Aaron Hand

Pony Up for High Index
October 10, 2007

Gathering for a panel discussion last night at the Immersion Symposium, a few materials suppliers got, admittedly, a bit whiny about the funding that they could really use to accelerate the learning on high-index immersion materials — immersion fluids, lens materials, resists, the whole shebang.

Peter Krüll of optics maker Schott stood up in the audience and answered the question of what it would take to accelerate development of high-index lens materials by a factor of 2. His answer: $5M.

Symposium attendees were urged by Bryan Rice, Intel assignee to Sematech and chair of the symposium, to go back to their home offices and get the top execs signed on to support high-index immersion lithography. Really, it would only take one of those chipmakers to decide to support high index to get the whole thing on its way. It only took Intel, after all, to give EUV all the resources it needed, doling out funding to several key players throughout the infrastructure. With high-index immersion lithography, we’re talking about a tiny fraction of the money and resources needed compared with the billions that have been spent on the development of EUV lithography.

Word on the street is that just one company in the voting group at Sematech has chosen high-index immersion lithography as its No. 1 next-generation pick. Maybe that could change and more companies could climb on board. But maybe it doesn’t matter. Maybe it would only take that one company to step up and foot a relatively small bill that could secure its position at the 22 nm node, and perhaps beyond.

Krüll threw out the figure of $5M. But the suggestion I heard today was that somebody give Schott $10M. Make sure they have the resources they need to get the job done. And while they’re at it, give a toolmaker $25M to develop an interim exposure system — perhaps using fused silica lenses and a Gen2 immersion fluid with a refractive index of 1.65. Meanwhile, take that first-generation 1100i exposure tool that’s sitting idle in Albany, and put some high-index immersion fluid in it.

In other words, do whatever it takes so that the industry can started kicking the tires on this high index thing, and see what other challenges might pop up that need solving. They might find that it’s not the right solution. They might find that, ultimately, they have another 157 on their hands. But they also just might find a very workable, cost-effective alternative for a relatively small ante.

Posted by Aaron Hand on October 10, 2007 | Comments (0)