Re <<Oh yes there is. First silicon is the first silicon of the full design. >>
Oh I know that, but that does not say much. It says nothing about how it should work. While developing the process, AMD did 0.13 SOI silcon well before anyone thinks. But there was no expectation as to it working.
Mani
I'm sorry Mani, but yes it does. I work in Semiconductor Manufacturing, and First Silicon to us means functional working die, according to design. Nothing less. Granted, that says nothing about die yield. Hopefully you will get multiple funtional die on the "First Silicon" wafers, but regardless, One functional die on the wafer, regardless of speed, is "First Silicon".
As far as the Process goes, we don't really say "First Silicon". A Process is deemed "Manufacturable", when Yield and Bin Splits meet the required pay back. If you are hitting your tool Performance Parameters, you should end up with expected Bin Splits at End Of Line. Of course, the Process continually evolves, and the bar in Process Engineering is always being raised....
I like to think of it as Job Security.......
:-)
Semi |
