Using Sensor Data To Improve Yield And Uptime


Semiconductor equipment vendors are starting to add more sensors into their tools in an effort to improve fab uptime and wafer yield, and to reduce cost of ownership and chip failures. Massive amounts of data gleaned from those tools is expected to provide far more detail than in the past about multiple types and sources of variation, including when and where that variation occurred and how,... » read more

Blog Review: Feb. 13


UltraSoc’s Rupert Baines notes that awareness is rapidly increasing for the value of embedded insights and system data. Cadence’s Paul McLellan reviews the highlights of the upcoming SPIE conference in San Jose. Synopsys’ Taylor Armerding discusses the key findings of a report on cybersecurity practices for the automotive industry, including what components of vehicles pose the hi... » read more

Variation Issues Grow Wider And Deeper


Variation is becoming more problematic as chips become increasingly heterogeneous and as they are used in new applications and different locations, sparking concerns about how to solve these issues and what the full impact will be. In the past, variation in semiconductors was considered a foundry issue, typically at the most advanced process node, and largely ignored by most companies. New p... » read more

Analyzing Worst-Case Silicon Photonic Device Performance Through Process Modeling And Optical Simulation


Silicon photonics is an emerging and rapidly-expanding design platform that promises to enable higher-bandwidth communication and other applications. One of the best qualities of silicon photonics is its ability to leverage existing CMOS fabrication equipment and process flows. However, this means that it is subject to the same process defects and variations. Previous blog posts [References 1,2... » read more

Effects of a Random Process Variation on the Transfer Characteristics of a Fundamental Photonic Integrated Circuit Component


Silicon photonics is rapidly emerging as a promising technology to enable higher bandwidth, lower energy, and lower latency communication and information processing, and other applications. In silicon photonics, existing CMOS manufacturing infrastructure and techniques are leveraged. However, a key challenge for silicon photonics is the lack of mature models that take into account known CMOS pr... » read more

N7 FinFET Self-Aligned Quadruple Patterning Modeling


Authors: Sylvain Baudot, Sofiane Guissi, Alexey P. Milenin, Joseph Ervin, Tom Schram (IMEC and COVENTOR) In this paper, we model fin pitch walk based on a process flow simulation using the Coventor SEMulator3D virtual platform. A taper angle of the fin core is introduced into the model to provide good agreement with silicon data. The impact on various Self-Aligned Quadruple Patterning proces... » read more

Some Chipmakers Sidestep Scaling, Others Hedge


The rising cost of developing chips at 7nm coupled with the reduced benefits of scaling have pried open the floodgates for a variety of options involving new materials, architectures and packaging that either were ignored or not fully developed in the past. Some of these approaches are closely tied to new markets, such as assisted and autonomous vehicles, robotics and 5G. Others involve new ... » read more

CMOS Area Scaling And The Need For High Aspect Ratio Vias


Resolving internal routing congestion will be essential to enable CMOS area scaling to the N5 node and beyond. The solution will require new design maneuvers in place and route (PnR), as well as patterning innovations. In this work, we present inter-layer high aspect ratio vias or ‘SuperVia’ (SV) as one technology element that could enable track height scaling to 4.5T at aggressive N5 dime... » read more

3D NAND: Challenges Beyond 96-Layer Memory Arrays


Unlike scaling practices in 2D NAND technology, the direct way to reduce bit costs and increase chip density in 3D NAND is by adding layers. In 2013, Samsung shipped the first V-NAND product using 24 layers and MLC [1]. Five years later, in 2018, vendors of 3D-NAND have all announced production plans for 96-Layer NAND using TLC [2]. According to recent news reports, vendors are already working ... » read more

Carmakers To Chipmakers: Where’s The Data?


The integration of electronics into increasingly autonomous vehicles isn't going nearly as smoothly as the marketing literature suggests. In fact, it could take years before some of these discrepancies are resolved. The push toward full autonomy certainly hasn't slowed down, but carmakers and the electronics industry are approaching that goal from very different vantage points. Carmakers and... » read more

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