Enthone breaks ground on copper damascene production plant
Enthone has announced the construction of a new production facility for the exclusive manufacturing of certain components of the company's next generation ViaForm copper damascene electroplating chemistries.
Copper-based chips are semiconductor integrated circuits, usually microprocessors, which use copper for interconnections. Since copper is a better conductor than aluminium, chips using this technology can have smaller metal components, and use less energy to pass electricity through them. Together, these effects lead to higher-performance processors. They were first introduced by IBM, with assistance from Motorola, in 1997.
Scheduled to open this fall, the facility is being built to address growing market demand. It will also further enable the ability to meet a more stringent set of requirements the semiconductor wafer fabrication market is calling out for.
From left to right: Greg Watka, Director of Operations - Enthone Americas; Dave Penman, Vice President of Global Operations - Alent plc; Bob Weber, Plant Manager - West Haven; Jason Maupin, Vice President - Enthone Americas; James Kalanta, Vice President - Alent, and; Matti Liliback, Enthone Engineering & Facilities Manager
The Enthone ViaForm Copper Damascene Manufacturing Facility further expands and strengthens the company's high volume manufacturing (HVM) production and advance research centre, all of which are located at its global headquarters in West Haven, Connecticut USA.
Similar to the HVM, the new facility will exceed Class 1000 packaging requirements and feature computer integrated manufacturing, including in-line particle count, fully automated and enclosed chemical distribution, and dedicated processing streams. This significant investment makes Enthone more vertically integrated in manufacturing which enables enhanced control over quality and quicker response to supplying customer needs.
Enthone will continue to maintain additional manufacturing at locations throughout the United States as specified by Process of Record (POR) requirements. Supported by the company's Customer Value Six Sigma program, all copper damascene chemical manufacturing adheres to stringent batch-to-batch control and consistency standards as required by semiconductor producers worldwide.
Jason Maupin, Vice President, Enthone Americas says, "This expanded manufacturing capacity tangibly demonstrates Enthone's commitment to addressing our customers exacting manufacturing requirements, as we continue to develop electrochemistries to meet advanced copper interconnects at 20 nanometres and beyond."
Enthone says its ViaForm copper damascene processes deliver superior filling performance for wafer fabrication. Each process is specially designed for manufacturing advanced copper interconnects and provides a high degree of process control that enables a more robust interconnect fill capability and ensures greater device yield and reliability. Used by the many semiconductor manufacturers, ViaForm chemistry is claimed to reduce wafer defects and has proven to capably integrate into Enthone customers' process flow.
