Jordan Valley delivers multiple system repeat order for its thin films metrology systems from major foundry

MIGDAL HA'EMEK, ISRAEL: Jordan Valley Semiconductors Ltd., a leading provider of X-ray metrology solutions for advanced semiconductor fabs, announced the delivery of a follow-on order of its JVX7200 and JVX6200 thin-film metrology systems for a major foundry in the Far East.

"This repeat order clearly shows the customer's confidence in our system's enabling capabilities and production worthiness," said Isaac Mazor, Jordan Valley's CEO. "Jordan Valley metrology tools target the most demanding FEOL and BEOL applications, such as complex SiGe stacks, silicide, high-k/metal gate and metallization," added Mazor.

The JVX7200 metrology platform, winner of SEMI's 2010 "Best of West" award, is installed in several advanced logic fabs, targeting complex SiGe and Si:C metrology for both R&D and production control. The JVX7200 platform combines two absolute measurement techniques: Fast HRXRD (High-Resolution X-Ray Diffraction) and fast XRR (X-Ray Reflectance).

The fast-HRXRD channel measure SiGe stack composition, strain and relaxation while the small spot fast-XRR provides thickness and density of complex SiGe stacks.
Recently introduced, the JVX7200's "VEGA" XRR channel is the first sub-mm spot XRR, which enables on-product measurement with improved precision & repeatability.
The JVX6200 metrology platform combine XRR and XRF channels targeting applications such as high-k/metal gate silicide, ONO, SiON, Cu seed/barriers and others.

"While techniques like SE often require frequent off-line calibrations due to correlation of parameters, the XRR and HRXRD techniques are absolute and provide accurate and repeatable measurements without the need for external calibration," said Alon Kapel, director of Sales and Marketing at Jordan Valley.

"Furthermore, the XRR data analysis methods are easy to use and robust. They can accommodate a wide variation in the thickness ranges around the target values in multilayer stacks unlike the narrow ranges that are often needed in ellipsometry due to variations in the optical parameters n&k," added Kapel.

JVX6200i production metrology tool
The JVX6200i advanced X-ray metrology system is a high throughput, high uptime and low COO production tool. It is a multi-channel metrology tool for advanced semiconductor FEOL and BEOL processes as well as wafer-level packaging (WLP) applications.

The popular configuration combines X-ray fluorescence (XRF) and X-ray reflectance (XRR). Typical applications are: FEOL (High-k/metal gate, SiON and ACL hard masks), BEOL (Cu seed/barrier, Cu electroplating and CMP) and WLP (UBM stack, Sn/Ag micro bumps and Cu pillars).

JVX7200 production metrology tool
The JVX7200 (TM) advanced X-ray metrology system is the first tool for in-line production control of epitaxial SiGe &Si:C applications. This tool combines Fast HRXRD and Fast XRR channels.

The JVX7200 is capable of measuring SiGe composition, thickness, density, strain and relaxation of single and multi-layer stacks on product wafers with high throughput, accuracy and repeatability. Unlike optical or spectroscopic tools HRXRD and XRR are first principle techniques that deliver accurate and precise results without calibration.