300-mm fabs: A turning point for the industry?
By Joanne Itow, Semiconductor Business News
Aug 4, 2002 (10:13 PM)
URL: siliconstrategies.com
The following is a regular column provided to SBN by analysts at Semico Research Corp., a market research firm in Phoenix. Itow is a senior analyst at Semico.
We know 300-mm wafers will eventually provide economic benefits, open new doors for technology advances, and move theindustry to the next generation of products. But is this any different from what we've been through with other wafer size transitions?
One of the unique and very important factors in the conversion to 300-mm wafers is rooted in the development of industry standards. Groups such as Sematech and SELETE figured out what had to be done and developed standards for how to do it. These groups developed standards on automation, wafer handling, and the linking of various aspects of the equipment and data flow. The result was a much more integrated process for the design of the facilities and processes for 300-mm.
Intel used those 300-mm fab standards to create an overall vision of what the fab should be. Intel's Fab 11x in Rio Rancho, New Mexico was constructed only after the decisions were made on what that concept would be. The factory was built with unique characteristics based on the vision.
The 300-mm fab does have some unique characteristics, however. In addition, all 300-mm fabs do not look exactly alike and each manufacturer is adopting operational procedures that are unique to each vendor.
And a number of operational items have changed, which will impact the overall chip-manufacturing process:
*The 200-mm fab has people moving within the bays, but a 300-mm wafer fab does not. There is much less handling of wafers in a 300-mm fab, because everything is automated.
*In a 200-mm fab, 60% of the people are there to move the material around the fab. In a 300-mm fab only 40% of the workforce will deal with wafer handling, and that percentage will go down as more of the wafer transportation becomes automated.
*The number of people maintaining the equipment will remain about the same for 200-mm and 300-mm wafer fabs. So in terms of percentage of workforce involved, 300-mm equipment maintenance will represent more of the staff.
*On the other hand, 300-mm fabs are designed to make it easier to maintain equipment. In a 200-mm fab, each piece of equipment is operated independently and operated by a single technician at the tool.
*The 300-mm fab has a much higher level of automation, which will allow central control of the operations within an entire bay and eventually the entire factory. Ideally, the tools will run themselves so that the factory will have a stable process and can be run with a good simulator and scheduling system.
All of these changes for 300-mm fabs were developed jointly between semiconductor manufacturers and equipment vendors. Although there is always a concern that joint development or development of industry standards might affect the advancement of the business, these standards have not compromised the competitive nature of the equipment market.
For example, it has been circulating that Intel selected Nikon over ASML in the first round of a huge 193-nm lithography tool order as the vendor for the critical lithography equipment. However, ASML appears to have booked some 193-nm lithography business within Intel as well. Meanwhile, the largest Taiwanese foundries have continued with ASML.
In a recently released report from Semico Research, the data indicates that the economics and acceptance of 300-mm is now underway. Although there is room for continued improvement, equipment, materials, and products are all ready and companies are making the investment now in order to take advantage of the benefits during the upcoming recovery.
The semiconductor industry is constantly challenged to make products faster, smaller and less expensive. At every juncture, solutions have been found that improve the semiconductor product. The 300-mm wafer is still in its introductory phase, but Semico believes that these larger wafers will enable product development that hasn't even been envisioned yet. |
