The capstone of the MEng degree is a group industry project in a manufacturing company or an Institute project. During the Spring semester, students begin meeting with the company and their thesis advisor to identify the problem or opportunity to pursue, define the project scope, and outline the expected deliverables. These meetings are typically held weekly, either in person or via video calls. Then, in the summer, from mid-May to mid-August, students work on the company project full-time. These projects, undertaken by groups of three students per site, form the basis of the thesis portion of the degree. Students work on-site under the supervision of an MIT faculty member, typically solving near-term problems for their company.
Several companies propose projects in late fall, and a selection process matches students with their assigned projects and MIT faculty advisors. Students begin their initial work at each company site in January, followed by once-weekly meetings during the spring semester. From late May until mid-August, the groups work on-site full-time to complete their projects. Students document their full contribution to the project thesis, which is submitted to their MIT advisor for approval.
Recent Project Examples
Supply Chain Planning in Semiconductor Manufacturing
The team mapped out its current planning framework, including demand management, capacity planning, and material planning. After identifying the challenges faced in the current framework, the team proposed a framework for managing demand, capacity, and material planning that encompasses strategic, tactical, and operational planning.
Template Modeling for Control Assembly
The final assembly of ion implantation equipment must take place in a clean room. To reduce the time and expense of this assembly, the team developed a novel alignment system that can eliminate in-plant assembly and enable the equipment supplier to assemble on the customer’s site. This significantly reduces both the time and expense of assembly, saving considerable clean room capacity.
Continuous Micro Contact Printing
In this project, the conventional printing process of flexography was combined with the soft-lithographic process of micro contact printing for resist application. A prototype system was constructed, and the basic limits of process speed and quality were explored. Based on this work, the company can continue its path toward commercializing this novel process.
Wash Cycle Improvement in High-Performance Circuit Board Production
This project sought to identify the root causes of flux residue presence underneath critical high-performance circuit components. It combined board architectural design-related issues and investigated alternative washing methods. It then recommended a new washing strategy and equipment to greatly reduce board failures.
Improved Back-End Processing for Polymer Solar Cells
This project, which was located at a medium-stage start-up company, involved modeling the manufacturing system for material resource planning and yield tracking. It developed a scan-code-based inventory tracking system and conducted a time study to inform future production needs. It also identified the existing bottlenecks and suggested changes to improve the throughput, yield, and reliability of the processes
Quality Improvements for a Diagnostic Fluidic Device
Working with a local microfluidics start-up company, this team examined several issues related to scaling up to mass production. It identified opportunities for quality control improvement and also studied certain critical processes to allow for the prediction of expected behavior once at scale.
Reduce the Cycle Time in Ion Implanter Manufacturing
This team was tasked with increasing the capacity of a complex assembly line to meet high demand without incurring significant capital investment. Through the use of value stream mapping, they eliminated non-value-adding steps, reduced WIP, and added an analytical system for decision making