2016 will prove to be a pivotal year in the history of semiconductor lithography.\u00a0 How do I know this? \u00a0Because every year proves to be a pivotal year in the history of lithography.\u00a0 Why should 2016 be any different?\u00a0 Our industry moves too fast to allow a slack year.<\/p>\n
I am frequently reminded of Sturtevant\u2019s Law, not just because it is cute and funny (though it is), but because behind the humor lies a profound truth.\u00a0 Sturtevant\u2019s Law says that the end of optical lithography is 6 \u2013 7 years away.\u00a0 Always has been, always will be.\u00a0 When I started in the field of lithography way back in 1983, Sturtevant\u2019s Law was as yet unformulated but nonetheless in full swing.\u00a0 X-ray or e-beam lithography was sure to take over by 1990 since it was obvious that optical lithography could not cross the 1 micron barrier.<\/p>\n
This was but one of many, many failed predictions of the end of optical lithography.\u00a0 But the fundamental truth behind Sturtevant\u2019s Law is this:\u00a0 we always know what we are doing for the next node (in 2 \u2013 3 years), and are pretty sure about the node after that, but we have almost no visibility into what comes next.\u00a0 We know all of the unsolved problems looming beyond the 6 year horizon, and can\u2019t quite picture the solutions.\u00a0 Sturtevant\u2019s Law is a statement about our research and development timelines and how they relate to the pace of Moore\u2019s Law.<\/p>\n
But while Sturtevant\u2019s Law has been in force for over 30 years, I\u2019m afraid that it may be coming to an untimely end.\u00a0 The reason is simple:\u00a0 we no longer have good visibility out to two nodes (6 years).\u00a0 We have a just barely reasonable impression about what the next node will bring, and are sure that the node after that is impossible.\u00a0 The end of optical lithography is no longer 6 -7 years away, it is 2 \u2013 3 years away, and even that time frame seems impossibly distant and opaque.<\/p>\n
Our angst is about more than just lithography.\u00a0 Of course, we lithographers know that the industry moves to the pace that we set.\u00a0 Still, it is disconcerting to believe that a slowdown in lithography means the end of Moore\u2019s Law.\u00a0 Yet that is what is at stake.\u00a0 In 2016, we must discover a path that keeps Moore\u2019s Law moving forward, or watch Moore\u2019s Law fall flat.<\/p>\n
But a slowdown of Moore\u2019s Law has already begun.\u00a0 Intel\u2019s 14-nm node was a year late, and Intel has admitted that its 10-nm node will also be late, on a 3-year node pace rather than the historic 2-year cycle.\u00a0 TSMC has not admitted the slow-down, but is experiencing it anyway.\u00a0 They created a \u201cfaux\u201d node, a 16-nm product line that has the same dimensions and density as the previous 20-nm node.\u00a0 Revealingly, when the 16-nm node came online last year, they did not report the revenues of that node separately as had been their normal practice, but rather began to lump the 16 and 20-nm node revenues together in one bucket.\u00a0 \u201cFollow the money\u201d was good advice coming from Deep Throat, and is good advice in the semiconductor industry as well.<\/p>\n
Moore\u2019s Law is slowing down because lithography is not keeping up.\u00a0 Multiple patterning is expensive and process control is a serious problem.\u00a0 No other solutions are available.\u00a0 Now, this where EUV is supposed to come in and save the day, right?<\/p>\n
Alas, EUV is late.\u00a0 ASML has made very good progress in the last two years, but that progress has been enough to keep EUV late, not enough to catch up with the industry need.\u00a0 Anyone who has read these conference blogs before knows that I have been and continue to be an EUV skeptic.\u00a0 But for the first time in over 20 years of development, I finally see a glimmer of hope for EUV.<\/p>\n
Time is the enemy of all lithography development programs.\u00a0 The demands of lithography move at an unrelenting pace, and even the slightest schedule slip in a lithography development program is the kiss of death.\u00a0 EUV is late, an almost unmistakable sign of failure, and yet finally there is hope.\u00a0 And here is the reason.<\/p>\n
EUV was supposed to save Moore\u2019s Law.\u00a0 But instead, the slowdown of Moore\u2019s Law may save EUV.<\/p>\n
The 10-nm node will be two years late compared to the original schedule (naming games aside), as we are now on a three-year Moore\u2019s Law cycle.\u00a0 But since EUV is more than two years late, it still could not impact that node.\u00a0 How late will the 7-nm node be?\u00a0 Could it be late enough to use EUV?\u00a0 That is a distinct possibility.<\/p>\n
The big picture of lithography is bigger than the picture we will see at the SPIE Advanced Lithography Symposium in 2016, since the big picture involves the macroeconomics of the semiconductor industry itself.\u00a0 But what we will see here this week is still big and very important.\u00a0 How painful is multiple patterning really?\u00a0 How close is directed self-assembly to being production worthy?\u00a0 What is the status of nanoimprint manufacturing for Flash production?\u00a0 Has there been any progress in taming the roughness beast?\u00a0 And of course, what about EUV source power?<\/p>\n
There are always many questions coming into the start of the SPIE lithography conference.\u00a0 I am excited to start learning the answers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
2016 will prove to be a pivotal year in the history of semiconductor lithography.\u00a0 How do I know this? \u00a0Because every year proves to be a pivotal year in the history of lithography.\u00a0 Why should 2016 be any different?\u00a0 Our industry moves too fast to allow a slack year. I am frequently reminded of Sturtevant\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4,5,6],"class_list":["post-475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-microlithography","tag-mircrolithography","tag-moores-law","tag-spie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lithoguru.com\/life\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lithoguru.com\/life\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lithoguru.com\/life\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lithoguru.com\/life\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lithoguru.com\/life\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=475"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lithoguru.com\/life\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":476,"href":"https:\/\/lithoguru.com\/life\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475\/revisions\/476"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lithoguru.com\/life\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lithoguru.com\/life\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lithoguru.com\/life\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}