Members of eBeam Initiative, a forum to educate and promote new semiconductor production techniques using electron beam (eBeam) technologies, will exhibit the latest eBeam technology-based advancements to enhance wafer yields and photomask critical dimension uniformity (CDU) at Photomask Japan (PMJ) 2012.
The PMJ 2012 is the 19th international symposium covering latest developments in photomasks and next-generation lithography masks. The symposium is being conducted at the Pacifico Yokohama in Japan. Among the breakthroughs to be presented, the eBeam Initiative will emphasize HOYA’s achievement in enhancing mask quality with reduction in shot count through the application of model-based mask data preparation (MB-MDP) on a production mask writer.
GLOBALFOUNDRIES will demonstrate the effect of MB-MDP on wafer simulation by presenting the results of mask-wafer double-simulation. The company will highlight how MB-MDP enables inverse lithography to realize wafer yield improvement. Moreover, shape-dependent-mask CDU has become a critical parameter affecting wafer yield. HOYA will show the effect of the latest eBeam technologies like overlapping variable-shaped beam shots and MB-MDP on mask fidelity, shot count, and stability to manufacturing variation.
HOYA in partnership with fellow members JEOL and D2S has evaluated eBeam technologies to improve mask quality so as to meet its customers’ complicated mask requirements. D2S’ Chief Executive Officer, Aki Fujimura explained that at £ 20 nm logic nodes, mask assist features and certain pieces of the main mask features have a width below 80 nm, thus increasing the difficulty to maintain mask accuracy, which in turn impacts wafer yield negatively. New developments in semiconductor production increase the value and significance of eBeam technologies to handle the difficulties related to shot count, mask accuracy, and production expenditures.
Source: http://www.ebeam.org/