Fab-tool vendor KLA-Tencor has announced the availability of its latest wafer defect inspection systems, and is shipping the products to its clients in the foundry, logic and memory IC fields.
The new suite of systems are designed to address the wide range of defect issues that new material structures and design rules are imposing on manufacturers of advanced chips, KLA-Tencor said.
The 2900 Series broadband optical wafer defect inspection platform delivers increased capture of small defects on early process layers and back-end layers, with sensitivity approaching that of e-beam inspection in some cases, KLA-Tencor indicated. The tool features a two-dimensional Directional E-Field, new brightfield and darkfield apertures, and new wavelength bands that can boost defect signal and/or reduce wafer noise. It also helps provide a significant improvement in defect location accuracy with a redesigned stage.
Among the new portfolio of advanced wafer defect inspection tools also include the Puma 9650 Series narrowband optical wafer defect inspection systems, which provide improved defect capture in yield-critical die areas, such as the edges of SRAM arrays, memory transition regions and page breaks. It also provides higher sensitivity to particles and pattern defects including bridges, residue and extra pattern on front-end etch layers.
KLA-Tencor also launched its eS800 Series e-beam inspection systems that feature leading-edge physical and electrical defect capture on a wide range of layers and structures - the most challenging of which include defects inside deep trenches and vias, or at the very edges of DRAM and SRAM arrays. Moreover, the eS800 offers the throughput needed to scan large areas of the die to find electrical defect signatures such as under-etch, shorts or opens.
When asked about his views on the 2012 semiconductor market and applications that will become the main driving force, Robert Cappel, senior director of marketing at KLA, said that the semiconductor market is largely driven by consumer and enterprise devices, and therefore much is dependent upon the growth rates of mobile platforms, PC's and servers. In general, growth mobile platforms favor the foundry and flash semiconductor segments while growth in PC's favor logic and DRAM segments, Cappel continued.
