March 12, 2001–Santa Clara, California–IBM Corp. has joined the Extreme Ultra Violet (EUV) LLC industry consortium to support the development of EUV lithography technology. EUV lithography technology is being developed to allow semiconductor manufacturers to etch circuit lines smaller than 0.1-micron, creating future generations of more powerful microprocessors and higher density memory chips. Processors built using EUV technology are expected to reach speeds of up to 10 GHz in 2005 to 2006.
“IBM has over 20 years of experience in developing EUV optics technology and its application to scientific research, and we intend to support EUV’s growing viability as an NGL candidate,” says John Warlaumont, director of silicon technology for IBM. “We are formalizing our relationship with the EUV LLC to help the semiconductor industry further evaluate EUV for use in the production of advanced semiconductors.”
IBM joins the private industry consortium led by Intel Corp., Advanced Micro Devices, Motorola, Micron Technology, and Infineon Technologies AG. These companies have joined forces with the Virtual National Laboratory (comprised of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratories, and E.O. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) to develop EUV lithography technology targeted at increasing computer chip capabilities.
“Six large manufacturers of a wide variety of chips have now committed major resources to the EUV lithography program,” says Sunlin Chou, chairman of the EUV LLC board, and senior vice president and general manager of Intel’s Technology and Manufacturing Group. “IBM’s participation raises our confidence that EUV lithography will succeed both technically and commercially. We look forward to working with equipment and materials suppliers to accelerate the development of the EUV lithography infrastructure.”
The EUV LLC is working directly with Silicon Valley Group Lithography (SVGL) and ASM Lithography to commercialize EUV technology, targeting availability of manufacturing tools in 2005. The EUV LLC has also developed relationships with more than 40 U.S.-based infrastructure companies to ensure that all of the key components can be attained for commercialization.