Inside Leti’s Litho Lab


By Mark LaPedus Semiconductor Manufacturing & Design sat down to discuss future lithography challenges with Serge Tedesco, lithography program manager at CEA-Leti; Laurent Pain, lithography lab manager at CEA-Leti; and Raluca Tiron, a senior scientist at CEA-Leti. SMD: CEA-Leti has two major and separate programs, including one in directed self-assembly (DSA) and another in multi-beam ... » read more

Design-For-DSA Industry Begins To Assemble


By Mark LaPedus The industry is aggressively pursuing directed self-assembly (DSA) as an alternative patterning technology for future chip designs. DSA, which enables fine pitches through the use of block copolymers, is in the R&D pilot line stage today. The fab tools, process flows and materials are basically ready, but there are still several challenges to bring the technology from th... » read more

Reaching For The Reset Button In Lithography


By Mark LaPedus Amid ongoing delays and setbacks, extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography and multi-beam e-beam have both missed the 10nm logic node. So for the present, chipmakers must take the brute force route at 10nm by using 193nm immersion with multiple patterning. Now, it’s time to hit the reset button. For the 7nm node, chipmakers currently are lining up the lithographic competition... » read more

Directed Self-Assembly Grows Up


By Mark LaPedus At last year’s SPIE Advanced Lithography conference, Christopher Bencher, a member of the technical staff at Applied Materials, said the buzz surrounding directed self-assembly (DSA) technology resembled the fervor generated at the famous Woodstock rock concert in 1969. This was clearly evident from the tumultuous and free-flowing movement that threatened the status quo o... » read more

The Week In Review: Feb. 25


By Mark LaPedus Is China set to bail out a U.S. government technology darling? Two Chinese automotive companies, Geely and Dongfeng Motor, are reported to have bid between $200 million and $350 million for a majority stake in Fisker, the maker of plug-in hybrid cars. If that happens Fisker—which has $192 million in U.S. federal government loan guarantees—could be headed to China, according... » read more

Tradeoffs On The Fly


By Ann Steffora Mutschler With classical bulk planar technology no longer shrinkable, the industry has been honing in on new ways to continue some scaling, achieve extra speed or better power while minimizing leakage. “To overcome the limits [of bulk planar technology] we need a different solution,” explained Giorgio Cesano, technology R&D marketing director at STMicroelectron... » read more

Experts At The Table: The Sky Isn’t Falling


By Ann Steffora Mutschler Semiconductor Manufacturing and Design sat down recently to discuss how the industry is making 3D ICs a reality today with Sylvan Kaiser, chief technology officer at Docea Power; Steve Smith, senior director for 3D-IC strategy at Synopsys; and Ahmed Jerraya, director of strategic design programs at CEA-LETI. SMD: How far are we from having the models we need to ena... » read more

Experts At The Table: The Sky Isn’t Falling


By Ann Steffora Mutschler SemiMD sat down recently to discuss how the industry is making 3D ICs a reality today with Sylvan Kaiser, chief technology officer at Docea Power; Steve Smith, senior director for 3D-IC strategy at Synopsys; and Dr. Ahmed Jerraya, director of strategic design programs at CEA-LETI. For part one of this series, click here. SemiMD: Because CEA-LETI has direct expe... » read more

The Sky Isn’t Falling


By Ann Steffora Mutschler 3D ICs add a new dimension to design with new degrees of freedom possible, even with the added design and manufacturing complexities. Looking at the semiconductor ecosystem today and anticipating what will be needed to enable 3D ICs, it is certain that relationships will need to change. What will be required of the players and who will take responsibility for wh... » read more

DSA: High Stakes Game Of Alphabet Soup


By Mark LaPedus Directed self-assembly (DSA) is making progress for potential use in semiconductor production, but the industry must make some major advances in a sometimes forgotten and unsung segment—materials. DSA is a complementary patterning technology that makes use of block copolymer materials to enable fine pitches in chip designs. But today’s block copolymers based on poly (MMA... » read more

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