Producing an electronic product is a very complicated process, and its involved lots of different type material/process suppliers from upstream to downstream (from IC to PCB to chassis to software). Here is from failure analysis viewpoint to simplify it to three main integration levels: System, board (PCB) and IC/component level.

At system level, its deal with product functions to meet final design objective (product specification). If any function is not behaved accordingly, then it is consider as failure. This level is mostly handle by software of troubleshooting and isolation of fault hardware/software portion. Some issues are caused by system assembly process and not needed next level board analysis.

At board level, its deal with circuitry and signaling that needed to perform such function. This level is mostly perform signal and logic measurements to find out the misbehave circuitry. Final objective is to isolate out the fault IC/component and fix the functional issue. Some issues are caused by PCB assembly (PCBA) processes and not needed next level analysis.

At IC/component level, the analysis is to find out the fault location and its physical/chemical type (the defect). It is involved all types of Analytical Instruments that analyze it by physics and chemically.

While the failure issue can be fixed after board level analysis, failure analysis still needed to carry-on at IC/component level. This is to find out the actual failure root cause and get the proper fixes from IC/component. However, not all failure finding from IC/component level will be fixed by hardware changes. It is depending on impact scale, economic level (cost & effective), and any related resource limitation. From product design perspective, the “quick & cheap” fixes maybe come from alternative methods like software fix or changing compatible IC/component parts.