3.2.1 Product quality
Helping customers with product development and mass production is one of VisEra's top priorities. VisEra's customer service team is committed to providing world-class services to customers, including product design consultation, project development assistance, and professional technical support. We establish good communication channels with customers and provide the highest level of protection for their confidential information. We are committed to serve as the most reliable partner for our customers.
VisEra invests in continuous quality improvement in every part of the Company to ensure complete customer satisfaction. If any defect or inconvenience is found, we communicate with customers immediately and implement all necessary measures to isolate the event. We uphold the following quality policy and invite all employees to cooperate with each other to achieve our goal of zero defects:
We have committed ourselves to the establishment and implementation of the ISO 9001 system to expand the applications of our products. We launched the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system to integrate resource management for processes, batch control, equipment, masks, raw materials, and project control. We also launched the IATF 16949 quality management system for the automotive industry and implemented advance preparation by obtaining the ISO 13485 certification for the medical supply chain in 2019. The Company pursues continuous quality improvements to enhance competitiveness and achieve quality improvements across the board.
To strengthen VisEra's quality culture, the Quality Assurance Department organizes general quality courses for all employees each year and promote the use of the Eight Disciplines Problem Solving as the basic framework for the problem-solving steps of the Company. Our aim is to increase employees' awareness of quality and their use of quality assurance tools. We hope that the use of quality tools can help employees find opportunities for improvement in their work and propose valuable and effective response measures. We offered 59 digital courses and reading courses for quality management in 2023 for 998 attendees who passed the courses with 434 total training hours.
In addition, VisEra encourages all employees to actively participate in continual improvement programs. We organize the Continual Improvement Team Conference (CIT Conference) each year to provide a platform and rewards for exchanging ideas. We hope to create a corporate culture of high quality and continual improvement based on the spirit and activities for continual improvement.
Results of VisEra's CIT activities in the last five years
3.2.2 Green Product Design
Green product design focuses on considering and minimizing the product's impact on the environment in the design process of the product while ensuring the quality and functional performance of the product. The core idea is to account for environmental protection requirements first and employ means such as choosing green materials, reducing energy consumption, reducing pollution emissions, and designing for recycling to achieve green and sustainable development of products.
VisEra focuses on green design (Design for Environment) and adopts Life Cycle Thinking (LCT) in the sourcing of production materials/manufacturing process/product transportation/product use/waste disposal process. We implement product design/process management and continual improvement in seven major categories. We have always spared no efforts in developing advanced/ efficient and environmentally friendly products. We continue to develop products that have low energy consumption and high performance with customers. We also implement conflict mineral management and hazardous material management with our influence on suppliers. In terms of our continuous efforts to improve the environmental friendliness of our products, we continue to set environmental safety and health performance targets, and promote waste reduction, resource reuse, and greenhouse gas reduction projects to support green design.
We aim to reduce production costs, improve product quality, enhance the brand image, meet the needs and expectations of customers and consumers for environmental protection, and achieve sustainable development.
3.2.3 Product Environmental Impact Assessment
VisEra adopts a sustainability approach to reduce the impact of products on the environment in all stages of its life cycle, including the production and transportation of raw materials, product manufacturing, testing, and packaging. We completed the first product life cycle, carbon footprint, and water footprint assessment in 2019 and obtained third-party certification for ISO 14040, ISO 14067, and ISO 14046 compliance. After the assessment, we found that GHG reduction should remain a strategy for VisEra to implement continuous improvements. In addition to increasing the ratio of renewable energy in electricity consumption, we shall also seek other strategies for reduction at the source. In 2023, supply machine parameters and scrubber overflow adjustments will be adjusted in response to production capacity needs; power-saving and water-saving measures will be simultaneously evaluated for factory equipment, as detailed in Chapter 5.3 and Chapter 5.4.
VisEra will review the product life cycle environmental footprint every three years to identify the risks and opportunities of hot spots in each phase. The information will be used as the reference or baseline for continual improvements of the environmental management system and provide actual contributions to the Company's business expansion and environmental sustainability.
Major hot spots of global warming:
Midpoint Environmental Footprints Verified
(per 8-inch wafer equivalent/layer)
3.2.4 Hazardous Substance Management
VisEra established the QC 080000 hazardous substance management system to manage hazardous substances. We adopted the principle of minimizing the use of hazardous substances that are harmful to human health or pollute the environment.All products produced for customers meet international regulations and customers' requirements for the use of hazardous substances in products.
VisEra also continues to promote replacement plans for hazardous substances in the production process. We require suppliers of process materials to provide statements to guarantee that their products do not contain substances harmful to the environment that are banned by international organizations and ensure that products meet the requirements of the customers as well as regulations such as the EU RoHS, REACH Directive. Materials must be 100% compliant with regulations and customer requirements for zero hazardous substances and may not use perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and its related substance and N-methylpyrrolidone (NMP).
We completed the evaluation and introduction of PFOA and NMP alternative materials in 2020, and no PFOA and NMP were used in 2021. We continued to evaluate/execute the PFHxA replacement program starting from 2022 and completed 6 photoresists (14%) PFHxA replacement in schedule in the end of 2023. We plan to complete the introduction of 100% PFHxA replacement materials (42 photoresists) by 2025.
The use and management of chemicals is closely related to environmental protection and sustainable development, and has been one of the focuses of various sustainability indicators in the international community. VisEra is committed to green and sustainable management, and we constantly optimize our production processes to reduce the chemical consumption per unit. We have completed 35 chemical reduction projects (average reduction of ~40%) by the end of 2023.
Product hazardous substance management procedures:
