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Technology Stocks : General Lithography -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bilberry who wrote (1285)	11/28/2001 2:42:59 AM
From: Andrew Vance	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1305

Just wanted to post the following article as an historical archive and as some small validation of my 25 years of lithography expertise. I took a great deal of flack from the SVGL people in the past, and with some supposed Micrascan experts on this subject. As it turns out, we are finally burying the Censor stepper that was technically inferior. Yes, the Micrascan comes from a long line of failures, starting with its original incarnation of a Censor Stepper that was re-engineered from the ground up as the Micrascan I when Perking Elmer took them over. The Micrascan became a IBM play toy with most of the systems owned by IBM, who forced it into the SEMATECH fabs in Austin Texas. From there it was re-incarnated in numerous model versions and found its way into Intel and a select small group of users elsewhere. To coin a phrase from a colleague, this has always been a "pig on stilts." Now that it is likely the Micrascan is to be put into its coffin, maybe people will believe me about the patent Ultratech has that could put a world of hurt on the step and scan equipment providers that may be forced to pay royalties of some sort to UTEK, as these systems start to go mainstream. Andrew November 27, 2:27 AM ET - ASML Selects 300mm TWINSCAN as Single Platform at 193nm Wavelength (BUSINESS WIRE) - ASML Holding N.V. of the Netherlands (ASML) announced that it would converge its 193nm wavelength product offering onto a single platform, the TWINSCAN™ AT1100, the industry's first high-productivity, dual-stage ArF (193nm) lithography system for 300mm wafer processing with 100nm resolution. ASML will discontinue before year-end the development and shipment of its Micrascan V product, a 193nm wavelength system acquired through the company's merger in May 2001 with the Silicon Valley Group, Inc. The company will extend TWINSCAN manufacturing competencies and certain R&D programs from the Netherlands to the Wilton, Connecticut, facility to optimize ASML's industrial base in the United States. Developed for volume production applications, the 300mm TWINSCAN AT1100 is a 193nm wavelength system with the industry's highest numerical aperture ArF lens. ASML has been the leading supplier of high numerical aperture 193nm solutions to the industry since June 2001 through its 200mm PAS 5500 Step & Scan platform. TWINSCAN features dual wafer stage technology that enables the exposure of one wafer and the alignment of the next wafer to take place in parallel, giving higher throughput and increased productivity.