Lithography
Research and development platform recently united IMEC and Hynix Semiconductor. Joining forces in a collaborative effort the companies will explore immersion and EUV lithography challenges within IMEC’s non-volatile memory program.
Hynix joins IMEC’s (sub-)32nm CMOS research platform
Hynix Semiconductor Inc (Hynix has entered into a strategic partnership with IMEC, to perform research and development for the (sub)-32nm memory process generations.
As part of the agreement, Hynix will collaborate within IMEC’s advanced lithography program addressing both immersion and EUV lithography challenges and within IMEC’s nonvolatile memory program. The latter program has gained significantly increased momentum in the past year by expanding its floating gate and nitride memory activity lines into advanced material research, including exploration of advanced high-k dielectrics. From June 2007 onwards, a team of researchers of Hynix will reside at IMEC to closely collaborate with IMEC’s researchers in the above mentioned areas. In this way, they will build up fundamental understanding and develop robust solutions for the 32nm and beyond DRAM and Flash memory process generations.
With this agreement, the top five memory suppliers including Hynix, Elpida, Micron, Qimonda and Samsung, collaborate within IMEC’s global research platform to scale CMOS to 32nm node and beyond. The platform also unites multinational logic IDMs and foundries, including Infineon, Intel, NXP, Panasonic, STMicroelectronics, Texas Instruments and TSMC. With leading companies of the two semiconductor market segments jointly collaborating in the platform, a selective interaction and cross-fertilisation is established which enhances process R&D to the 32nm node and beyond answering the needs of the whole semiconductor market.
“With facing various challenges in developing next generation technologies, difficulty and risk have continually increased,” said Dr. Park Sung-Wook, Executive Vice President and head of R&D Division, Hynix Semiconductor. “By joining IMEC and collaborating with industry-leading partners, we expect to lessen the risk for developing leadingedge, cost-effective technology and contribute to the growth of the semiconductor industry.”
“We are excited that Hynix has joined our research platform. Their valuable know-how in memory scaling will be an important asset for our global research platform,” said Prof. Gilbert Declerck, President and CEO of IMEC, (pictured above). “The fact that the world’s top five memory suppliers and five leading logic manufactures and foundries joined our research platform proves we have been successful in adapting our programs to the needs of all semiconductor players. The programs run in a balanced way with good interaction and cross fertilisation between logic and memory companies.”
