Cymer Ships ArF Light Source for Lithography

Light source developer Cymer LLC has announced the first shipment of the newly qualified XLR 800ix light source for argon fluoride (ArF) immersion lithography systems.

Several leading semiconductor manufacturers received early access upgrades to the XLR 800ix, achieving <2-fm total bandwidth variation in every exposure field, about 10 times better than existing technology used today.

As chipmakers extend the use of ArF immersion light sources with multipatterning to the sub-10-nm technology nodes, it becomes increasingly critical to reduce variability across all processes. In partnership with chipmakers, Cymer found that lower bandwidth variation can lead to lower critical dimension variation, which improves patterning performance both within and wafer to wafer. The XLR 800ix introduces new bandwidth stabilization technology, enabling an eight times improvement in bandwidth measurement fidelity, which can be used to tightly control bandwidth stability.

“We are seeing a strong pull to upgrade our installed base light sources to the newest configuration because the XLR 800ix’s performance far exceeds customers’ expectations,” said David Knowles, vice president of the product development group at Cymer. “From technology improvements to application enhancements, the XLR 800ix brings together all our strengths into one platform to deliver powerful results for our customers.”

Cymer develops lithography light sources used by chipmakers to pattern advanced semiconductor chips.