Novellus claims that their new Sabre tool is making production chips now, though they won't identify the customer, and claims they've put 150,000 wafers through the first tool shipped. That gives them a clear advantage over AMAT, unless AMAT is keeping their ECD tool under wraps, too.
Regarding Semitool, I don't know enough about either system to judge the relative merits, but you certainly can't ignore them. They certainly have substantial R&D experience, and may also have at least a beta production tool. (It's hard to say, because the chipmakers are being very tight-lipped about what they're actually doing. Only IBM is claiming to be production-ready with copper, though. If there's only one customer, it's unlikely that both Novellus and Semitool are selling tools to it.) Their big disadvantage vs. Novellus would be size and ability to provide the other parts of the equation.
Novellus is also better positioned for alternatives to copper. For instance, a number of Japanese companies are doing serious R&D on aluminum damascene--the cost advantages of damascene, without the risky switch to copper, and DRAMs don't need copper performance yet anyway. That's bad for Semitool, but still a potential market for Novellus.
Katherine |
