Molecular Imprints Takes Template Replication to HDD Production
Molecular Imprints Inc. today introduced the Perfecta TR1100 template replication system to the hard disk drive industry, providing for significant reductions in the time and cost needed for high-density disk production. Mask and HDD maker Hoya has placed one of two orders received already.
Aaron Hand, Executive Editor -- Semiconductor International, 9/2/2009
Molecular Imprints Inc. (MII, Austin, Texas) today introduced a template replication tool, the Perfecta TR1100, that is geared toward the hard disk drive (HDD) industry. It is a patterned media version of a mask replication system that MII began talking about earlier in the year, designed to save considerable time and money in the creation of masks or templates for use in nanoimprint lithography.
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The Perfecta TR1100 is a template replication tool for the hard disk drive industry. (Source: Molecular Imprints) |
Based on the company's Jet and Flash Imprint Lithography (J-FIL) technology, the Perfecta TR1100 enables the high-fidelity mass replication of a master imprint template at a cost that is orders of magnitude lower than that of fabricating the original master template. With today's and previous announcements (including an early-July announcement with DNP), MII is building a significant mask infrastructure for imprint lithography, in which it no longer provides only the replicated templates, but also the means for others to produce templates at a lower cost of time and money.
Like the CMOS industry's Moore's Law, the HDD industry has a roadmap that shows memory bit density increasing every year by anywhere from 50 to 100%, according to Mark Melliar-Smith, MII's CEO. It used to be that increased areal density could be achieved by making finer read/write heads that move across the disk, but it's no longer quite that simple. As disk density approaches 1 Tb/in2, the magnetic elements written into the disk become unreliable, he explained. This is where patterned media comes in, with the magnetic material patterned directly on the disk.
Patterned media has a roadmap taking it to a density of 1 Tb/in2 by 2011, with pilot lines for this technology coming in even sooner. "A big challenge, of course, in the disk drive space is that cost, in many ways, is everything," Melliar-Smith said. "They need sub-20 nm lithography, but they need it at a low cost of ownership."
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A "feature proud" imprint (left) from a master template written with e-beam technology can be replicated into a "field proud" imprint (right) on a Perfecta template replication tool. (Source: Molecular Imprints) |
Unlike the semiconductor industry, which has yet to embrace nanoimprint lithography for mainstream volume production, HDD manufacturers have come to realize that imprint lithography is the answer for increasing bit density, and are buying the tools, according to Melliar-Smith. Mask replication is the next step in reducing mask costs further.
Today's unpatterned media costs $4-6 per disk, according to Melliar-Smith, who added that the disk makers have targeted additional costs for patterning (including all lithography and patterning steps, on both sides of the disk) to come in at $1-2 per disk. MII's first-generation Perfecta platform brings the lithography portion of that cost to ~$2.63 per disk. A second-generation tool (the TR2200) should bring that number to 84 cents per disk; and MII estimates that a high-volume manufacturing tool should be able to hit targets of <35 cents added per disk by next year.
MII has already sold two Perfecta TR1100 systems, including one to Hoya Corp., a merchant mask and HDD manufacturer that has formally accepted and installed the tool at its facility. This installation will facilitate the commercial availability of imprint templates for advanced patterned media development and pilot production. The other tool has been sold to another HDD manufacturer.
Hoya will use the TR1100 along with its own mask and HDD expertise to provide high-resolution templates to other HDD manufacturers, according to Tsuyoshi Watanabe, general manager of Hoya's R&D Center. "The transition to patterned media represents a fundamental shift in the hard disk drive industry, introducing new processes and requiring new equipment innovations in the disk media production fabs," he said. "With all of those changes taking place in the fabs, the last thing that HDD manufacturers should have to worry about is dealing with the complexity and costs associated with manufacturing templates as well."
Producing master templates using traditional e-beam technology in the volume needed to support patterned media production is cost-prohibitive. MII's template replication approach still uses a rotary e-beam write to produce a master template, but then the TR1100 uses imprint lithography to make 10,000 high-fidelity replicates of that master. Those replicated templates can in turn imprint 10,000 disks, currently at a speed of 120 disks/hour.
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