An inventive method in an integrated circuit (IC) manufacturing process
for using data regarding repair procedures conducted on IC's at probe to
determine whether any further repairs will be conducted later in the
manufacturing process includes storing the data in association with a
fuse ID of each of the IC's. The ID codes of the IC's are automatically
read, for example, at an opens/shorts test during the manufacturing
process. The data stored in association with the ID codes of the IC's is
then accessed, and additional repair procedures the IC's may undergo are
selected in accordance with the accessed data. Thus, for example, the
accessed data may indicate that an IC is unrepairable, so the IC can
proceed directly to a scrap bin without having to be queried to determine
whether it is repairable, as is necessary in traditional IC manufacturing
processes.