November 15, 2001 – Santa Clara, CA – Applied Materials, a provider of epitaxial (epi) deposition technology to the semiconductor industry, has installed its Epi Centura systems at Analog Devices’ fabs in MA, and CA, where they are being used for next-generation bipolar device production using silicon (Si) and silicon germanium (SiGe) technologies.

Silicon germanium is a key material that enables the fabrication of high frequency, low power chips. One of the most common applications for SiGe is in the formation of heterojunction bipolar transistors, where a small amount of germanium is added to the base of a silicon bipolar device to overcome fundamental gain, speed, and resistance trade-offs in silicon transistors.

Brad Scharf, division fellow and manager of Process Development at Analog Devices’ fab in Wilmington, MA, said, “Our early involvement with SiGe heterojunction transistors with epitaxial bases demonstrated the value of that technology for high-speed mixed-signal applications. After a thorough investigation of different CVD and UHV-CVD SiGe technologies, we chose the Epi Centura for its excellence in productivity, throughput, profile control, and process uniformity. The flexibility of the multi-chamber system and the applications expertise demonstrated by Applied Materials were also positive factors. This system meets all of our requirements for both Si and SiGe production today, and for several future device generations.”

“This multi-system installation at a bipolar process leader like Analog Devices shows our market momentum for both new and sustaining epi technologies,” stated Per-Ove Hansson, GM of the Epi Substrate Division at Applied Materials. “We have added many new features to the Epi Centura for advanced epi processing, including automated setup of complex germanium profiles, integrated preclean, and integrated metrology that will help our customers meet both current and future epi processing needs.”