Company News
Staff -- Semiconductor International, 10/1/2002
- Corning Inc. (Corning, N.Y.) has received a patent (#6,410,192B1) for an advanced photoblank substrate material specific to 248 and 193 nm lithography. The material has high transmission at the 193 nm wavelength — greater than 90% on a 6.35 mm-thick photoblank substrate. The substrate also has low birefringence and good refractive index homogeneity.
- XTREME technologies GmbH, a joint venture between Jenoptik AG (Jena, Germany) and Lambda Physik AG (Göttingen, Germany), has received its first order for EUV light sources. Shipment is scheduled for 2003. Exitech Ltd. (Oxford, England) will use the light sources in microsteppers supplied to International SEMATECH (Austin, Texas) for EUV process development.
- Leica Microsystems Lithography (Jena, Germany) has received an order from the Fraunhofer Institute for Microelectronic Circuits and Systems (IMS, Dresden, Germany) for a Leica ZBA30 e-beam lithography tool. It will enable both maskmaking and direct writing on silicon wafers.
- International SEMATECH (ISMT, Austin, Texas), along with other global industry leaders, will hold the first International Symposium on Extreme Ultraviolet Lithography Oct. 15-17 in Dallas. ISMT previously held Next-Generation Lithography (NGL) workshops, which have been replaced with the more focused EUVL Symposium. For more information, go to www.sematech.org.
- Anvik Corp. (Hawthorne, N.Y.) has installed a wide-field lithography system, a HexScan 1100 SWE, at a major semiconductor manufacturer. The system, to be used for advanced packaging, offers 10 µm resolution over 200 mm wafers.
- ASML Holding NV (Veldhoven, Netherlands) has appointed Leader Koo president of its track business, based in San Jose. He was previously ASML's vice president of sales for central and western North America.
- Ultratech Stepper Inc. (San Jose) has implemented a cost-reduction plan, which involves reducing its workforce by ~15% (~50 positions). Previous cost-saving efforts during the current downturn have included salary reductions, mandatory shut-down days and restricted hiring.
- Tokyo Electron Ltd. (TEL, Tokyo), Ebara Corp. (Tokyo) and Dainippon Screen Mfg. Co. Ltd. (Kyoto City, Japan) have entered into a memorandum of agreement to found a joint-venture company focused on a low-energy direct-write e-beam system. Based on direct-write e-beam technology developed at Toshiba Corp. (Tokyo), the system is expected to be capable of 65 nm resolution, with full-scale shipment by 2005. The tentative name of the joint venture is E-Beam Corp.
