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Strategic Acquisitions: Expanding KLA-Tencor’s Ability to Help Customers Reduce Risk and Increase Profitability Maintaining the technological edge has always been key to being competitive in the semiconductor industry. With today’s accelerating pace of technological change, however, the risks inherent in maintaining that edge are steadily increasing. To reduce those risks, semiconductor companies need new strategies that are designed to accelerate the knowledge transfer process from the development fab to manufacturing operations.
and customizable yield analysis programs that facilitate wafer lot disposition, increase productivity and enable excursion identification in real time; and 3) a proprietary integration technology that facilitates real-time communication across all KLA-Tencor tools. The PMC-Net solution is based on a scalable architecture that can incorporate new analysis modules and additional data sources to meet changing fab requirements.
Recognizing the criticality of this knowledge transfer process, KLA-Tencor introduced the industry’s first process module control (PMC™) solution last year. Delivering a fab-wide process control infrastructure, the PMC approach integrates parametric and defect control systems with automated data acquisition, analysis, simulation and modeling and connectivity software. As a result, a fab’s engineering staff can rapidly optimize yield across the fab’s most critical processes — lithography, films, etch and chemical mechanical planarization.
“KLA-Tencor has recently acquired two software technologies that greatly enhance our PMC-Net capabilities,” said Gary Dickerson, KLA-Tencor’s chief operating officer. “These acquisitions reflect our dedication to providing new software-based, leading-edge yield management technology to our customers as expeditiously as possible. Our corporate strategy is to accomplish that goal through a focused combination of internal product developments and external partnerships and acquisitions.”
Last November, KLA-Tencor augmented its PMC solution with its PMC-Net™ software, the industry’s first software solution to connect all yield, process and test-floor related data into a single, automated, customizable and easy-to-use data collection, analysis and reporting system. This solution enables semiconductor manufacturers to speed time to market and time to profit by helping them to accelerate yield learning rates and reduce time to corrective action for yield and process excursions. The system accomplishes this through three unique core components: 1) a centralized database that stores all yield-relevant data from across the fab in a single format; 2) the PMC-Net Applications Suite™, an expanding range of automated, modular
ACME Systems As the leading supplier of yield engineering analysis software, Taiwanbased ACME’s software is used to correlate parametric electrical test and wafer sort yield data with in-line work in progress (WIP) and metrology and defect data. ACME’s patented Advanced Correlation Engine (ACE™) has been incorporated into the PMC-Net’s Klarity ACE™ software module. “By using the Klarity ACE module in conjunction with PMC-Net, device manufacturers will be able to access process and test data that can be rapidly compiled, correlated and analyzed—reducing the time to actionable information and speeding the ramp to higher device yields,” commented Dickerson. “ACME’s advanced engineering analysis software is installed at Spring 2000
15 fabs worldwide, and customers report that the ACE technology enables a 10 to 20 times reduction in time from problem identification to solution.” FINLE Technologies FINLE’s industry-standard lithography modeling and data analysis software enables semiconductor manufacturers to speed development of the advanced lithography processes required to develop and produce integrated circuits with 0.13 µm and smaller geometries. Combined with KLA-Tencor’s inspection and measurement tools and expertise, FINLE’s lithography modeling and analysis software will provide customers with a closer connection between in-line parametric data, lithography process modeling and device performance. “The 0.13 µm node is a critical inflection point for the industry,” noted Dickerson. “Since these design rules are well below the wavelength of the light used for imaging, the ability to model, measure and control the lithography process becomes as mission-critical as the imaging technology used.” As a result of these acquisitions, KLATencor has expanded the PMC-Net yield information network’s capabilities, which, in turn, increases the benefits customers gain from implementing it in their fabs. The ACME acquisition, which resulted in Klarity ACE, adds to the ability to bring related information together in one place. Its advanced correlation engine provides powerful analysis and visualization tools that help the process engineer recognize and understand process excursions and determine the necessary corrective action. In addition, FINLE’s Klarity CD provides linewidth-specific process window analysis, further extending the capabilities of the PMC-Net solution.
Yield Management Solutions
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