INDUSTRY NEWS

Reclamation project

Kobe Precision's new 64,800-sq-ft silicon wafer reclaim fab in Hayward, CA, will be able to process up to 90,000 8-in.-equivalent wafers per month, making it the largest facility of its kind in North America. Paul Miller, vp and gm of the company, says the plant is ramping to volume production and all equipment, including the final cleaning tool pictured above, should be installed and qualified by the end of March. The chipmaker customers use the reclaimed wafers as test wafers to optimize and monitor their manufacturing processes. The reclaim process involves the removal of the various surface films and layers, after which the used wafers are repolished and cleaned, ending up in a Class10/1000 cleanroom with Class 1 minienvironments for the final cleaning stages before packaging. Miller says that Kobe's patented process consistently removes only 20 µm of the substrate surface, compared with 50—80 µm in earlier days. The process is robust, regardless of the type of incoming materials or patterning found on them, including copper interconnects. Noting that reclaimed prime wafers were used during the silicon shortage of the 1970s, Miller wonders why his products couldn't play the same role now. "Reclaimed wafers are like new wafers, except they're thinner," he says. "Why do we need to make perfect silicon when all that matters is a few microns on top?"

Photo courtesy of Kobe Precision