Dan Armbrust, President and CEO, Sematech

Over the last half-century the semiconductor industry has been remarkably successful in making chips that are faster, better, cheaper — and smaller. As a result, our world is smaller — people around the globe are connected in ways we never even imagined a few decades ago.

The industry has been equally successful in creative cooperation, driven by both opportunity and necessity. The advantages of shared R&D models are clear: minimizing the cost of developing new technologies, sharing the risks, and making otherwise big and complex research projects possible.

In addition to alliances and partnerships, the industry also comes together in technology conferences, allowing manufacturers, suppliers, developers, academia and consortia to share knowledge and thus make the most informed, cost-effective decisions possible.

Every year SEMATECH and its subsidiaries sponsor, host and participate in various workshops and forums at SEMICON West. The highly anticipated event, attended by thousands of experts each year, provides knowledge-sharing, content-laden meetings, and serves as an important arena to foster dialogue and cooperative action.

At SEMICON West this year there will be exciting new developments that will further exemplify the innovative strides the industry is taking to accelerate technology development, increase productivity, and reduce costs.

The desire for integration of function and performance improvement is driving strong interest in 3D ICs with TSV interconnects. 3D interconnect is an expansive technology that requires broad collaboration among IDMs, equipment and materials suppliers, fabless and fab-lite manufacturers, and test, packaging and assembly companies. In order to address the various implementation scenarios for 3D TSV, leading-edge processes, integration approaches, and tool sets are being developed — including the development of wafer metrology technologies to measure and improve 3D interconnect processes.

Another important topic at SEMICON West will be the outlook on next-generation fab technologies, such as extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography. This year, more than any other, we see the EUV community working collaboratively to address capital cost issues as well as find innovative solutions to the most prevalent challenges in advanced lithography technologies.

For example, SEMATECH’s EUVL Mask Infrastructure (EMI) partnership, an industry-wide consortium of EUV stakeholders to fund the development of metrology infrastructure to support EUV mask development, shows that we can go outside the customary business practices and collaborate — across the entire supply chain — on the development of next-generation lithography. With today’s industry structure, it is inevitable that other major technology transitions will have to be addressed across the supply chain in unaccustomed collaborations.

No other industry engenders this kind of collaboration or interdependence, and SEMATECH is proud to play a role. Innovation and connections — the keys to staying productive and profitable in a changing industry — will be the overarching theme this year at SEMICON West, a time-honored venue, in bringing people together, showcasing our industry’s innovation, and building bridges to the future.

At a gathering of a few journalists last week in Wilton, Conn., ASML revealed that it has achieved first light on the NXE:3100, its pre-production EUV tool. “That means that the Cymer source is alive, up and operational,” said Noreen Harned, vice president of marketing, technology and new business at ASML. All integration and safety checks have been completed, and EUV photons are now traveling through the scanner. “It’s a very big milestone,” she said, adding, “Before the end of the year, at least one customer will have wafers out.”

The lithography toolmaker is slated to ship the first of six NXE:3100 tools, equipped with a Cymer EUV light source, by the end of the year. The final system will go out by the first half of 2011.

The first of ASML’s NXE:3100 tools, due to be shipped before the end of the year, has
achieved first light.

Each milestone passed confirms that EUV lithography is beyond science fiction, and it’s just a matter of time until the technology is used for critical layers in high-volume manufacturing. “There are no two ways about it; we are into figuring out how to make EUV lithography work in production,” Harned said.

The NXE:3100 is ASML’s next step beyond the alpha demo tool (ADT), which resides at imec in Leuven, Belgium, and the University at Albany’s College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering (CNSE) in New York. The ADT uses a discharge-produced plasma (DPP) source, and has a throughput spec of 4 wph. By the time the 3100 is shipped later this year, it is expected to have a throughput of 60 wph, based on source power of >100 W and resist sensitivity of 10 mJ/cm².

It’s not quite there yet, though. Cymer’s laser-produced plasma (LPP) source that’s been integrated into the first 3100 tool is currently at about a third of the necessary power, according to Harned. That’s pretty standard protocol, she said, particularly when dealing with as much new technology as EUV lithography has to deal with. She said it will all be up to snuff by the time everything is bundled together and shipped off. “Cymer has things that they can do that they’ll bring and do the upgrades at our factory.”

The NXE:3100, besides having a much higher source power and throughput, improves on other points as well, including better resolution (27 nm) improved low-flare optics, a new high-sigma illuminator, and dual stages on its new EUV platform. Although ASML was able to capitalize on the Twinscan — its dual-stage platform used in XT and NXT systems from 365 to 193 nm wavelengths — an entirely new platform (dubbed NXE) had to be designed for EUV, complete with vacuum operation to handle the 13.5 nm wavelength.

The facility in Wilton, which was part of Silicon Valley Group (SVG) before it merged with ASML in 2001, focuses on the production of the reticle portion of ASML’s lithography tools. The Wilton group has shipped three of the six NXE:3100 reticle stages to Veldhoven, the Netherlands, and another — which we saw in its final testing stages on our cleanroom tour — will likely go out by the end of this week. In the Netherlands, all six systems are in build, Harned said. “One is completely built, and another one is right on its heels.”

Although ASML is building just six of the 3100s, the company has had quite a few requests for additional systems, according to Harned. “Our judgment is that the real production tool is the 3300, so we decided to do just the six systems,” she said, adding later, “They were latecomers after the others placed orders — there was enough time difference, and we had to make decisions on what we did with our supply chain and everything else.”

Needless to say, those users are clamoring for development of ASML’s NXE:3300B, which is due out in 2012. The 3300B takes resolution to 22 nm and is expected to increase throughput to 125 wph with a 15 mJ/cm² resist and source power of >250 W. It will also include a new high-NA six-mirror lens, high-efficiency illuminator, optional off-axis illumination, and a reduced footprint.

ASML will make a concession on resist sensitivity for the 3300 tools because of the interrelatedness of resolution, linewidth roughness (LWR) and dose sensitivity, Harned said. “Since we’re going to push down on resolution, and we’re going to push down on linewidth roughness, something had to give,” she said. “Percentage-wise, we’re making a very big concession; the source supplier taking part of the burden too.”

The toolmaker is taking specific steps with its 3300 tools so that, despite the 15 mJ/cm² resist sensitivity, they’ll still reach the at least 100 wph needed for volume production (and 150 wph for the 3300C in 2013). “If the world has a 10 mJ/cm² resist that can still do 22 nm imaging, the machine will not limit the throughput,” Harned added. “They’ll realize much more than 100 wph.”

Ultimately, the NXE:3300 is expected to push down to 16 nm resolution with current resist capabilities, Harned said, and could push down to 11 nm with off-axis illumination. And EUV extendibility is possible beyond 10 nm with increased apertures, she added.

— Aaron Hand

If you had asked me at the beginning of the year — as the semiconductor manufacturing industry rang with positive notes after the worst downturn in its history — what I’d be doing come mid-July, I would’ve told you that I’d be on my way to San Francisco, to cover SEMICON West for Semiconductor International. Oh, how much has changed since then. And yet my plane ticket is booked, I’ve reserved my hotel, and I have my sights set once again on the industry’s biggest tradeshow in North America.

SI has since been tossed by the wayside, and the semiconductor manufacturing industry faces an even greater need for clear, detailed reporting on the technical and economic developments in the industry. As the editorial manager for the SEMICON West Daily News, I plan to bring you daily print updates about what’s happening on the show floor, on the show stages, and around the industry. Through MySemiconDaily.com, we’ll also bring the latest news to your computer — whether or not you’re able to attend SEMICON West this year.

We have some great coverage lined up already from key industry players, including the latest trends in 3-D integration, LED manufacturing, CMP, cost-of-ownership models, and more. We’ll even be getting some exclusive technical coverage of new developments imec will be releasing at the show. We’ll be reporting live from the show on market updates, keynote talks, and technical discussions. And not to forget the co-located Intersolar North America, our daily coverage will also include the latest on photovoltaic developments, particularly as they affect the semiconductor manufacturing industry.

So stick around. I’ll be sharing some pre-show buzz with you as we lead up to July 12, and will be bringing you loads more as we hit the show floor running.

— Aaron Hand

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