Honeywell expands semiconductor packaging research and development facility
Honeywell Electronic Materials announced that it will expand its Spokane, Wash.-based research and development centre, which is dedicated to developing critical advanced packaging materials for semiconductor manufacturers, including thermal management, electrical interconnect and burn-in materials.
As part of the expansion, Honeywell will invest more than $1 million in the facility and equipment. The project, to be completed by the end of 2007, will add approximately 85 new pieces of state-of-the-art equipment, allowing for, among other things, expanded and enhanced thermal interface material mixing and characterization, analytical and application testing, thermal and reliability testing, and failure analysis. The expansion will also include a complete metrology lab, allowing Honeywell to replicate customer manufacturing obstacles and test for solutions.
"Honeywell's focus is to develop next-generation materials that help semiconductor manufacturers manage the tremendous heat put off by advanced microchips," said Rebecca Liebert, vice president and general manager of Honeywell Electronic Materials. "Overcoming this challenge is crucial to allowing manufacturers to make chips ever more powerful and smaller."
Semiconductor packaging is crucial for the success of semiconductors in end use devices such as desktop computers, laptops, phones, and PDAs. Packaging materials include materials that connect the chip to the end-use device (electrical interconnect), those that transfer and dissipate the heat produced by the chip (thermal management) and those that are used to test the chips ability to perform (burn-in). Thermal management is a particular concern for the semiconductor industry.
Higher power but smaller semiconductors generate massive heat flux, which is the amount of heat travelling across a certain surface in a certain amount of time. The heat flux of today's chips is similar to that experienced by the tiles of the space shuttle upon re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere. Unless this heat flux is addressed, chip performance can be reduced or the chip's lifespan could be shortened.
