Jul 12 2005
Novellus Systems, Inc., the productivity and technology leader in advanced deposition, surface preparation and chemical-mechanical planarization processes for the global semiconductor industry, today unveiled an innovative high-density plasma (HDP) gap fill process for its SPEED® NExT™ 300-mm chemical vapor deposition (CVD) system. Novellus’ new Sequential Profile Modulation (SPM) process technology provides a robust gap fill solution for high-aspect-ratio features in 65-nm devices, delivering superior productivity and cost advantages at volume-production levels. In addition, SPEED NExT with SPM process technology is fully scalable to accommodate technology shrinks and device design changes without the need for extensive process re-optimization, further enhancing overall return on investment.
Ever-shrinking device geometries and increasingly stringent gap fill and film-quality requirements have rendered traditional HDP CVD technology unable to meet customer demand for efficient performance at lower cost, particularly at the emerging 65-nm high-volume manufacturing node. The new SPM process technology for SPEED NExT remedies this situation by employing short, in-situ plasma treatment steps to enable front-end-of-line and back-end-of-line high-aspect-ratio gap fill applications—shallow-trench isolation (STI), inter-layer, inter-metal and pre-metal dielectrics and passivation. By incorporating this process into its proven SPEED NExT platform, Novellus enables customers to realize significantly reduced capital investment and cost of ownership of up to 30 percent, as well as fab floor space savings of as much as 40 percent, since the higher throughput allows customers to buy fewer tools for a given capacity need.
“We developed our SPM process technology to reduce complexity and provide extendibility,” said Dr. Mike Barnes, vice president and general manager of the GapFill business unit at Novellus. “Our customers need a high-uptime platform and a cost-effective HDP CVD gapfill solution for their 65-nm high-volume manufacturing requirements that is easily extendible to future process generations. By simply implementing the SPM process technology to SPEED NExT, our customers can quickly ramp up the advanced gapfill capability with
Novellus introduced SPEED NExT, the next-generation product in its SPEED family of HDP CVD products last July 2004. Since then, the company has shipped numerous modules and upgrades of SPEED NExT to key customers worldwide, including more than 60 shipped in the last three quarters. Recent shipments of SPEED NexT have incorporated the SPM process technology capability. Customer response has been extremely positive, confirming the capabilities and benefits of the SPM process technology, which is being implemented worldwide into customer manufacturing lines. SPM process technology can be implemented in previously installed SPEED HDP CVD systems.