Category Archives: Semicon West

by Debra Vogler, senior technical editor, Solid State Technology

Semilab SSM, a division of Semilab, announced at SEMICON West the SRP Express 170, a new member of its NanoSRP family of metrology products. The manual system offers density and resistivity depth profiling using spreading resistance profiling technology (SRP), which provides a direct measurement of the resistivity and carrier density profiles of electrically active dopants.

According to the company, small and mid-tier semiconductor and solar cell manufacturers have had to choose between high-end, high-throughput systems designed to support multiple samples at a time — or older obsolete low-end manual systems. The company is targeting this new product to fill that void.

The key technology in the SRP Express is a new piezoelectric table system, a third-party design made specifically for Semilab, according to Chris Moore, president of Semilab SSM. Contact probing, especially when moving the sample to probe at different points, has to do a number of things very well. “You have to get the probes to precise locations and there can be no vibration when taking the measurements,” he explained. “Very few XY stages have a mode where there isn’t some level of vibration induced by the table system itself, whether its servo system or a stepper system.” He noted that often end-users have to power down such systems and then lock and unlock them, which adds to the amount of work, and the results aren’t as good. “We’ve found that this particular [piezoelectric] table design is far superior to anything we’ve used in the past,” he told SST.

Advantages that a piezo drive has over other drive mechanisms, Moore said, include no jittering, no motion during power-off, and no electric holding force required to keep micro-position. “Keeping the position fixed during measurement is key for point-contact measurements,” he explained. There is no electronic interference during measurements and no heat dissipation, he added. Furthermore, sub-micron resolution and precision translates to better x-position repeatability and therefore measurement repeatability. — D.V.

August 6, 2009: Jean Christophe (J.C.) Eloy, president and CEO of Yole Développement, talks with Small Times‘ Pete Singer at SEMICON West, about the MEMS market and notable trends.

Eloy forecasts a flat MEMS market in 2009 — though that’s good news compared with the lousy performance of the semiconductor industry. He expects 15% growth in 2010 as new applications continue to emerge, e.g., in medical and industrial.

Growth is particularly good in areas such as accelerometers and gyroscopes, and this is linked to their expanding use in offering key added value in consumer electronics, for everything ranging from mobile phones to pointing devices to navigation systems.

Another big boost is in what he calls “intertial measurement units,” which spawns from the aerospace/defense sector, which requires particularly advanced motion sensing. Just a few years ago (5-10), motion sensing on the order of six or nine degrees of freedom cost anywhere from $1K-$10K — but thanks to the evolution of MEMS technology, it can now be had for <$10.

As for MEMS equipment, it’s faring not much better than the suppliers for the semiconductor industry. Investments in the past year were sufficient to support production for the next couple of years, he notes. 2010 will be somewhat improved but flat; the true “restart” for equipment purchases will happen in 2011, he says.

by Debra Vogler, senior technical editor, Solid State Technology

July 27, 2009 – ATMI latest “green” product, RegenSi 74, released at SEMICON West, is an improved and more environmentally friendly extension of its advanced test wafer recycle and reclaim products. The line of all-wet process materials is used by semiconductor manufacturers to strip away films from test wafers while limiting damage to the underlying silicon.

The new process, designed to operate at room temperature, is able to rapidly remove aluminum and copper stacks and can be implemented on wet-bench platforms to replace existing two- or three-chemical process steps (see Figures 1 and 3). Tod Higinbotham, EVP, process solutions at ATMI, told SST that standard processes use commodity chemistry (e.g., dilute HF) which doesn’t work as well on newer, more advanced films being used, so higher concentrations are needed which then eat away at the silicon. As test wafer usage goes up with increasingly complex processes now being used, the reclaim process also becomes more difficult.


Figure 1. Overall costs per test wafer cycle (individual results will vary). (Source: ATMI)
CLICK HERE to view larger image

Conversely, the new chemistry is highly selective and strips away a wide variety of films, yet will not touch the silicon, “leaving a passivated, very smooth surface that can be reused for another test,” said Higinbotham. By using the new chemistry, test wafers require little or no grinding and polishing to restore their surface to a reusable condition (see Figures 2 and 4).


Figure 2. Test wafer reclaim cycle sustainability (individual results will vary). (Source: ATMI)

Furthermore, by using the new chemistry, end users have reduced waste volumes, and greatly reduced rinse water volumes. The product was designed using the Twelve Principles of Green Chemistry, explained Higinbotham. “When you use less chemical, you use less tool time and less pump time, and that translates to less energy usage,” said Higinbotham. So while performance chemistries are more expensive than commodity chemistries, they attack the COO issues (i.e., tool utilization, less hazardous waste, less disposal cost) that end users care about.


Figure 3. Si surface condition after industry-standard, three-chemical process. (Source: ATMI)
CLICK HERE to view larger image

The company has said that its new solution can cut film removal cycle times in half and greatly reduce the amount of chemicals required for wafer reclamation. And in some end user trials, silicon loss has been reduced by as much as 75% compared to traditional reclaim methods. According to the company, the new chemistry can provide an overall carbon footprint 18× lower than existing three-step processes. In one case, the company said its new process was shown to require up to 85% less energy and save up to 20 tons of de-ionized rinse water per day. — D.V.


Figure 4. Si surface condition after RegenSi 74 process. (Source: ATMI)
CLICK HERE to view larger image

At SEMICON West, Horacio Mendez, executive director of the SOI Industry Consortium, previewed a major study that compares the manufacturability, performance, and cost of 3D transistors vs. bulk. Ensuring companies in the process of making a decision about transitioning from bulk to SOI have access to information so they can make an educated decision, is a high priority of the Consortium, he notes.

Mendez also previews the group’s “Simply Greener” initiative to showcase major energy savings vs. bulk silicon, and discusses the role of the group:

July 27, 2009 – Matthias Meier, manufacturing engineering & automation at the Fraunhofer Institute, discusses his role as “coach” of the PV Equipment Standards task force in an interview at SEMICON West. SEMI released the new PV2-0709 standard at SEMICON West. Driven by the needs of solar PV manufacturers, the standard, which focuses on data acquisition and access, is expected to be widely adopted.

The key features of the standard are to allow access to data generated on production equipment for PV manufacturing — following substrates through the line, collecting all data generated on the way, using processes to establish quality measures, e.g. figure out where glitches occur in the production line and detecting them early.

There is a clamor to adopt such standards from all sides, notes Meier. Manufacturers complain that they have to specify systems for every factory, what the interfaces should be. Equipment suppliers need to build and maintain those interfaces. Software firms find it hard to integrate all the equipment. And now some initial manufacturing lines are now using at least part of the standard, he notes.

July 21, 2009 – Preliminary numbers are in from last week’s Intersolar North America, where the show more than doubled its exhibition participation and “exceed[ed] organizers expectations for the second straight year,” according to a statement put out by group.

More than 560 total solar exhibitors presented at both Intersolar and the co-located SEMICON West, with 444 solely on the Intersolar side up from 210 a year ago, a 111% increase, the group noted. Combined, the two events hosted ~17,000 visitors, roughly the same as in 2008; the Intersolar NA conference, with 170 speakers in 25 tracks, attracted >2000 visitors. (SEMI’s own preliminary numbers, released during its market analysis update on Tuesday afternoon, indicated a +4% increase in preregistrations across both events, with SEMICON West-only exhibitors numbering ~695, down about 23% from 2008.

“The US solar market has incredible potential, and with the support of industry associations, including the SEMI PV Group, ASES and CALSEIA, we are creating an opportunity for solar professionals to come together and discuss continued development for the US market,” said Markus Elsaesser, CEO of exhibition and conference organizer Solar Promotion International GmbH, in a statement.

Videos and photos showcasing Intersolar NA can be found at the group’s Web site.

SEMI’s newly appointed Chairman of the Board of Directors, J.C. Kim, who is also representative director and chairman of Edwards Korea, Limited, reveals that the board will be revisiting the value proposition for SEMICON trade shows during its policy and planning meeting, held during SEMICON West week. He also discusses the changing economics and company mix that is driving the need for the revisit. He also said that bringing green initiatives to the industry is a way to bring greater value to SEMI’s members.

Wally Rhines, chairman and CEO of Mentor Graphics, summarizes the key themes from his keynote at SEMICON West. His contention is that the industry is not consolidating — never has — and shows no signs of doing so in the future. He notes that the 45nm and 65nm nodes are taking off at exactly the same rate as 90nm, 130nm and 180nm did. And with new applications bringing new companies into the fold along with new revenue streams, he says the semiconductor industry is poised to recover at a faster pace than the overall economy.


In these videos with Solid State Technology senior technical editor Debra Vogler, Jan Vardaman, TechSearch International, examines the barriers, and breakthroughs, around 3D integration. Paul Siblerud, SEMITOOL, discusses the role of the EMC-3D consortium in developing new packaging technologies, such as through silicon vias (TSV).

July 16, 2009 – IMEC had several major announcements at SEMICON West. Ludo Deferm discusses the major advantage of using laser anneal over spike anneal: the reduced thermal budget. The low budget limits the diffusion of dopants into the silicon during their activation. Such a limited diffusion helps to keep short channel effects under control as the physical dimensions of the transistors shrink.

Deferm also summarizes the research center’s EUV mask cleaning program. The research will develop processes of record (PORs) for EUV mask cleaning that are effective in removing the contamination of interest, yet are gentle enough to be applied repeatedly without reducing mask lifetime.

IMEC researchers have also investigated RuTa metallization as a promising scheme for achieving good metallization of 22nm features. It could likely replace the traditional Ta physical vapor deposition (PVD), which, for decreasing feature sizes, looses its ability to achieve uniform Cu seed. The research center evaluated four different metallization schemes (i.e., TaN/Ta, RuTa, TaN + Co and MnOx) in terms of Cu fill, electrical performance and compatibility with chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) slurries.