EV Group of St Florian, Austria - a supplier of wafer bonding and lithography equipment for semiconductor, micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS), compound semiconductors, power devices and nanotechnology applications says that a HERCULES nanoimprint lithography (NIL) track system has been ordered by micro/nanotechnology R&D center CEA-Leti of Grenoble, France, where it will augment the process development and demonstration capabilities available to participants in the collaborative EVG-Leti INSPIRE program.
More than an industrial partnership to develop NIL process solutions, the INSPIRE program was launched by Leti and EVG in June 2015 to demonstrate the cost-of-ownership benefits of NIL for a wide range of applications, such as photonics, plasmonics, lighting, photovoltaics, wafer-level optics and biotechnology. Through INSPIRE, Leti and EVG are supporting the development of new applications from the feasibility-study stage to the first manufacturing steps on EVG platforms, as well as transferring integrated process solutions to industrial partners. The aim is to significantly lower the barriers for adopting NIL technology for use in manufacturing novel products.
"Nanoimprint lithography has shown significant potential as a low-cost, high-resolution patterning solution for emerging and growing applications outside the semiconductor industry," says Laurent Pain, patterning program manager, Leti. "The INSPIRE program launched by Leti and EVG is designed to accelerate the adoption of this promising technology in high-volume manufacturing. Installing this tool supports our goal of expanding and accelerating the scope of INSPIRE and demonstrating the benefits of this versatile, powerful nano-patterning technology," he adds.
"To date, this program is supporting the development of NIL solutions for several customers thanks to the combined expertise and capabilities provided by both organizations," says Markus Wimplinger, EVG's corporate technology development and IP director. "With the addition of EVG's HERCULES NIL track system - which has already been installed in multiple high-volume manufacturing sites - we expect INSPIRE's success to continue to grow."
HERCULES NIL is a fully integrated track system that combines cleaning, resist coating and baking pre-processing steps with EVG's proprietary SmartNIL large-area NIL process in a single platform. It can imprint structures in sizes ranging from tens of nanometers up to several micrometers while offering throughput of 40wph (wafers per hour) for 200mm wafers. The system is built on a highly configurable and modular platform that accommodates a variety of imprint materials and structure sizes - providing a high degree of flexibility in addressing manufacturing needs. The fully integrated approach also minimizes the risk of particle contamination, says EVG.
