3D IC at ITRI
With all the work going on globally on 3D IC I thought it was time to review what was going on at ITRI , Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Research Institute.
The ITRI Advanced Stacked- System Technology and Application Consortium (Ad-STAC) has been set up to:
- Explore 3D IC technologies, products and markets among members
- Collaborate with global organizations
- Leverage government resources
- Facilitate sharing of resources and IP
- Establish certification test facilities and standards
Their powerful members list includes: ETEMA, ATMI, BASF (material), AMAT, STS, Cadence, Silvaco, MTK, TSMC, UMC, ASE and SPIL.
The ITRI 3D IC Technology roadmap is shown in the figure below
ITRI indicates that they will have a 300 mm 3D IC line in place and operational in 2010.
If we look at recent announcements full 300 mm prototype lines are scheduled to come on line in 2010 at : IME (Singapore); ITRI (Taiwan); IMEC, CEA Leti, IZM-Dresden (Europe) and Sematech (USA) . Have I missed any ?? Many of these announcements may have been a bit aggressive, but I certainly expect all these lines to be functional by 2011 and certainly the kind of expenditure that these lines represent is a strong indication that 3D IC is expected to have a major impact on the microelectronics industry.
I’ll be spending next week at the IEEE 3D IC Conf in the “city by the bay”….maybe I’ll see you there. For all the latest on 3D IC Integration and advanced packaging stay linked to PFTLE.………………………..
PFTLE commented:
Observer - you are correct. Taiwan Inc put a big bet on bumping and WLP and it paid off and now they will do the same in 3-D IC. My bet is that this will also pay off for them.
PFTLE commented:
PTFTLE agrees with all these comments. The announcement by ITRI is important based on history. Recall when everyone else thought bumping could not become a commodity technology, Taiwan Inc. agreed to all put capacity in place and drive the price down. The accomplished this and made low cost bumping and WLP a realioty. I fully credit their unified position with accomplishing this. This move into 3-D IC can accomplish the same thing. I expect UMC and SPIL to try to catch up with TSMC, ASE, Amkor through this ITRI based effort.
JIC observer commented:
The Jisso International Council (JIC) is working to coordinate standards development in the area of 3D. Right now there is a lot going on and it will be necessary to provide some coherency to highlight and make use of the many evolving solutions in 3D.
observer commented:
ITRI and the Taiwan government are placing a really smart bet on the future of 3D ICs. It has much more potential to positively change the shape of things to come than a possible 450mm wafer size. Perhaps this is why we don’t see ITRI actively working on 450mm. Pay attention!
itri.org.tw commented:
ITRI is a leading research institute in the world high-tech community. World-recognized LEDs, RRAMs, flexible devices exemplify on-the-mark vision, now again demonstrated with the 3DIC initiative.
