Friday, April 16, 2010
The transition to copper interconnect for memory devices skyrocketed in 2009. As a result, while overall semiconductor equipment sales decreased more than 40 percent in 2009, equipment directly tied to the copper interconnect part of semiconductor manufacturing decreased only 8.7 percent, according to Robert Castellano, president of The Information Network. (New Tripli, PA).
Micron Technology Inc. (Boise, Idaho) was the first DRAM maket to produce commodity DRAM with copper, instead of aluminum, in late 2006. Elpida followed a year later, according to analyst. Thereafter all the memory suppliers, led by Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., spent large sums of money upgrading their wafer fabs to copper and this affected purchases of copper deposition equipment and materials in 2009. It also hit sales of traditional aluminum equipment and copper will impact nearly every sector of the semiconductor equipment market in 2011, the firm said.
The impact of this transition on processing equipment was most obvious in equipment used with traditional aluminum interconnects. For example, the high-density plasma CVD sector (HDPCVD), which is used for depositing undoped (USG) and doped (PSG and FSG) films saw revenues drop 72 percent in 2009. Metal-etch equipment revenues registered a similar drop.
The integration of copper into memory devices presents a different set of challenges than the long-established integration in logic processes. DRAM and flash memory, which comprise the majority of the memory applications, exhibit high aspect ratios, small critical dimensions, and high sensitivity to line resistance.
The growth of the PVD market was strong for the deposition of the copper barrier metal, which is typically a bi-layer of Ta/TaN, or TiN. However, the transition to memory presents challenges. As feature size continues to shrink, a thinner barrier metal is required to maximize copper volume in the damascene structure and maintain effective resistivity. Ultra-thin barrier metals must achieve optimum step coverage, density, and morphology in high aspect ratio trenches and vias.
"The transition to copper greatly impacted the chemical mechanical planarization slurry and pad business," added Castellano. "Eventually this huge ramp in copper transitioning will stabilize and these consumables will again track the overall CMP and semiconductor equipment markets."
By: DocMemory
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