PCN (Product Change Notification)

Notes

Unannounced changes are among the most serious supplier findings in an automotive audit, since they invalidate the customer's qualification.

Overview

A product change notification (PCN) is the formal notice a chip supplier issues before changing a product's design, process, materials, assembly or test site, or other manufacturing details, so that customers can judge the impact and requalify if needed. Notice periods and content are set by industry standards and by contracts, and automotive customers in particular expect advance notice of any change.

How it works

When a supplier plans a change, its change control process decides whether customers must be told. A PCN typically describes what will change, why, which part numbers are affected, how the supplier has qualified the change, the date from which changed parts may ship, and how to tell old from new parts, such as by date code. Customers can ask for samples and data and may raise objections within a set period.

Qualification standards define what evidence a change needs. AEC-Q100, for example, says the supplier will meet the user's requirements for product and process changes, and gives a table of which reliability tests are expected for each type of change. Automotive customers may also require a new PPAP submission.

Industry standards set common rules for change notification in electronics, and individual supplier agreements often add longer notice periods or stricter definitions of which changes count. A closely related notice, a product discontinuance or end-of-life notice, announces that a part will stop being made.

Examples

• A PCN announcing a move of assembly to a second factory, with qualification data and a first ship date.
• A die revision with a metal layer change, announced with new date codes and reliability results.
• An automotive customer asking for samples and a PPAP update before accepting a changed part.
• A change of mould compound in a package, requiring package-level requalification tests.

Why it matters

An unannounced change can cause failures or requalification costs in a customer's product, so PCN handling is a core part of supplier quality. Quality, product and customer quality engineers prepare and track PCNs, customers' component and supplier quality engineers assess them, and design teams sometimes need to evaluate samples. Managing many PCNs across a large bill of materials is a significant workload for equipment makers.

In the chip lifecycle PCNs arise throughout production, whenever a supplier changes a fab, assembly site, material or design revision, and they continue until end of life.

Related terms

• J-STD-046A
• EOL notice
• Qualification family
• ORT
• EOL
• A0 silicon

Where it appears on the Hub

Used on 40 pages of the Hub. In each group, the pages that mention it most come first.