Date: Jan 16, 2013 Source:
Molecular Imprints, Inc., a technology leader in advanced semiconductor lithography, today announced the delivery of the first advanced lithography platform capable of patterning 450mm silicon wafer substrates. The Imprio¨ 450, was accepted by a leading semiconductor manufacturer at the end of 2012 and is now being used to support the 450mm wafer process development demands as part of a multi-year wafer services contract to facilitate the semiconductor industry’s transition to lower cost 450mm wafer production. Robert E. Bruck, corporate vice president and general manager of Technology Manufacturing Engineering (TME) Intel Corporation showcased one of these first fully patterned 450mm wafers during SEMI’s Industry Strategy Symposium (ISS) at Half Moon Bay, California on January 14th, 2013.
“The semiconductor equipment and manufacturer supply chain must have early access to high quality, fully patterned 450mm wafers in order to develop and optimize their products and processes in time for this transition”, said Mark Melliar-Smith, President and CEO of Molecular Imprints. “Our proprietary Jet and Flash™Imprint Lithography (J-FILTM) technology is the only lithographic solution available today that can meet the demanding fine feature requirements of the industry’s 450mm transition . J-FIL™technology has demonstrated 24nm patterning with exceptional line edge roughness (<2nm LER, 3 sigma) and critical dimension uniformity (1.2nm CDU, 3 sigma) with extensibility to 10nm using a simple single patterning step process. The Imprio¨ 450 platform has a new stage and universal substrate chuck design that enables both 300mm and 450mm wafers to be processed without interruption. Having this advanced lithography available now to support this global initiative will accelerate the semiconductor industry’s transition to 450mm wafers by at least two years. In an era where multi- year and multi-billion dollar optical lithography development programs are becoming the norm we were able to design, build and deliver an advanced nanoimprint platform in just one year from receiving the customer’s purchase order. I want to give a special thanks to the teams at Molecular Imprints, our semiconductor customer, and our supply chain that helped us realize this truly remarkable achievement”.
J-FIL’s inherent Cost of Ownership (CoO) advantages achieved by avoiding power limited EUV light sources, complex optical lenses and mirrors, and difficulties with imaging using ultrasensitive photoresists, make it well aligned with semiconductor memory manufacturing. This new 450mm patterning system acceptance coupled with our recent multiple module order announcement underscores Molecular Imprints tremendous progress towards placing J-FIL technology into high volume production of advanced CMOS devices.
About Molecular Imprints, Inc. Molecular Imprints, Inc. (MII) is the technology leader for high-resolution, low cost-of-ownership nanopatterning systems and solutions in the semiconductor, display and hard disk drive (HDD) industries. MII is leveraging its innovative Jet and Flash™Imprint Lithography (J-FIL™) technology with IntelliJet™material application to become the worldwide market and technology leader in high-volume patterning solutions for storage and memory devices, while enabling emerging markets in display, clean energy, biotechnology and other industries. MII enables nanoscale patterning by delivering a comprehensive nanopatterning solution that is affordable, compatible and extendible to sub-10-nanometer resolution levels. For more information or to follow us on twitter, visit www.molecularimprints.com
