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VLSI CHIP MAKING’S SINGULAR FUTURE

1). G.Naga Sathish 2) D.Krishna Avinash
B.E ,2/4 ECE, B.E ,2/4 ECE,
S.R.K.R.Engineering College, S.R.K.R.Engineering College,
BHIMAVARAM-534 204. BHIMAVARAM-534 204.
nagasathish007@gmail.com dkavinash@gmail.com

ABSTRACT- Since the invention of the integrated dollars,according to a preliminary analysis by a

circuit in 1958,the number of processing steps research firm.Semiconductor industry jobs in the US
required to make one has grown from less than 10 to alone dropped from 2,68,000 in 1999 to 2,35,100 in
several hundreds. At the same time, the silicon july 2003,according to the US department of labour.
wafers on which the VLSI ICs are produced have Semiconductor industry is still facing serious
gone from being coin sized to being dinner-plate – problems as it claws its way back toward profitably
sized. Today one of these 300-mm wafers can yield and sustained employment growth. And for economic
more than 700 Ics.With such a large number of Ics and technological reasons, the relentless drive towards
coming from a single wafer and with wafers coming faster,cheaper,smaller and good quality chips is a
off manufacturing lines at rates of tens or thousands growing problem.
a month, companies can quickly find themselves
suffering from losses especially in turbulent Many companies are trying to get rid of this
markets.Batch process which is being followed problem.This problem can avoided to some extent if
nowadays by VLSI chip makers is one of the main ICs are manufactured with one wafer at a time
reasons for these losses. In batch process machines process(Singular process) rather than many wafers at a
work on a large batch of wafers at the same time time process(Batch Process).The IC process steps are
and take more than three months to produce VLSI given in brief and the advantages of singular wafer
Ics. To avoid the overproduction of chips,one process over batch process are discussed.
method is to go for single wafer process. In single
wafer process semiconductor companies will be able
to produce chips more quickly when the orders 2.CHIP PRODUCTION TODAY - IN DETAIL
came in, in the exact quantities specified by those
orders. In this paper the IC fabrication steps are Fabrication of a finished packaged IC has three
given in brief. Batch process and the Single wafer key groups of processing steps regarding its type.
process are compared in detail.In the following
years all manufacturers will inevitably adopt single • Making of transistors.
wafer manufacturing process in order to have
• They are wired together into circuits on
faster,cheaper , smaller and good quality chips.
the chip.
• Small silvers of silicon, known as die are
packaged into finished chips.
1. INTRODUCTION
Integrated circuit was invented in 1958 by
Jack Kilby at Texas Instruments,USA. A Silicon wafer
is divided in to number of small blocks.Each block will
give us the required IC after undergoing many
processing steps. Now 300mm wafers can yield more
than 700 Ics.There are many companies like
Texas,Intel,Motorola,National
Semiconductors,Signetics etc..are manufacturing ICs
all over the world in large quantities.

Since the bursting of the dot-com bubble

in 2000 sent IC sales into losses. In the second
quarter of 2001,the entire supply chain including
chip makers, distributors,contract manufacturers and
consumer-product manufacturers was with an excess Fig: 1 Jack Kilby the inventer of IC examining a
of chips worth more than 13 billion dollars. wafer filled with chips at Texas Instruments.

In the third quarter of last year(2004) chip Building an integrated circuit like a computer
oversupply was still at a worrisome 1.6 billion chip is a very complex process. It is divided into two

major parts, front end and back end. In the front end,
you make the components of the circuit. In the back
end, you add metal to connect the components and then
you test and package the chip. Below is a simplified
description of the steps.
3. FRONT END-CONSTRUCTION OF
COMPONENTS
1 The construction plans for the chip
are made and tested .Just as in building
a house, you need a construction plan to
construct with a computer.
2.From the construction plans, masks
with the circuit patterns are made.
4. BACK END – ADDING THE CONNECTING
3.Under precisely monitored
conditions, a pure silicon crystal is
grown. Circuit manufacturing demands
the use of crystals with an extremely
high grade of perfection.
4.The silicon is sawed into thin wafers
with a diamond saw. The wafers are
then polished in a number of steps until
their surface has a perfect mirror-like
finish.
5.The silicon wafer is covered with a
layer of insulating silicon oxide.
6.A covering film of protective material
is put on top of the insulating silicon
oxide. This material, a bit like the film
in any ordinary camera, is sensitive to
light.
7.UV-light is shone through a mask and
onto the chip. On the parts of the chip
that are hit by light, the protective
material breaks apart.
8.The wafer is developed, rinsed and
baked. The development process
removes the parts of the protective
material exposed to light.
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9.The wafer is treated with chemicals
in a process called "etching." This
removes the unprotected insulating
material, creating a pattern of non-
protected silicon wafer parts
surrounded by areas protected by
silicon oxide.
10.The wafer is run through a process
that alters the electrical properties of
the unprotected areas of the wafer. This
process is called "doping." Steps 5-10
are repeated to build the integrated
circuit, layer by layer. Other layers of
conducting or isolating layers may also
be added to make the components.
WIRES
11.Finally, when all the components of
the chip are ready, metal is added to
connect the components to each other
in a process called metalization. This is
done in a way similar to the making of
the components. First a conducting
metal like copper is deposited over the
chip.
12.On top of the metal a layer of UV-
sensitive photo resist is added.
13.Next, a mask that describes the
desired layout of the metal wires
connecting the components of the chip
is used. UV-light is shone through this
mask. The light hits the photo resist that
isn't protected by the mask.
14.In the next step, chemicals are used
to remove the photo resist hit by UV-
light.
15.Another step of etching removes the
metal not protected by photo resist.

16.This leaves a pattern of metal that is
the same as the one described by the
mask. Now, the chip has a layer of
wires that connect its different
components.
17.Today, most integrated circuits need
more than one layer of wires. Advanced
circuits may need up to five different
layers of metal to form all the necessary
connections. In the last picture we have
added another layer of metal to our
example. As you can see, a layer of
insulating material is put between the
two metal layers to prevent the wires
from connecting in the wrong places.
Of course, to add the second layer we
had to go through the same steps as
when adding the first layer of metal.
18.When the final layer of connecting
metal wires have been added, the chips
on the silicon wafer are tested to see if
they perform as intended.
19.The chips on the wafer are separated
with a diamond saw to form individual
integrated circuits.
20.Finally, each chip is packed into the
protective casing and subjected to
another series of tests. The chip is now
finished and ready to be shipped to
manufacturers of digital devices around
the world.
5. BATCH PROCESS
The VLSI IC manufacturers are mainly
following batch process.This is observed to be the one
of the reasons for chip companys’ losses.The batch
processing equipment vastly increases the time it takes
for a wafer to pass through the production line.The
reason for the delay is that the furnace cannot process a
single wafer because it is not made for that.The
equipment’s temperature, gas-flow rate, chemical
concentration is set to handle many wafers at once. So a
wafer must wait until dozens of other wafers are ready
to go in. Some wafers may wait around for days before
they move into the equipment for the next step. So sigle
wafer process is far better than batch process, because
VLSI IC manufacturers can plan their production of
chips whenever they have orders from buyers and
within less time. Other advantages of single wafer
process is are given below.
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5.1 Advantages of single wafer process over batch
process
* More good chips than that of batch process.
* Equipment is smaller than batch equipment.so it
is possible to have better control over conditions
like temparature and gas flow.
* It produces Ics that are faster and more reliable.
* The trick in single wafer manufacturing is to
devise processes that handle a single wafer
efficiently enough to compensate through speed .
for example for the economies of scale that are
lost with elimination of batch processing.
* It is rapid thermal processing.it occurs in a
chamber in which lamps directly heats the
wafer,so the temparature to which each wafer
rises is more uniform over time,and the electrical
properties of the circuits are more uniform as
well.
* In this facility forming of layers that make up
the transistor’s gate involves three substeps.Bull all
three of these substeps can occur inside a single
machine.These combined machines, known as
clustur tools .
* The extreme isolation available with this clustur
machine allows sio2 thickness to be controlled
uniformly to a few mono layers of atoms-a control
not possible with batch machines.
* In some cases this machine is fundamentally
better than its batch counterpart because of
differences in the physical principles through
which they work.
* Sensors inside the machine are used to measure
important parameters .Sensors let technicians make
adjustments to properties like wafer temparaturs
and gas concentrations on the fly.It gives the
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better control of manufacturing conditions and
yields wafers with less variation from chip to
chip and from wafer to wafer. 7.References:

* The economic advantage of this processing [1] Rajendra Singh and Randhir Thakur “Chip
extend beyond the chips themselves .Even the Making’s singular Future” IEEE Spectrum, 2005.
equipment itself is much smaller physically than [2] Douglas Pucknell. VLSI Design Technics
that used in batch processing.

* The smaller area means that building the facility

costs less and many operating expenses are also
significantly lower.

* A packaging technique called wafer level

packaging is increasingly common among chip
makers.It is a step toward this processing ,because
it is possible to do the cleaning steps and to build
connections between the package and the chip and
among chips in the package.

* In this process ics can be manufactured

according to the demand because chip over supply
causes dropping of chip prices.

6.Conclusion

With this discussion it is believed

that all manufacturers will inevitably adopt to
single wafer process rather than batch process
universally in the following years exclusively to
make VLSI ICs.The Ic manufacturers can plan their
production very well with single wafer process