Formerly known as Materials Research Source LLC, Systine is commercializing a breakthrough technology (Low Energy Electron Enhanced Etching LE4) for plasma dry etching of semiconductor chips. LE4 provides atomically smooth etched surfaces and sidewalls at length scales ranging from millimeters to 20 nanometers, without causing ion bombardment damage, the main problem with all dry plasma etching methods. LE4 is the only technology that etches with lighter electrons instead of the heavy ions in use currently. Systine will design, manufacture, sell and service this semiconductor front end processing equipment to a variety of customers. In the early stage, the customers are compound semiconductor chip manufacturers (using Gallium Arsenide, Gallium Nitride and Indium Phosphide) such as TRW, Conexant, Agilent, AXT, Nitronex, etc. In the next stage, Systine will sell equipment to silicon based chip manufacturers like Intel, IBM, and Motorola. Systine has a working 3 prototype with manual load lock and sample stage. Systine is currently etching custom chips for potential beta customers in preparation for early sales of R&D machines to these customers. Systine has developed a tool it has named "Gradina" after the tool used by Michaelangelo to make luminously smooth surfaces on his legendary human statuary. As with the famous artist, semiconductors require extremely fine surfaces to retain quality and reliability as the industry moves to ever smaller, faster devices powering the electronic age. The machine will be sold to semiconductor makers whose products are used to penetrate numerous markets requiring extremely small devices. In a paradigm shift for the industry, the Gradina can, today, etch features as small as 20 nanometers in size without collateral damage to the semiconductor material. By contrast, the smallest devices that can be made to run advanced computers are 130 nanometers. A nanometer is one twenty thousandth the diameter of a human hair.
