Chip Industry Week In Review

By The SE Staff - 10 Jan, 2025 - Comments: 0

Global semiconductor sales hit $57.8 billion in November 2024, an increase of 20.7% compared to the same month last year, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association. In U.S. government news: The U.S. Department of Commerce finalized up to $325 million in CHIPS Act funding for Hemlock Semiconductor, which will support construction of a new semiconductor-grade polysilicon manufac... » read more

Chip Industry Week In Review

By The SE Staff - 20 Dec, 2024 - Comments: 0

Updated for 12/20 government fundings and 12/23 for China trade investigation announcements. President Biden announced a trade investigation into "China's unfair trade practices in the semiconductor sector." The announcement stated "PRC semiconductors often enter the U.S. market as a component of finished goods. This Section 301 investigation will examine a broad range of the PRC’s non-m... » read more

Do More With Less In Semiconductor Manufacturing

By David Park - 17 Dec, 2024 - Comments: 0

The recent resolution of labor disputes sheds light on a universal concern: the balance between automation and workforce dynamics. These situations mirror a challenge faced in semiconductor manufacturing—embracing AI without displacing the people driving the industry. Moving beyond automation fears US port workers expressed concerns about automation technologies, such as autonomous cranes a... » read more

Navigating Increased Complexity In Advanced Packaging

By Gregory Haley - 17 Dec, 2024 - Comments: 1

As chips evolve toward stacked, heterogeneous assemblies and adopt more complex materials, engineers are grappling with new and often less predictable sources of variation. This is redefining what it means to achieve precision, forcing companies to rethink everything from process control and in-line metrology to materials selection and multi-level testing. These assemblies are the result of ... » read more

Aftermarket Sensors Boost Yield In Wafer Fabs

By Anne Meixner - 10 Dec, 2024 - Comments: 0

Third-party sensors are being added into fab equipment to help boost yield and to extend the life of expensive tools, supplementing the sensors that come with equipment used in fabs. The data gleaned from those sensors has broad uses within the fab. It can measure process module performance, identify defect sources, and alert fabs of impending equipment failure. And when coupled with machine... » read more

Yield Management Embraces Expanding Role

By Laura Peters - 12 Nov, 2024 - Comments: 0

Competitive pressures, shrinking time-to-market windows, and increased customization are collectively changing the dynamics and demands for yield management systems, shifting left from the fab to the design flow and right to assembly, packaging, and in-field analysis. The basic role of yield management systems is still expediting new product introductions, reducing scrap, and delivering grea... » read more

Hybrid Bonding Makes Strides Toward Manufacturability

By Laura Peters - 28 Oct, 2024 - Comments: 0

Hybrid bonding is gaining traction in advanced packaging because it offers the shortest vertical connection between dies of similar or different functionalities, as well as better thermal, electrical and reliability results. Advantages include interconnect scaling to submicron pitches, high bandwidth, enhanced power efficiency, and better scaling relative to solder ball connections. But whil... » read more

Using AI To Glue Disparate IC Ecosystem Data

By Ed Sperling and Ann Mutschler - 26 Sep, 2024 - Comments: 0

AI holds the potential to change how companies interact throughout the global semiconductor ecosystem, gluing together different data types and processes that can be shared between companies that in the past had little or no direct connections. Chipmakers always have used abstraction layers to see the bigger picture of how the various components of a chip go together, allowing them to pinpoi... » read more

Optimizing Wafer Edge Processes For Chip Stacking

By Laura Peters - 23 Sep, 2024 - Comments: 0

Stacking chiplets vertically using short and direct wafer-to-wafer bonds can reduce signal delay to negligible levels, enabling smaller, thinner packages with faster memory/processor speeds and lower power consumption. The race is on to implement wafer stacking and die-to-wafer hybrid bonding, now considered essential for stacking logic and memory, 3D NAND, and possibly multi-layer DRAM stac... » read more

Legacy Process Nodes Are Critical To Many Industries

By David Park - 19 Sep, 2024 - Comments: 0

As the semiconductor industry continues to push the boundaries of innovation with advanced nodes, it is easy to overlook the critical role that ICs manufactured at legacy process nodes play in our everyday lives. While the spotlight often shines on the leading-edge advancements of 5nm technology and below, it’s the mature nodes, those above 28nm and even above 130nm, that are the unsung ch... » read more

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Chip Industry Week In Review

Chip Industry Week In Review

Do More With Less In Semiconductor Manufacturing

Navigating Increased Complexity In Advanced Packaging

Aftermarket Sensors Boost Yield In Wafer Fabs

Yield Management Embraces Expanding Role

Hybrid Bonding Makes Strides Toward Manufacturability

Using AI To Glue Disparate IC Ecosystem Data

Optimizing Wafer Edge Processes For Chip Stacking

Legacy Process Nodes Are Critical To Many Industries

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