300 mm products lead the way at Semicon West
By Lisa A. Karter
San Francisco — Among the hundreds of new products rolled out at Semicon West last month, many had one thing in common — they targeted the 300 mm semiconductor manufacturing market.
One new product that made its debut at Semicon is a 300 mm silicon crystal-growing system from Kayex (Rochester, NY), a unit of General Signal Corp. Dubbed the Vision300, the crystal growing system was commissioned to Kayex by a major silicon wafer manufacturer in June 1996. The system will be ready to ship in September and is expected to be used for wafer manufacturers who produce 256-Mbyte DRAMs and 1-Gbyte DRAM silicon substrates.
Asyst Technologies, Inc. (Fremont, CA) introduced its SMIF-300 mm Series, a family of products that meets all Semiconductor Equipment and Materials International (SEMI) and the International 300 mm Initiative (I300I) guidelines and standards, according to the company.
Fluoroware (Chaska, MN) introduced a 300 mm product — the F300mm front-opening unified pod for 25-piece 300-mm wafer lots. The company also announced a strategic alliance with Ecological Technologies, Inc., a matrix tray reprocessing service that enables reclamation of wafer trays. In early July, Fluoroware announced a joint development program with Daifuku (Tokyo) to develop 300 mm manufacturing solutions.
KLA-Tencor (Milpitas, CA) introduced new laser- and image-based wafer inspection capabilities for its products, and a new automatic Booth defect classification system. In addition, Motoman, Inc. (West Carrollton, OH) rolled out a new line of OEM 2-, 3-, and 4-axis cleanroom robots for particle-free wafer handling and other intrabay applications.
Fairchild Technologies Semiconductor Equipment Group (Fremont, CA) introduced the first cluster tool for low-k spin-on dielectric processing. The product allows for migration to 0.25-micron circuits.
Meanwhile, CFM Technologies (West Chester, PA) featured its Full-Flow 8100 wet processing system that uses queuing automation, a feature that stops time delays for material handling. Queuing automation stages wafers to be loaded into the processing chamber while another wafer load is being processed. The feature does work with standard mechanical interfaces (SMIFs). The system uses a single, sealed process chamber for all chemical and rinse processes. Throughout the entire process neither the product nor the chemicals ever contact the outside environment.
Other product launches included the A400XT from ASM Europe (Bilthoven, The Netherlands). The clustered modular vertical furnace features a 920 mm flat zone so that more wafers can be loaded into the same reactor volume. For anti-corrosion wafer cleaning solutions and post-clean treatments, EKC Technology, Inc. (Hayward, CA) introduced a new line of products. And, Equipe Technologies, Inc. (Sunnyvale, CA) showed off its new 300 mm cluster tool platform and dual-arm robot.