05/24/2011 

GT Solar International Inc. (NASDAQ:SOLR) introduced the ASF100 advanced sapphire growth system, which produces larger 100kg sapphire boules in the standard furnace chamber. Larger sapphire boules can enable lower costs for LED chips.

05/24/2011 

Varian, Novellus, and Disco prove that customer service really does matter, in VLSI Research's latest annual customer satisfaction survey of large and small chipmaking equipment suppliers.

05/23/2011 

The top 20 semiconductor firms paced at 11% growth in 1Q11, raking in $54.8B in sales, led by the usual suspects, according to rankings from IC Insights.

05/23/2011 

Demand for semiconductor manufacturing equipment continues to inch up, with demand staying relatively steady as prior sales flush out the supply chain, according to data from SEMI.

05/23/2011 

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) George Mason University (GMU) researchers are studying the optimal characteristics of silicon nanowires and dielectric stacks for charge-trapping memory.

05/23/2011 

Gary Green, co-chair of the interactive poster session at last week's Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Conference (ASMC), reviews key themes discussed, including the need for collaboration across several fields, as well as technical topics from metrics for defect sampling to lithography patterning for 32nm and below.

05/19/2011 

The last day of this week's SEMI/IEEE Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Conference (ASMC) featured talks on EUV readiness and hurdles, CMOS image sensors' increasing complexity, embedded memory failure analysis to improve yields, and a coming shift from chip technology efficiency back to innovation.

05/19/2011 

A recurring theme at this year's Confab is that 3D integration shows tremendous promise, particularly with many fabless companies, yet many barriers remain -- and the first and biggest is preparing the supply chain.

05/19/2011 

Janice Golda, Intel, co-led a session at The ConFab 2011 on continued device scaling. EUV infrastructure will be a major topic, as well as transistor challenges. While lithography difficulties exist at tighter device densities, Golda reminds us that metrology obstacles must also be tackled.

05/19/2011 

An Steegen, imec, shares how imec is helping enable Moore's Law's continuation to <10nm. Moore's Law through 19nm could be lithography-enabled, Steegen says, but past that point we need to rely on materials, such as high-k, and new device architectures. She also provides an update on imec's EUV progress.

05/19/2011 

The semiconductor industry is moving to 3D device structures, says Raj Jammy, SEMATECH, at The ConFab 2011, discussing TSV and system-in-package (SiP) opportunities and challenges. He also summarizes logic and memory roadmaps.

05/19/2011 

Since the beginning of 2011, the supply chain has been secure and ready to make the wafer size transition from 300mm to 450mm, says Tom Jefferson, 450mm program manager, ISMI, in this video interview at The ConFab 2011.

05/19/2011 

LED manufacturing processes lack the level of automation seen in the semi chip fab industry. Wafer size transitions are occuring rapidly, and thicknesses also vary. The forefront of LED fab, much like chip fab, is wafer level packaging, cluster tools for automation, and advanced substrate materials. Iain Black, Philips Lumileds, presents an overview of LED fabrication, device architectures, and markets for the end products.

05/18/2011 

Another eventful (but still rainy) day at this week's SEMI/IEEE Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Conference (May 16-18) offered two highlights sharing a theme: how partnerships can address challenges in device scaling and manufacturing.

05/18/2011 

Alchimer's wet-deposition process, AquiVantage, grows interconnect layers for interposer redistribution layers (RDLs) and significantly enhances via-last backside wafer interconnects. The process eliminates 2 costly photolithography steps.

05/18/2011 

Describing work being done at Albany Nanotech, IBM's Dave Medeiros listed the new anticipated due-date for EUV lithography (11nm), and what other lithography option might be ready as an alternative technique around that same time.

05/18/2011 

Thomas Jefferson, ISMI 450mm program manager, presented results to date on the consortium's progress in ushering in the next wafer transition, and how industry participants are doing their part to keep momentum going.

05/18/2011 

Raj Jammy, VP of materials and emerging technologies at SEMATECH, covered a broad swath of CMOS scaling drivers, system and device trends, and infrastructure requirements.

05/18/2011 

imec's An Steegen outlined the requirements to continue Moore's Law and new technologies being pursued to that end. Perhaps most important is lithography, where she provided an update on EUV tool productivity, resist benchmarking, and mask defect results.

05/17/2011 

Bill McClean, IC Insights, explains that demand is good for the IC industry, thanks to smartphones and tablets. Supply, on the other hand, is relatively tight. IC Insights is forecasting 10% growth for the semiconductor market in 2011. The video was recorded at The ConFab 2011 in Las Vegas.