Category Archives: Metrology

By Michael Droeger

Over the past three decades, most of the world’s innovations have centered largely on business models and involved iterative advances of existing technologies, with none matching the global impact of the top 10 semiconductor industry discoveries and advances, Dr. Morris Chang, founder of TSMC and the IC foundry model, said at SEMICON Taiwan 2018 this week.

Few have as clear a perspective on the transformative power of semiconductors as Dr. Chang, founder of TSMC and father of the IC foundry model. Keynoting the IC60 Master Forum celebrating the 60th anniversary of the invention of the integrated circuit (IC), Dr. Chang listed what he considers the 10 key semiconductor industry innovation milestones since 1948:

1. Invention of the transistor by Shockley, Bardeen, and Brattain – 1948

2. Silicon transistor – 1954

3. Integrated circuit – 1958

4. Moore’s Law – 1965

5. MOS technology

  1. MOS FET – 1964
  2. Silicon gate – 1967
  3. CMOS  – 1970

6. Memory

  1. DRAM – 1966
  2. Flash – 1967

7. Outsourced assembly and test (OSAT) – 1960s

8. Microprocessor – 1970

9. VLSI systems design – 1970-1980

  1. IP and design tools – 1980-present

10. Foundry model – 1985

Among the most consequential semiconductor advances may be yet to come, Dr. Chang said, citing innovations including artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning, new device architectures, Extreme Ultraviolet lithography (EUV), 2.5D/3D packaging, and new materials such as graphene and carbon nanotubes.

Dr. Chang argued that because bringing an innovation into production is immensely more expensive than proving a theory in a lab, innovators are not always the ones to implement and benefit from their novel ideas. Today, innovation costs are skyrocketing, driving more consolidation across the supply chain.

Michael Droeger is director of marketing at SEMI.

Originally published on the SEMI blog.

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), representing U.S. leadership in semiconductor manufacturing, design, and research, today announced worldwide sales of semiconductors reached $39.5 billion for the month of July 2018, an increase of 17.4 percent compared to the July 2017 total of $33.6 billion. Global sales in July 2018were 0.4 percent higher than the June 2018 total of $39.3 billion. All monthly sales numbers are compiled by the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) organization and represent a three-month moving average.

“The global semiconductor industry posted its highest-ever monthly sales in July, easily outpacing last July and narrowly ahead of last month’s total,” said John Neuffer, president and CEO, Semiconductor Industry Association. “Sales were up year-to-year across every major semiconductor product category and regional market, with the China and Americas markets leading the way with growth of greater than 20 percent.”

Regionally, sales increased compared to July 2017 in China (29.4 percent), the Americas (20.7 percent), Europe (11.7 percent), Japan (11.5 percent), and Asia Pacific/All Other (5.7 percent). Sales were up compared to last month in China (1.7 percent) and the Americas (0.4 percent), held flat in Asia Pacific/All Other, and decreased slightly in Japan (-0.1 percent), and Europe (-2.4 percent).

For comprehensive monthly semiconductor sales data and detailed WSTS Forecasts, consider purchasing the WSTS Subscription Package. For detailed data on the global and U.S. semiconductor industry and market, consider purchasing the 2018 SIA Databook.

Dr. Gary Patton, Chief Technology Officer and Senior Vice President of Worldwide Research and Development at GLOBALFOUNDRIES, will deliver the opening keynote address at the inaugural GSA Silicon Summit – East, being held Tuesday, October 9 in Saratoga Springs, NY.

The conference is presented by the Saratoga County Prosperity Partnership (Saratoga Partnership), Saratoga County, NY’s economic development agency; the Global Semiconductor Alliance (GSA), a leading voice for the worldwide semiconductor industry; and the Center for Economic Growth (CEG), a regional economic and business development organization.

A well-recognized industry leader in semiconductor technology R&D with over 30 years of semiconductor experience, Gary Patton is responsible for GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ semiconductor technology R&D roadmap, operations and execution. His address will discuss “Market Drivers for Moore and Beyond Moore Semiconductor Technologies.”

“We are delighted that Gary Patton, a distinguished technologist, innovator, visionary and thought leader in the semiconductor industry, will be launching the first GSA Silicon Summit – East with his keynote,” said Shrikant Lohokare, Executive Director and Senior Vice President, GSA. “I can see Gary’s unique insights into technology inflections and emerging market opportunities they enable at the leading edge of Moore’s Law and Beyond setting the tone for a fantastic program and discussions to follow.”

“Gary Patton is the perfect choice to kick off Silicon Summit – East, which focuses the eyes of the semiconductor world squarely on Saratoga County,” said Marty Vanags, President of the Saratoga County Prosperity Partnership. “Gary’s leadership role in enabling GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ position as the world’s most advanced semiconductor manufacturing operation demonstrates his success in driving innovative technology that delivers business results.”

Prior to joining GLOBALFOUNDRIES, Patton was Vice President of IBM’s Semiconductor Research and Development Center, where he was responsible for IBM’s semiconductor R&D and technology development alliances. A Fellow of the IEEE, he received the 2017 IEEE Frederik Philips Award for industry influence and leadership in the development of leading-edge microelectronics technology and collaborative research, and in 2016 was inducted into the VLSI Research Hall of Fame for his contributions to the advancement of the semiconductor industry over several decades.

Additional speakers confirmed at this time include Mukesh Khare, Vice President of the IBM Research Semiconductor Group; Gary Bronner, Deputy CTO and Senior Vice President of Rambus Labs/Rambus; and Huibert Verhoeven, Senior Vice President and General Manager of the IoT Division, Synaptics.  A complete list can be found at https://www.gsaglobal.org/2018sse/meet-the-speakers/.

Registration is now open for Silicon Summit – East at https://www.gsaglobal.org/2018sse/registration/. Complete information about the event, including the program and sponsorship opportunities, can be found at https://www.gsaglobal.org/2018sse/.

GSA Silicon Summit – East is the product of a strategic alliance established last year by the Saratoga Partnership and GSA, which represents more than 400 member companies in 32 countries that combine for over 75 percent of revenue in the $400 billion semiconductor industry. With a theme of “Harnessing Emerging Semiconductor Market Opportunities,” the event is designed to promote partnerships and drive efficiencies that advance semiconductor technology and business, while also informing the regional ecosystem on growth opportunities.

 

Lattice Semiconductor Corporation (NASDAQ: LSCC), a provider of customizable smart connectivity solutions, announced the appointment of Steve Douglass as the Company’s Corporate Vice President, R&D, effective immediately. Mr. Douglass brings extensive experience building and leading global high performing engineering and customer-facing teams that deliver industry-leading IC products and solutions. He has a proven track record of creating and executing business strategies that inspire customer innovation and deliver profitable results. Prior to Lattice, Mr. Douglass was the Corporate Vice President, Customer Technology Deployment at Xilinx, Inc.

Jim Anderson, President and Chief Executive Officer, said, “We are excited to have Steve Douglass join Lattice. His proven ability to lead global FPGA and CPLD teams, and drive customer-focused innovation in targeted applications make him the perfect fit. His technical skills, market knowledge and leadership capabilities will help further strengthen Lattice as we drive sustained growth and profitability by accelerating the worldwide adoption of our ground-breaking hardware and software solutions.”

Mr. Douglass said, “I am excited to be joining Lattice and leading its R&D efforts. Lattice has an excellent programmable product offering built by a talented engineering team. I look forward to the opportunity to further strengthen the portfolio with market driven innovations that will help deliver profitable growth for the Company.”

Steve Douglass brings to the role over 30 years of broad technology experience developing programmable solutions for many markets including wired and wireless communications, industrial, automotive and test and measurement. He is a 20-year Xilinx executive, most recently serving as Corporate Vice President, Customer Technology Deployment and leading the Worldwide Technical Sales and Support team since 2012. Prior to that, he held a wide range of leadership positions, including Vice President and GM, Advanced Products Division, and Vice President of Product Development.

Mr. Douglass was previously at Cypress Semiconductor for 13 years and served in various leadership roles, including Business Unit Director, CPLDs and FPGAs. He began his career as a Circuit Design Engineer at Intel Corporation. He was awarded 23 U.S. and International patents for FPGA and PLD architectures and circuits, and has received numerous industry honors including EDN’s Product of the Year and Innovator of the Year. He holds a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University and Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from Santa Clara University. He also serves on Santa Clara University’s Electrical Engineering Industry Advisory Board.

SEMI Europe and AENEAS today announced that they have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to form a strategic partnership to support the European electronics industry’s growth. Under the agreement, SEMI Europe and AENEAS will collaborate to bolster the industry through joint advocacy and communications, awareness building and the exchange of best practices.

As the global electronics industry enters a new area of digitalisation, Europe is aiming to take the research and development lead in smart applications such as autonomous transportation, augmented and virtual reality, wearables, artificial intelligence and high-performance computing.

“To foster Europe as a centre of excellence in smart applications, we need to strengthen its electronics ecosystem by creating tighter connections among large companies, SMEs, research organisations and academia,” said Reinhard Ploss, AENEAS President. “Our strategic partnership with SEMI Europe will help drive greater technology innovation by bringing these critical players together and enable members of both associations to pursue growth opportunities at the European level.”

“With excellent RD&I institutes, globally competitive materials and equipment businesses, and semiconductor manufacturers, Europe is strategically positioned to lead in the global electronics value chain,” said Laith Altimime, president of SEMI Europe. Together, SEMI Europe and AENEAS are committed to working to drive closer European-level collaboration between industry and research institutions in pre-competitive areas to develop innovative and sustainable solutions for the digital economy.”

AENEAS is a non-profit industry association established in 2006. The purpose of the association is to promote Research, Development and Innovation (RD&I) in order to strengthen the competitiveness of European industry across the complete Electronics Components and Systems (ECS) value chain.

The China IC Ecosystem Report, a comprehensive report for the IC manufacturing supply chain, reveals that front-end fab capacity in China will grow to account for 16 percent of the world’s semiconductor fab capacity this year, a share that will increase to 20 percent by the end of 2020. With the rapid growth, China will top the rest of the world in fab investment in 2020 with more than $20 billion in spending, driven by memory and foundry projects funded by both multinational and domestic companies, according to the new report released today by SEMI.

The report also shows that IC Design remained the largest semiconductor sector in China for the second year in a row with $31.9 billion in revenue in 2017, widening its lead over the long-dominant IC Packaging and Test sector. The ascent of China’s IC Design sector comes as the region’s equipment market is expected to claim the top spot in 2020 for the first time on the strength of the continuing development of its domestic manufacturing capability. China’s maturing domestic fab sector is also benefiting domestic equipment and materials suppliers. Both groups continue to see gains in their product offerings and capabilities, particularly in silicon wafer production. The China IC Ecosystem Report is produced by SEMI, the global industry association and provider of independent electronics market research.

The more than RMB140 billion (US$21.5 billion) accumulated by the National IC Fund, a critical component of the 2014 National Guideline to address China’s semiconductor trade deficit, has spurred rapid gains throughout the region’s IC supply chain. Semiconductors are China’s largest import by revenue. Phase 2 of funding aims to raise another RMB150-200 billion ($23.0-$30.0 billion).

Encouraged by the National Guideline and favorable policies, skilled overseas talent is returning to China, triggering an explosion of domestic IC Design start-ups that are benefiting from access to investment and favorable policies, the report shows.

Other highlights from The China IC Ecosystem Report include:

  • Currently 25 new fab construction projects are underway or planned in China. 17 – 300 mm fabs are being tracked as part of this investment and expansion activity. Foundry, DRAM and 3D NAND are the leading segments for fab investment and new capacity in China.
  • China’s IC Packaging and Test industry is also moving up the value chain by enhancing its technology offerings through mergers and acquisitions and building advanced capabilities to entice international integrated device manufacturers.
  • China’s IC materials market, currently dominated by Packaging materials, became the second largest regional market for materials in 2016, a position it solidified in 2017. China’s materials market is expected to grow at a 10 percent CAGR from 2015 to 2019, driven primarily by the region’s new fab capacity ramp in the coming years. Fab capacity will expand at a 14 percent CAGR during that period.

The China IC Ecosystem Report covers the latest semiconductor supply chain and market developments including the rise of China’s IC industry, national and local government policies, public and private funding, and their implications for China’s IC supply chain. The report also compares key domestic companies and their international peers segment by segment. To learn more and get a sample of the report, visit http://www.semi.org/en/china-ic-ecosystem-report.

Eugenia is a Senior Product Marketing Manager at SEMI. 

Originally published on the SEMI blog.

Rudolph Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: RTEC) today announced its new Dragonfly™ G2 platform, which incorporates many of the benefits of the Firefly™ system onto the Dragonfly platform, including higher sensitivity and throughput and the proprietary Clearfind™ Technology. The new system increases the options for advanced packaging customers to meet their wafer-based application challenges on a single platform. To date, customer evaluations have reported throughput increases greater than 50 percent over the first-generation Dragonfly system. The new Dragonfly G2 systems are scheduled to begin shipment in the latter part of the fourth quarter and will be highlighted at the SEMICON® Taiwan trade show September 5-7 in Rudolph’s booth N686-4F.

The Dragonfly G2 system achieves significant throughput and productivity increases using proprietary camera technology combined with stage speed and accuracy. Additionally, its modular architecture permits plug-and-play configurability of Rudolph’s technologies such as Truebump™ Technology, for more accurate bump height measurement, and Clearfind Technology, for non-visual residue detection. Streamlined software algorithms contribute to the faster throughput and enable the system to handle increasing bump counts, which have already exceeded 80 million bumps per wafer.

“Advanced packaging processes are evolving rapidly, with larger packages, shrinking features, and higher counts of smaller bumps on every wafer, and the Dragonfly G2 system is designed to meet these new challenges,” said Tim Kryman, senior director of corporate marketing at Rudolph Technologies. “At the same time, its increased throughput reduces cost-of-ownership and its configurable modular design lets one system do the work of two. Based on the positive feedback from customers’ beta testing we are expecting strong demand for this latest evolution of our technology. We expect the Dragonfly G2 system to meet our customers’ future inspection needs as increasing demands for higher quality products are driving more data with greater integrity and faster throughput to meet the growing volumes of consumer and auto electronics products.”

“An important driver for Rudolph Technologies is to increase our pace of innovation to ensure we are anticipating our customers’ roadmaps,” added Mike Goodrich, vice president and general manager of Rudolph’s Process Control Group. “We were very pleased to be able to demonstrate that commitment with the release of this Dragonfly G2 system. Not only have we significantly improved throughput and imaging capability, but we have also provided the powerful Clearfind Technology to make a compelling, no compromise, advanced packaging process control system.”

The Dragonfly G2 system can be ordered now with shipments expected to begin in Q4. First-generation Dragonfly systems can be retrofitted on-site with a second-generation upgrade kit.

Micron Technology, Inc., (NASDAQ:MU) today announced plans to invest $3 billion by 2030 to increase memory production at its plant in Manassas, Virginia, creating 1,100 new jobs roughly over the next decade. These investments are contemplated in Micron’s long-term model to invest capital expenditure in the low thirties as a percent of revenue. The expansion will position the Manassas site — located about 40 miles west of Washington, D.C. — to support Micron’s leadership in the rapidly growing market for high quality, high reliability memory products.

Source: Micron

“Micron’s Manassas site manufactures our long-lifecycle products that are built using our mature process technologies, and primarily sold into the automotive, networking and industrial markets,” said Micron President and CEO Sanjay Mehrotra. “These products support a diverse set of applications such as industrial automation, drones, the IoT (Internet of Things) and in-vehicle experience applications for automotive. This business delivers strong profitability and stable, growing free cash flow. Micron is grateful for the extensive engagement of state and local officials since early this year to help bring our Manassas expansion to fruition. We are excited to increase our commitment to the community through the creation of new highly skilled jobs, expanded facilities and education initiatives.”

“Micron’s expansion in the City of Manassas represents one of the largest manufacturing investments in the history of Virginia and will position the Commonwealth as a leader in unmanned systems and Internet of Things,” said Governor Northam. “This $3 billion investment will have a tremendous impact on our economy by creating 1,100 high-demand jobs, and solidifies Micron as one of the Commonwealth’s largest exporters. We thank Micron for choosing to deepen their roots in Virginia and look forward to partnering in their next chapter of major growth.”

The initial clean room expansion is expected to be completed in the fall of 2019 with production ramp in the first half of 2020. This expansion will add less than 5% to Micron’s global clean room space footprint and will primarily support enablement of DRAM and NAND technology transitions as well as modest capacity increase at the site, in-line with growing customer demand for Micron’s long-lifecycle products.

“As a leading global supplier of automotive electronics systems and components, ZF appreciates the long-standing support of Micron to our business,” said Karsten Mueller, vice president, Corporate Materials Management, Global Commodity Electronics at ZF Friedrichshafen AG. “Meeting the ever-increasing demands for automotive applications will require significantly greater memory as the dual trends of advanced safety and autonomy drive the industry forward. Micron’s decision to expand the manufacturing and R&D capabilities at this IATF-certified facility is another indication that this growth should only accelerate in the future.”

As part of this expansion, Micron will also establish a global research development center in Manassas for the development of memory and storage solutions focused mainly on the automotive, industrial and networking markets. The research and development center will include laboratories, test equipment and a staff of approximately 100 engineers.

The Virginia Economic Development Partnership (VEDP) worked with the City of Manassas and the General Assembly’s Major Employment and Investment (MEI) Project Approval Commission to secure the project for Virginia. Micron will be eligible to receive an MEI custom performance grant of $70 million for site preparation and facility costs, subject to approval by the Virginia General Assembly. Additionally, the City of Manassas and utility partners are providing a broader, comprehensive support package to enable the expansion, including substantial infrastructure upgrades and additional incentives.

By Jay Chittooran

In testimony last week before a U.S. government interagency panel considering tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods, SEMI called for the removal of nearly 100 tariff lines, all of which cover items critical to the semiconductor manufacturing process, including materials and machines.

Jonathan Davis, global vice president of advocacy at SEMI, explained in his testimony that while SEMI strongly supports efforts to better protect valuable intellectual property (IP), tariffs will not help address Chinese trade practices, and will ultimately have significant and unintended consequences. SEMI asserts that these tariffs will harm companies in the semiconductor supply chain by increasing business costs, introducing uncertainty, and stifling innovation. Collectively, SEMI estimates that this round of tariffs will cost its 400 U.S. members more than tens of millions annually in additional duties. All told, SEMI estimates that all U.S. and Chinese retaliatory tariffs will cost members nearly $700 million in annual duties.

SEMI’s full written comments note that these tariffs, on top of those already in force and the retaliatory tariffs, will hamstring the industry. The tariffs seem to target U.S. firms for simply operating in China. Given that tools and materials are extremely complex, precise, and difficult to manufacture, it is unreasonable to believe that a constituent component can simply be replaced with a part from another source. Further, this U.S. government approach does not take into account that many items  subject to these tariffs are not available, at sufficient quality and cost, from domestic sources, or even non-Chinese sources. We stand steadfast in our belief that this trade action will raise prices, put thousands of high-paying and high skill jobs at risk, and curb growth.

Over the past four months, SEMI submitted written comments and offered testimony on the two previous rounds of tariffs, citing the damaging impact tariffs would have on the U.S. semiconductor industry. The first round of tariffs – on $34 billion worth of Chinese goods – took effect July 6, and the second round – targeting $16 billion in Chinese imports – will be imposed on August 23. The tariffs hit machines and tools central to the semiconductor industry, including equipment used to manufacture wafers, boules, and chips as well as test, inspection and sensing equipment.

We urge SEMI members to review the $200 billion U.S. tariff list to determine the level, if any, of impact. We also strongly encourage members to review Chinese retaliatory lists as well. Any SEMI members who have questions, should contact Jay Chittooran, Public Policy Manager at SEMI, at [email protected].

Originally published on the SEMI blog.

North America-based manufacturers of semiconductor equipment posted $2.36 billion in billings worldwide in July 2018 (three-month average basis), according to the July Equipment Market Data Subscription (EMDS) Billings Report published today by SEMI. The billings figure is 4.9 percent lower than the final June 2018 level of $2.48 billion, and is 4.1 percent higher than the July 2017 billings level of $2.27 billion.

“Global billings declined for the second month in a row, indicative of customer push-outs,” said Ajit Manocha, president and CEO of SEMI. “We expect the industry to weather this soft patch and end the year overall with strong growth.”

The SEMI Billings report uses three-month moving averages of worldwide billings for North American-based semiconductor equipment manufacturers. Billings figures are in millions of U.S. dollars.
Billings
(3-mo. avg.)
Year-Over-Year
February 2018
$2,417.8
22.5%
March 2018
$2,431.8
16.9%
April 2018
$2,689.9
25.9%
May 2018
$2,702.3
8.1%
June 2018 (final)
$2,484.3
8.0%
July 2018 (prelim)
$2,363.1
4.1%

Source: SEMI (www.semi.org), August 2018

SEMI publishes a monthly North American Billings report and issues the Worldwide Semiconductor Equipment Market Statistics (WWSEMS) report in collaboration with the Semiconductor Equipment Association of Japan (SEAJ). The WWSEMS report currently reports billings by 24 equipment segments and by seven end market regions. SEMI also has a long history of tracking semiconductor industry fab investments in detail on a company-by-company and fab-by-fab basis in its World Fab Forecast and SEMI FabView databases. These powerful tools provide access to spending forecasts, capacity ramp, technology transitions, and other information for over 1,000 fabs worldwide. For an overview of available SEMI market data, please visit www.semi.org/en/MarketInfo.