Silicon Specialists has over 20 years of wafer polishing/processing experience at our headquarters    and wafer production facility, located in Hayward (Silicon Valley) California, USA. Silicon Specialists provides substantial volume wafer polishing/processing service to customer specifications and production quantities. Silicon Specialists provides wafers and wafer processing services for any size, quantity, and specification. Prime Test, or Reclaim. Quality Wafer Services, Lowest Prices, On-time Delivery. Experience with variety of materials and applications. 

Silicon Specialists provides a variety of wafer processing services. Such Services include:

Wafer polishing - Single-Side or Double-side. Stock and Final Polishing.

Wafer Lapping

Wafer Thinning

Wafer Reclaiming (for re-use) Silicon (Si), and Silicon Carbide (SiC)

Wafer Cut-down/re-size

Edge Grind/ Profile shaping

Laser Marking

Wafer Etch

Wafer Cleaning

Wafer Inspection (incoming and final)

Wafer packaging to customer specs.

WAFER RECLAIM SERVICES
Silicon Specialists brings its many years of specialized experience in the wafer reclaim service to achieve ultimate customer satisfaction. We pride ourselves on exceeding customer objectives, through our precision process engineering and production/quality controls that include careful consideration of initial customer communications/parameters/specifications, incoming wafer inspection and presorting, strip/etch, lapping, polishing, clean/spin/rinse/dry, visual inspect or final inspection metrology tool analysis, final quality assurance documentation, and careful sorting/packaging. We offer best-in-industry results that deliver value and consistency to our customers.

SILICON WAFERS
Our expertise in Silicon goes back several decades. Our process engineers have been at the forefront of Silicon wafer production in virtually every step of the process, including such areas as Silicon crystal growth, slicing, lapping, stepped-polishing, single side polish, double-side polish, edge grind/shape, etching, cleaning, QA-inspections, process engineering and development, polishing plant design/production, special tool manufacturing, training, and packaging. We are highly skilled in all diameters of Silicon wafers from 50mm to 300mm.

Reclaim Silicon Wafers
SILICON CARBIDE (SIC) WAFERS
The process engineers at Silicon Specialists have significant experience in polishing Silicon Carbide, with removal rates that save substantial time and money for our customers. Wafer diameters include 50mm to 200mm. If you need Silicon Carbide (SiC) wafers polished or reclaimed, you can rely on the many years of experience in Silicon Carbide wafer polishing that Silicon Specialists engineers will provide.

THIN WAFERS
Silicon Specialists has the experience and the necessary tools/processes, to provide thin wafers in various diameters. We would be happy to review your particular specifications to determine how we might assist your thin wafer needs.

SPECIAL SERVICES
Customized Processing - The process engineers at Silicon Specialists have been performing custom polishing for many years, and would welcome discussing with you your unique project/application. We take pride in utilizing our knowledge in custom applications to enhance value to our customers. This includes special custom services such as the following:

Various materials/substrates.

Various wafer sizes and shapes.

Various wafer thicknesses including thin wafers.

Wafer Cut Down and shaping services.

Edge Grinding/shaping

QUALITY WAFER
Quality Silicon Wafers
Wafer reclaiming process refers to the recycling of silicon wafers. A reclaimed wafer is one that has been treated, stripped, polished and cleaned. It is then used again in manufacturing or testing of various devices. Usually, the secondhand wafer has multiple layers of different materials which make it useless to qualify the standards defined by the manufacturing, testing or research industries. The reclaim industry processes these wafers to make them useful and cost-effective.

Quality Silicon Wafers are thinner than virgin wafers but are equally useful for testing and less complex functions. The reclaim process includes a few necessary steps which are mentioned below

1: Sorting

The very first step is of sorting which is critical and helps to prevent the reclaim line from being contaminated with different metallic contents present on a used silicon wafer. Sorting includes a keen inspection of wafers. The process starts with visual inspection followed with wafer type determination. The silicon wafers also pass through measurement of dopant and a few mechanical parameters.

2: Stripping

The stripping step may vary as per the current condition and previous processing type of the used wafer. The process is conducted in an automated wet immersion batch tanks with solutions like SPM, alkaline etchs like KOH, Nitric acid, Phosphoric acid or concentrated HF etch. These chemicals are added depending upon the types of metal residues present. Quality Silicon Wafers from reclaim industry usually pass through additional pre-treatment.

3: Lapping and Grinding

Grinding is the process of removing SOI films from the silicon wafer to improve the quality and functionality. Grinding is similar to the process of CMP, but it is much faster. After the grinding process, the wafer requires smoothing and polishing to create uniformity.

After grinding the wafer is set for a mechanical process called lapping. A pad with polishing liquid is rubbed against the wafer to get rid of excess silicon from a wafer substrate. It gives semi-reflective and a dull grey finish. The edges of the wafer are rounded to create a finished look.

SILICON SPECIALISTS
Silicon Wafer
4: Polishing

There are two varieties of polishes- single side polishing and double side polishing. The process is a blend of chemical and mechanical polishing. Double-sided polishing produces the lowest TTV. After polishing the reclaimed wafer becomes thinner than the virgin wafer. If required, metallic contaminants and unwanted particles are removed after the polishing.

5: Cleaning

Batch immersion tanks are required to perform a final cleaning step. At this stage, RCA critical cleaning process is performed which include a combination of H2O: NH4OH: H2O2 at stage one, H2O:HCl: H2O2 at step 2. Reduction of metal levels. After the completion of the cleaning process, a surface tension dryer is used.

6: Inspection

It is the final step where the wafer is sorted again by the thickness and other defect levels before sending back to the market.  Troubleshooting equipment is used to perform the inspection.

Our expertise in Silicon goes back to 1990. Our process engineers have been at the forefront of Silicon wafer production in virtually every step of the process, including such areas as Silicon crystal growth, slicing, lapping, stepped-polishing, single side polish, double-side polish, edge grind/shape, etching, cleaning, QA-inspections, process engineering and development, polishing plant design/production, special tool manufacturing, training, and packaging. We are highly skilled in all diameters of Silicon wafers from 50mm to 300mm.

Prime

Virgin

Test

Reclaimed

Thin Film Oxide

Silicon On Insulator (SOI)

Ultra-thin Wafers

Ultra Flat Wafers < 1um

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