processing apparatus;
• preprocess the received data;
• divide the process sequence of the substrate processing apparatus into specific sections and determine whether congestion occurs in the specific sections;
• set an initial suspected region corresponding to a section in which the congestion occurs, analyze outliers in events occurring in the initial suspected region, deduce a final suspected region while updating the initial suspected region based on an event in which an outlier is identified, and determine an event with a greatest contribution to the final suspected region as a congestion cause;
• and
• notify the congestion cause and automatically control the substrate processing apparatus to reduce process congestion and improve substrate processing throughput, based on the determined congestion cause by performing at least one of:
• adjusting gas flow parameters of at least one process chamber in the substrate processing apparatus;
• modifying radio frequency (RF) power delivery timing in the at least one process chamber;
• controlling pressure ramping rates between process steps performed by the substrate processing apparatus;
• updating transfer robot scheduling between adjacent process chambers of the at least one process chamber;
• or
• modifying maintenance timing of components in the at least one process chamber,
• wherein a suspected region includes a section that contributes to the congestion cause, and
• each of the events includes an action performed for processes by the substrate processing apparatus.

A substrate processing system comprising:

• a substrate processing apparatus comprising at least one process chamber configured to perform a process according to a process sequence;
• a database configured to store data associated with the process sequence of the substrate processing apparatus;
• and
• a substrate processing congestion management apparatus configured to analyze a congestion cause of the substrate processing apparatus based on the data associated with the process sequence,
• wherein the substrate processing congestion management apparatus comprises at least one processor configured to:
• receive the data associated with the process sequence from the database;
• preprocess the received data;
• divide the process sequence of the substrate processing apparatus into specific sections and determine whether congestion occurs in the specific sections;
• set an initial suspected region corresponding to a section in which the congestion occurs, analyze outliers in events occurring in the initial suspected region, deduce a final suspected region while updating the initial suspected region based on an event in which an outlier is identified, and determine an event with a greatest contribution to the final suspected region as a congestion cause;
• and
• notify the congestion cause,
• a suspected region comprises a section that contributes to the congestion cause, and
• each of the events includes an action performed for processes by the substrate processing apparatus.