JMAR Secures Military Contract for X-Ray Masks
Online staff -- Electronic News, 5/29/2002
e-insite.net
JMAR Technologies Inc., a developer of X-ray lithography systems, today said its JMAR/SAL NanoLithography Inc. (JSAL) division has received a contract for sub-100nm next-generation lithography (NGL) masks used to make advanced chips.
The contract, valued at up to $10 million, comes from the Naval Air Warfare Center in Patuxent River, Md. Funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the two-year contract will allow JMAR to produce X-ray masks used to make high-performance gallium arsenide (GaAs) millimeter wave integrated circuits (MMICs), the company said. MMICs are used for radar, communication and space-borne applications. They are also being used in consumer electronics applications, such as automotive adaptive speed control and for high-speed Internet communications, JMAR said.
JMAR’s Burlington, Vt.-based JSAL business has in turn granted a $3 million subcontract to IBM Microelectronics to design and produce up to 50 masks during the first year of the contract. This work will build on IBM’s X-ray mask manufacturing technology, JMAR said.
The contract follows the San Diego-based company’s recently announced $34.5 million DARPA-funded contract from the Department of the Army for continued development of its 1nm laser plasma PXL system.
"We are currently assembling an all-JMAR PXL system at our JSAL Burlington facility. It combines an upgraded JSAL 5J X-ray stepper with the latest laser plasma soft X-ray source developed at JMAR Research (JRI) in San Diego," said Robert Selzer, senior VP for technology at JSAL. "We call this our NanoPulsar II system. It is scheduled for completion this summer and to be performing sub-130nm, and possibly sub-100nm lithography, before year-end. The masks to be provided to us by IBM under this program will play a critical role in enabling our PXL systems to demonstrate their ability to produce high-performance chips, at lower cost, well before other alternatives become available." |
