Semiconductor chip material king- sputtering target material

In the chip industry, sputtering target is a necessary raw material for vlSI manufacturing.  Which makes use of the ion, ion source through accelerating gathered in the high vacuum, and the formation of a high speed can ion beam, the bombardment of solid surface, ions and solid surface atomic momentum exchange, from solid surface atomic solid and deposition in the basal surface, bombarded solid is sputtering deposition film of raw materials, known as the sputtering target materials.  Target material is the core material in sputtering process.  

The unit device of integrated circuit is composed of substrate, insulating layer, dielectric layer, conductor layer and protective layer. Among them, the dielectric layer, conductor layer and even protective layer need to use sputtering coating process, so the sputtering target is one of the core materials for preparing integrated circuit.  The coating targets in the field of integrated circuit mainly include aluminum target, titanium target, copper target, tantalum target, tungsten-titanium target, etc., which require high purity of target, generally more than 5N (99.999%).  

Target classification There are many kinds of sputtering target, according to different classification standards, there can be different categories.  Sputtering targets can be classified by shape, chemical composition and application field.  

Sputtering target: although the volume is small, the core technology  

High purity metal sputtering target is mainly used in wafer manufacturing and advanced packaging process. Taking chip manufacturing as an example, we can see that it takes seven production processes to change a silicon chip into a chip.  They are diffusion (ThermalProcess), photo-lithography (Etch), IonImplant (Etch), DielectricDeposition, chemical mechanical polishing (CMP),  Metalization refers to the corresponding equipment, material and process used in each link.  The sputtering target is used in the process of "metallization", which uses high-energy particles to bombard the target with thin film deposition equipment and then forms metal layers with specific functions on the silicon wafer, such as conductive layer and barrier layer.  

Sputtering target material industry chain  

Sputtering target material industry chain basically presents a pyramid distribution.  The industrial chain mainly includes metal purification, target manufacturing, sputtering coating and terminal application.  

Terminal application is the largest area in the whole industry chain, including semiconductor chips, flat panel displays, solar cells and other fields.  

The purity of raw materials is the key factor affecting the properties of thin film materials, and high purity metal raw materials are the basis of target material manufacturing.  

High purity metal purification is divided into chemical purification and physical purification, in practical application, usually use a variety of physical and chemical means of joint purification to achieve the preparation of high purity materials.  

Different downstream applications have different requirements for sputtering targets, such as:  Semiconductor chips for sputtering target material purity metal materials, internal microstructure set a strict standard, need to master the key technology in the process of production and through long-term practice to make products that meet the technological requirements, therefore, semiconductor chip demand for sputtering target materials is the highest, the price is also the most expensive.  

In contrast, flat panel display, solar cells for sputtering target purity and technical requirements are slightly lower, but with the increase of target size, sputtering target welding bonding rate, flatness and other indicators put forward higher requirements.  

Development trend of target technology  

Sputtering target material to large size, high purity development  

The development trend of sputtering target technology is closely related to the technological innovation in the downstream application field. With the technological progress of the application market in thin film products or components, the sputtering target also needs to change accordingly.  

In the downstream application fields, the semiconductor industry has the highest quality requirements for sputtering target and sputtering film. With the manufacture of larger size silicon wafers, the sputtering target is also required to develop in the direction of larger size. At the same time, it also puts forward higher requirements for the control of sputtering target grain.  

The purity of the sputtering film is closely related to the purity of the sputtering target. In order to meet the needs of higher precision and finer micron semiconductor technology, the purity of the sputtering target is increasing, and even reaches 99.9999%(6N) purity.