PORTLAND, Ore.—Chip equipment vendor KLA-Tencor Corp. rolled out new tools for overlay control and photomask inspection Wednesday (Sept. 5) at the Semicon Taiwan tradeshow in Taipei.
Multi-patterning is growing in use and prominence as semiconductor manufacturing moves below the 28-nm node. But multi-patterning—a lithography technique that enhances feature density on the wafer—also introduces new sources of overlay errors and mask defects.
KLA-Tencor's new Archer 500 Overlay Metrology System is designed for high-volume manufacturing using multi-patterning at sub-28 nanometer nodes. By measuring and characterizing overlay errors, the Archer 500 improves accuracy and measurement speed as well as enabling the use of thin resist stacks and new materials such as opaque hard masks, according to the company.
"The demands of double-, triple-, quadruple- and other multi-layer patterning techniques have created very strict overlay specifications," said Becky Howland, senior director of marketing at KLA-Tencor (Milpitas, Calif.). "The Archer 500 measures on-layer, to-layer and within-layer errors, enabling accurate lithography overlay control for advanced nodes."
KLA-Tencor's Archer 500 has new illumination options that expand overlay measurement capability to new lithography layers and materials.