Advanced Fab Technology Inc

Group of Semiconductor Professionals, in Development and Manufacturing with laser- like focus to Enhance  Fab Performance

Executive Training
Goal: Know-how for Fab Executives to know the inputs that produces financial results

Short Term: Improve Performance in the Fab

Role of waferfab equipment in fab profitability and growth
Readiness for New Waferfabs and New Technology (MFG, equipment installation, release, preventive maintenance.
Methodology
Process integration
Equipment-process
Daily operation
Final Test
Ramp (Yield- Output)
Cost
New technology readiness for best-in-world time-to-market
Manufacturing innovation
Technology transfer
II Long Term: Solve Fab problems better than Global competitors now and in the future to gain market share

Product Development for time-to-market,.
Transfer roadmap, production ramp and steady state production
Cost Reduction

AFT provides a workshop on methodology, knowledge, tools-techniques, project plan and metrics for yield improvement and excursion control. We are effective use of benchmark data for immediate high yield and have improve yield from 62% to 92% on 28nm Logic yield.

1. Factors for Yield in terms of high yield capability, lot-to-lot, within wafer variation and edge yield with case studies for each. For example yield capability my not be because a tool in incapable of achieving high yield, but because of the maintenance procedures
2. Equipment, Process- Set up and Daily operation, including Hardware, seasoning, insitu clean
3. Effective use of FDC and equipment variables to meet process and final test, not observed by metrology or by current waferfab practices, equipment vendors and consultants.
4. Process marginality identification, centering transistor, interaction, and structural requirements – targets for parametric, defect density and interaction including the why and how of integrating process steps to build CMOS, High Power, SRAM, EPROM and Analog transistors as needed – In-line fail modes and their effects on final test, check for design and layout marginalities improvement and how to fix them.
5. Data Analysis- good lot/bad lot analysis, spatial patterns to pinpoint equipment
6. Defect monitoring program
7. Tools and Techniques for Rapid yield ramp

Description: Equipment- Process is the cornerstone for high yield.  The critical elements are the setup of the equipment, process, materials, metrology, and facilities, then control and equipment-yield model to know the high yield expectation as wafers are processed through their respective process steps.  

The class will be taught in three sessions, tuned to their respective area:

Group 1: Litho, Etch.     Group 2: CMP and WET    Group 3: Diffusion (Thermal) CVD, PVD, Implant  

Content:

• Equipment List Lessons Learned – to ensure equipment is capable of meeting yield requirements including typical fails of each vendor tool types (all tool across the world have similar failures- address these and learning is eliminated.
• Performance Data: Installation, setup, and qualification, including equipment constants that affect yield (this is the biggest problem in fabs that cause yield problem months later and lead to high variation in yield.
• Preventative Maintenance, Components, new spare, and refurbished parts
• Process recipe marginality, materials, material specs., material controls
• Process measurements, edge yield sensitivity to variation in yield
• Issues of observing the right sensors and recipe steps for yield and not get lost in big data and the massive amount of control charts

The training provides a Yield driven FDC workshop for setup and condensing 100,000 charts to observe only those that cause yield perturbations, diagnosis for quickly finding root cause and metrics for real time quality control. Equipment effectiveness for improving fab output and new technology readiness for rapid qualification and ramp are also included. Ideally, when FDC is setup correctly, using process-equipment- integration knowledge, the first lot of a new product will achieve benchmark yield.

Content:

1. Methodology- Concepts and understanding setup flow to prevent 80-90% of misleading signals that shut an equipment down to correct a problem that shows no improvement in yield.
2. Prioritization of right equipment sensors and statistics at critical steps of recipe from cumulative learning. The right set up and execution gains the ability to get zero defects
3. Set control limits: Yield driven (<10%), 3 sigma (10%) and 6/8 sigma (80%) and 8 sigma control limits to equipment is not shut down for false positives. And work is focused on right signals.
4. Daily operations to screen signals for bring up in daily operations meetings and follow up or previous days signals.
5. Data extraction, integration, processing and reporting of data quality required for modelling
6. Modelling to determine equipment-process margin and discovery of new sensitivities for new products and new technology.