Company Profile

Despite the technological advancements in online analytical metrologies for ultrapure water (UPW) quality monitoring, offline measurements of grab samples are critical to assess certain quality parameters to date not yet available for online analyzers (i.e. metals and ions). The current recommendations from IRDS (2021 yield enhancement) for metals in UPW to is <1 ppt, for critical metals for image sensors even <0.2 ppt at POP. Therefore, high performance analytics is required in terms of limit of quantification and analytical range. To be able to reliably measure such low concentrations of metals in grab samples, clean sampling strategies are absolutely required to avoid cross contamination onsite. In this work, we present a simple and effective tool helping to bring the samples from the facility to the lab in a clean and reliable way, minimizing main cross-contamination normally occurring during sampling in an industrial environment.

Nanoparticles represent one of the most critical contaminations in ultrapure supplies for semiconductor fabrication addressing ultrapure water (UPW), gasses and chemicals as well as materials of construction decreasing yield on the wafer. Along the UPW generation process, there are sources (e.g. materials) and sinks (e.g. filter) for nanoparticles. As final barrier for nanoparticles in the polishing step, ultrafilters are commonly used on UPW plants. However, the performance of the ultrafilters in the field in terms of removal performance for particles need to be investigated to come up with pro-active approaches for particle removal. Especially for UPW, there is a lack of online particle metrologies down to particle size of sub 50 nm. This study aims to give an overview on different particle metrologies to better understand the particle removal performance by ultrafilters on the market.

In the yield enhancement report 2021 there is a call for highly controlled deposition experiments to determine the particle deposition rate on the wafer compared to the known particle count in the ultrapure water (UPW) to gain better understanding about the contamination sources on-wafer. The goal of this collaborative study between Lam Research as a tool supplier and Ovivo Switzerland as an UPW engineering company is to investigate potential correlation between UPW quality form a full scale UPW plant and particle deposition on standard silicon 300 mm wafer.

In water treatment history, the problem of increased concentration of disinfection byproducts (DBPs) started to emerge in the early 1900s. This is when chlorine (and ozone) started to be applied as primary disinfection agents for drinking water. A reaction of the disinfection agent with organic compounds present in water often leads to the formation of various types of DBPs. Throughout the years, with a growth in awareness around the negative impacts of DBPs on human health, previously underutilized DBP removal technologies gained importance while new ones have also been developed.

This presentation was given as part of the Ultrapure Micro 2021 annual conference. It was given as part of the ultrapure water strand.

This presentation was given as part of the Ultrapure Micro 2021 annual conference. It was given as part of the ultrapure water strand.

Ultrapure water (UPW) is one of the main materials for electronics fabrication and therefore, it needs to be monitored for critical parameters such as nanoparticles (NP). The state-of-the-art online measurement techniques are challenged by particles at the killer particle sizes smaller than 10 nm. Due to the uncertainties in NP detection, the identification of NP sources and sinks in UPW system is limited nowadays. This review article aims to give an overview on the current developments and perspectives in metrologies for detection and control. The following topics will be discussed: transferability of general definition of NP to UPW, state-of-the-art particle analytics, sources and sinks of NP in UPW systems as well as dominant particle interactions responsible for NP contamination. This article was originally published in the Ultrapure Micro Journal in November 2017.

Nanoparticle contamination of ultrapure water (UPW) for microelectronics fabrication is expected to significantly decrease the yield and reliability of semiconductor devices. Tight nanoparticles control poses a technical and analytical challenge, especially in the particle size range down to a few nanometres. Most state-of-the-art online particle counters do not address the needs of advanced microelectronics manufacturing with critical particle sizes below 20 nm. Therefore, understanding of sources of nanoparticle contamination and strategies for control is limited. This study aims to profile nanoparticles ≥10 nm in a full-scale UPW polishing system after each process step using two novel particle measurement systems: an optical particle counter and an acoustic particle counter. For the first time, the performance of a whole UPW polishing system, including a Reverse Osmosis (RO) unit in terms of particle rejection, was investigated. Both particle counter instruments were evaluated with positive results. A statistical analysis was carried out to compare the significance of the particle counts achieved by the two different detection principles. Profiling throughout the UPW polishing system revealed that both instruments measure particle concentrations in the same range. The data is consistent and shows a clear trend: ion exchange mixed bed, Reverse Osmosis (RO) and ultrafiltration remove particles and represent sinks for nanoparticles ≥20 nm. The removal of nanoparticles between 10 nm and 20 nm is limited in this case however, especially for the final ultrafiltration. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with elemental analysis demonstrated that the particle chemistry was diverse. This indicates that different particle chemistries and particle properties might have influenced the particle counts. The results contribute to the advanced understanding of nanoparticle behaviour in UPW and provides more confidence in terms of monitoring at the lower particle range. This article was originally published in the Ultrapure Micro Journal in March 2019.

Water management at advanced facilities has become increasingly complex. The manufacture of the new generation of technologies has increased water demands and posed new challenges for internal and external infrastructure. This webinar focused on proactive solutions and strategies based on recent developments in SEMI Standards. The panel then discussed risk management, environmental compliance, reliability issues and data management for water management challenges.

This Q&A session took place at the 2020 Ultrapure Micro annual conference. It was a part of the Ultrapure Water Production track, and included speakers from the Critical Particle Monitoring session.