Silicon semiconductors

Electronics industries has rapidly advanced on the back of silicon SEMI, data storage, RAM, IC, and RF filter technology over the years, and the rate of change continues to follow Moore’s law. These small devices are at the heart of many advanced functional gadgets used in communication, PCs, consumer electronics, automotive, and advanced electronics for medical, industrial, and government applications. Most of these devices employ multiple layers of thin film on silicon wafer substrates. X-ray wafer metrology tools are an integral part of any silicon SEMI fab to monitor and control critical device parameters.

Typical materials used in these advanced thin-film devices are semiconductors, metal alloys, dielectrics, and polymers with thickness ranging from several microns down to monolayers. To understand, improve, and design new devices, it is essential to measure key thin film properties such as layer thickness, crystallographic phase, and alloy composition, strain, crystallinity, density, and interface morphology at every stage of the multi-step fabrication process. This presents considerable challenges to X-ray metrology techniques used to control the manufacturing process – instrumentation must keep pace with developments and meet increasingly rigorous semiconductor wafer metrology demands.

Unrivalled performance in X-ray wafer metrology solutions

Instrument performance is one of the key aspects of improving yield and product quality in semiconductor manufacturing. Over the years, Malvern Panalytical has continued to provide its customers with high throughput and best-in-class solutions to support the ever-changing and ever-tightening process requirements in thin-film analysis.

XRF (2830 ZT) wafer analyzer offers the ultimate capability for measuring film thickness and composition. Designed specifically for the semiconductor and data storage industry, the 2830 ZT wavelength dispersive X-ray fluorescence (WDXRF) wafer analyzer enables the determination of layer composition, thickness, dopant levels, and surface uniformity for a wide range of wafers up to 300 mm. With excellent light element performance down to boron and with a throughput of up to 25 wafers per hour, 2830 ZT is the best-in-class thin-film metrology tool for semiconductors industry.
XRD (X'Pert3 MRD and X'Pert3 MRD XL) provides absolute, calibration-free, and accurate information on crystal growth, giving material composition, film thickness, grading profile, and phase and crystal quality
Crystal orientation (Omega/Theta, SDCOM, DDCOM, XRD OEM, Wafer XRD 200, Wafer XRD 300) use of Azimuthal-scan technology to determine the crystal lattice orientation and more, returning accurate results in as fast as ten seconds. Able to characterize a wide range of materials, the SDCOM and DDCOM benchtops deliver high speed without compromising accuracy, while the Omega/Theta offers the highest accuracy and flexibility. The other solutions part of the crystal orientation range are meant for high operational capacity while being able to smoothly integrate into your existing systems. The Wafer XRD 200 and Wafer XRD 300 enable high throughput screening with advanced sorting options for wafer end control while the XRD-OEM tool provides an integrated solution for in-line crystal orientation directly inside crystal processing devices such grinders and wire saws.