Lucent, Chartered Combine Efforts

-- Semiconductor International, 5/1/1999

An agreement to jointly develop fabrication processes for high-performance copper and aluminum interconnects in next-generation CMOS integrated circuits has been formed between Lucent Technologies and Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing. As part of the collaboration, the two companies will merge their development efforts, thus combining 0.16 µm and 0.18 µm technologies from Lucent and Chartered, respectively.

A joint team of engineers will develop the processes at Lucent's R&D facility in Orlando, Fla. then transfer them to Silicon Manufacturing Partners (SMP) for volume production. SMP is a joint-venture fab in Singapore formed by the two companies in January, 1998. The resulting processes will be optimized for ICs used in data communications, mobile communications, graphics and consumer electronics-designs, which benefit from high-density interconnects, low-power consumption and cost efficiency. To support implementation of Chartered 0.18 µm processes, the first four participants in a new partnership network of leading electronic design automation (EDA) and intellectual property (IP) companies has also been put in place.

This development agreement 'will help us make advanced interconnect technologies with a common tool set available at SMP and at our other fabs worldwide,' said Mark Pinto, chief technology officer for Lucent's Microelectronics Group. 'That gives us more flexibility to match manufacturing demand with fab capacity and availability, inturn helping us deliver customer orders more quickly.'

The collaboration will ultimately shorten the development process and offers both companies additional flexibility to match manufacturing demand with fab capacity. The companies expect to begin prototyping new devices in the fourth quarter of this year.