The 450mm transition: Many unanswered questions

摘要

The move to a larger wafer size - from 300mm to 450mm - has been the focus of an interesting debate for the last five years. The largest semiconductor manufacturing companies in the world - Intel, TSMC and Samsung - have been strongly advocating the move, urging equipment suppliers to start development (which has started) and SEMI to create the necessary standards (which is done). Equipment suppliers have been understandably slow to embrace the change, given the long time for them to see the return on their investment during the last wafer size transition (200mm to 300mm).