10/14/2008  The AltaCVD chemical vapor deposition (CVD) and atomic layer deposition (ALD) tool from Altatech combines a unique vaporizer technology, chamber design, and gas/liquid panel integration. The combination of a proprietary reactor design and precursor introduction path with a pulsed liquid injection and vaporization is said to enable nanoscale control of thickness, uniformity, composition, and stoichiometry in complex materials.

10/14/2008  SUSS MicroTec now offers a nanoimprint toolkit that reportedly enhances the capabilities of its manual mask aligners by enabling them to pattern large areas with repeatable sub-50nm printing capability. The technology, substrate conformal imprint lithography (SCIL)was developed by Philips Research, (Eindhoven/The Netherlands) and transferred to SUSS MicroTec in a technology license agreement.

10/14/2008  Qimonda's selling its stake in its memory JV with Nanya to Micron, who are already in their own JV (for now) using a different DRAM technology. It's a shakeout for all three parties, in aspect of finance, manufacturing, technology, and strategy. Here's a quick rundown of who gains what.

10/14/2008  By Fran

10/14/2008  Highlights from last week's SPIE/BACUS Symposium on Photomask Technology in Monterey CA, include discussion of damage to pellicles caused by aggressive 193nm radiation, what's behind a new "sun effect" linked to clearing off reticle haze, more calls to replace chrome with opaque MoSi, why mask industry sales are improperly skewed, and the difficulty of migrating to smaller dimensions.

10/13/2008  Proven for high-volume 300mm manufacturing
By Emmet Hughlett, SUSS MicroTec, Inc.
In July 2007, IBM announced the qualification of C4NP for 200µm pitch lead-free solder bumping for shipped product. Since then, IBM has qualified 150µm pitch C4NP lead-free bumped wafers on a fully populated high-volume production line. SUSS MicroTec is completing build of additional C4NP equipment to meet ramping demand at IBM's Hopewell Junction bumping facility.

10/13/2008  The new partnership between Fujitsu Microelectronics, Advantest Corp. (through their JV, e-Shuttle), and startup D2S aims to make ICs faster and more cost-effectively for low- to mid-volume ASICs.

10/10/2008  The ugly economic condition still unfolding daily and globally is behind yet another chip industry downgrade, this time by iSuppli Corp. The firm now sees a 3.5% increase in chip sales this year to $280.1B, slightly below the 4% growth it predicted just two months ago.

10/10/2008  There appear to be two camps of perspective regarding AMD's spinoff off its manufacturing operations into a "Foundry Company" with help from Abu Dhabi investors. From a financial POV it's good to clean up AMD's books -- but strategically it's still unclear how the move will succeed in the foundry sector.

10/09/2008  In further efforts to cut production costs, and reduce reliance upon foreign technology providers, Korea's top two electronics manufacturers reportedly are in early stages of collaboration on development of steppers for LCD panel manufacturing.

10/08/2008  Semiconductor capital equipment spending had been expected to be lousy through 2008, but the upswing would start sometime in 2009. No longer -- Gartner now expects capex to slide even further this year and will drop another 13% in 2009, thanks to a full-on collapse in memory investments and economic pressures on consumer spending habits.

10/08/2008  October 8, 2008 Merck KGaA and Nano-Terra Inc. have extended their existing strategic alliance to develop nanotechnology-based products and solutions based on Merck's materials, to now focus on specific application development for Merck customers and move the technical capabilities into the marketplace for commercialization.

10/08/2008  October 7, 2008: Micromem Applied Sensor Technologies Inc. (MAST), a wholly owned US subsidiary of Micromem Technologies, has established a corporate office in New York City, part of the parent company's strategic plan to focus on magnetic sensor opportunities independent of the magnetic random access memory (MRAM) market.

10/08/2008  October 7, 2008: SUSS MicroTec, a supplier of solutions for the 3D, MEMS, advanced packaging and nanotechnology markets, announced that the capabilities of its manual mask aligners are now enhanced with a new nanoimprint toolkit that enables them to pattern large areas with repeatable sub-50nm printing capability.

10/07/2008  AMD appears to have finally made the fab-lite move it's hinted at for a long time, spinning off its fab operations to a jointly owned venture with investors from Abu Dhabi.

10/06/2008  October 6, 2008: EV Group (EVG), a supplier of wafer bonding and lithography equipment for the MEMS, nanotechnology and semiconductor markets, announced that three European universities have placed orders for multiple EVG systems worth >$2.9M.

10/03/2008  Already banged up by a punishing downturn that has evaporated sales and profits (and capacity spending), DRAM suppliers must now deal with another problem: the US financial crisis will likely make it a lot tougher for them to handle debt and obtain new funds for capital spending, notes a new report from iSuppli.

10/03/2008  Rudolph Technologies product manager Tuan Le tells SST about the improvements in its systems for detecting edge defects, necessitated by the switch to immersion lithography at 45nm.

10/03/2008  October 3, 2008: In providing a product solution to implement patented molecular transfer lithography (MxL) processes, a class of nanopatterning procedures that use water-dissolvable nanostructured polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) templates, TDI announces for sale the exaGlide 10 series.

10/03/2008  October 3, 2008: Michelson Diagnostics Ltd. (MDL) says it is broadening the commercial application of its 'multibeam' optical coherence tomography (OCT) technology into markets outside its core target of cancer diagnosis, such as industrial metrology, product inspection, tissue engineering, and developmental biology.