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Politics : Formerly About Applied Materials -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Proud_Infidel who wrote (15225)	2/1/1998 12:21:00 PM
From: Big Bucks	Respond to of 70976

BK. An interesting comment.<snip> We already see a number of our customers well underway in pursuing 0.18-micron programs," he said. As feature sizes shrink below 0.25 micron, more mask layers are used, and this means additional cleaning steps and more complex chemistries in the etching of side walls for finer geometries, Gibson added. What he didn't say was that 0.18uM is probably still 12-24 months away from getting close to production worthiness. Fabs are still struggling trying to get to 0.25uM and need to establish profitability for an extended time at this feature size to help fund the next push to smaller geometries. You can't just turn on this kind of process capability overnight since the supporting technologies aren't in place from the equipment manufacturers yet. Full 0.18uM equipment set support won't be ready for full manufacturing capability for at least 12 months if not longer. Fabs also need to show profitability and develop manufacturing expertise at reduced geometries before proceding to the next level. 0.18uM and below is being targeted to co-incide with the 300mm toolsets, which are still in development. These technology transitions take time and significant R&D capitalization before they are a marketable commodity. All facets of the technology transition must come together at the same time to be production viable, it is a daunting task not easily implemented or well controlled. There are tremendous technical and legal (patent) issues to contend with. BB