At SEMI’s SMC yesterday, Sung Wook Park, executive vice president and general manager of Hynix Semiconductor, provided a keynote address on the materials needs for mainstream memory chips over the next decade. DRAMs will likely turn into STTRAMs, and NAND Flash will probably be replaced by ReRAM (Ref: Ed’s Threads 080505). Combinatorial materials R&D company […]
As SEMI’s SMC today, Raymond Roberge, SVP and CTO of Praxair Electronics, proposed a pragmatic new collaboration model for electronic materials R&D. Semiconductor fab process materials TAM for 2008 was ~$10B, yet materials suppliers now question their ongoing profitability. “Certainly the 300mm shift has resulted in productivity advances for IDMs at the expense of materials […]
Smart Equipment Technology (S.E.T.), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Replisaurus Technologies and a leading supplier of high accuracy die-to-die (D2D), die-to-wafer (D2W) bonding and nanoimprint lithography solutions, announced yesterday that it will collaborate with IMEC on 3DIC R&D. IMEC’s 3D integration program explores 3D technology and design for applications in various domains, focusing on 3D WLP […]
At SEMI’s Industry Strategy Symposium (ISS) running at Half Moon Bay, California today, IMEC president and CEO Gilbert Declerck talked about the need for R&D to facilitate IC industry growth. An industry based on answering the question, “what have you done for me lately?” can never rest on past successes and must continue to innovate. […]
Rudolph Technologies today announces Discover Solar™—the first fab management software tool designed specifically to help photovoltaic (PV) manufacturers increase cell efficiency and reduce costs. Discover Solar accepts all available data from each step in the solar manufacturing process, and then applies statistical process control (SPC) algorithms to generate automated reports. A company spokesperson confirmed that […]
SolFocus, the Mountain View, California developer of Concentrator Photovoltaic (CPV) systems, today announced that it has raised $47.5 million in the first close of its Series C financing and appointed Mark Crowley chief executive officer. Crowley, who was named president of SolFocus in August 2008, will assume the role of CEO, while previous CEO and […]
Samsung has launched a new press release for “super-thin LED monitors” (http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20090107006252/en) that are really LCDs with LED backlight units (BLU). The company’s new P2370L is just 16.5mm thick and uses white LED instead of cold cathode fluorescent lamp (CCFL) illumination. Compared to CCLF units, LED BLUs consume 30% less energy, are constructed without mercury, […]
On January 6, 2009, ASM International and SAFC Hitech (a business segment within SAFC, a member of the Sigma-Aldrich Group) announced that they have entered into a certified manufacturer and partnership agreement for ALD precursors for barium- and strontium-based high-k insulators. The agreement includes certification criteria, a license to certain ASM ALD patents, and a […]
The first issue of the BetaSights Newsletter has been published (see link to a free copy in the right-side column of this page under “Newsletters”), and a reader has already provided a correction. Michael Current (San Jose, California) noticed that the initial web-link to the slides from Prof. Asenov’s IEDM 2008 variability presentation was incorrect; […]
FSI International, Inc. (Nasdaq: FSII) announced December 23, 2008 that it has received an order for it’s new ORION® single wafer cleaning platform after a beta evaluation by a major semiconductor manufacturer. The tool will be used for resist strip in 32nm metal interconnect modules, using FSI’s proprietary “ViPR” extension of the classic “piranha” (a.k.a., […]