Forty years ago, as chipmakers looked to increase the speed, efficiency and accuracy of chip production, KLA pioneered an automated inspection system that evolved to become what we now call broadband plasma, or BBP, patterned wafer inspection systems.
Today, as the widespread use of semiconductors across industries drives an ever-greater focus on the quality of the chips, manufacturers are increasing their focus on chip performance, yield and reliability.
New technologies such as high NA EUV lithography and advanced packaging, as well as novel architectures like gate all around (GAA) transistors, backside power delivery and other chip innovations, create production challenges that must be addressed to achieve quality targets.
As part of the process control strategy for today’s chipmakers, wafer inspection is used to detect critical defects of interest (DOI) after specific process steps, supporting fab engineers who work to resolve critical process excursions. BBP inspectors use advanced optical and data processing technologies to discover critical defects on patterned wafers during chip manufacturing. With tunable broadband illumination, flexible operating modes and multiple models, BBP inspectors support defect characterization and monitoring across the process layers, device architectures and design nodes used to produce today’s diverse chip types.
For four decades, BBP has served a key role in semiconductor process control, helping chipmakers identify issues that can affect final chip quality. As chip architectures and processes advance, the KLA global team of scientists and engineers are developing new light sources, sensors, novel algorithms and more that will extend BBP optical inspection well into the future.
The evolution of the technology parallels many manufacturers’ core challenges. During R&D, BBP inspectors deliver comprehensive defect information, which helps speed characterization and optimization of new processes, design nodes and device architectures. During ramp, BBP helps reduce baseline defectivity and accelerate yield learning by quickly finding process excursions, and during high-volume manufacturing, the BBP inspectors leverage high defect sensitivity at optical inspection speed to deliver accurate, actionable data for effective line monitoring.
KLA continues to expand on broadband plasma technology and deliver new solutions that help global chip manufacturers address their innovation challenges. Looking ahead, there will be additional opportunities to build on the legacy of BBP, accelerating the pace of production and enabling improvements in quality and precision.