Partnership between SUSS MicroTec and SET to develop a combined equipment solution for 3D chip integration

SUSS MicroTec SE and SET Corporation SA announce a partnership in sequential die-to-wafer (D2W) hybrid bonding, a die-based interconnect technology. As part of the partnership, SUSS MicroTec and SET will provide a fully automated, customizable, highest-yield equipment solution to customers. This solution will accelerate the industry’s path towards advanced 3D multi-die solutions such as stacked memory and chiplet integration.

GARCHING, GERMANY AND SAINT-JEOIRE, FRANCE � EQS Newswire - 1 September 2021 – SUSS MicroTec, a leading supplier of equipment and process solutions for the semiconductor industry announces a joint development agreement (JDA) with SET, a leading supplier of high precision flip-chip bonders. The main focus of the JDA is the development of a fully automated, customizable, highest-yield sequential die-to-wafer hybrid bonding equipment solution by combining SUSS MicroTec’s expertise with FEOL-compatible automated surface preparation of wafers and singulated dies which are populated on a wafer or frame and SET’s ultra-high accuracy die-placement technology, which will be further enhanced by high-performance metrology that offers closed-loop feedback to the bonding system.

At a time where traditional transistor-scaling is approaching its limit, 3D packaging and heterogeneous integration have already been widely adopted in the industry in order to further increase the performance and functionality of today’s semiconductor devices. However, today’s 2.5D and 3D packaging schemes are limited by the minimum interconnect density that traditional microbump technology can offer. Hybrid bonding solves this problem by bonding the direct contact between two metal pads (mostly copper) and surrounding dielectrics in one single bonding step. This bumpless bonding approach allows for substantially smaller pitches and higher interconnect density which are the key enablers for future generations of multi-die solutions.

Interconnect density scaling is driven by a number of fast-growing applications that include power computing, artificial intelligence (e.g. autonomous driving), 5G mobile, as well as a variety of additional More-than-Moore devices such as next-generation CMOS image sensors. To obtain high yields for devices with high interconnect densities customers not only require ultra-precise die-placement solutions, but also reliable surface activation and a process guaranteeing particle-free surfaces.

As part of this partnership, SUSS MicroTec’s high-efficiency surface preparation modules and throughput-optimized metrology solutions for post bond overlay verification will be combined with SET’s latest ultra-high accuracy D2W hybrid bonding platform. Closed-loop feedback between the metrology and the die-bonder module will help to continuously monitor and optimize the overlay performance, enabling consistent die-placement accuracy below 200 nm as well as interconnect pitch scales in the sub-micron region. The modular, highly flexible equipment concept allows for stand-alone surface preparation and hybrid bonding as well as a fully integrated equipment solution depending on the specific application and/or customer requirements. This concept also enables an integrated cluster approach that can support all individual hybrid bonding paths in a single platform: wafer-to-wafer (W2W), collective die-to-wafer (CoD2W) and/or sequential die-to-wafer (D2W).

Goetz M. Bendele, PhD, CEO of SUSS MicroTec, puts this into perspective: “Hybrid bonding is one of the main growth drivers of the advanced semiconductor backend equipment space, as well as one of the main growth levers for SUSS MicroTec. With our partnership with SET, we will be able to offer our customers a complete suite of both die-to-wafer and wafer-to-wafer hybrid bonding solutions for the broadest set of heterogeneous integration applications in the advanced backend space. Our die-to-wafer bonding solution, leveraging the combination of SET’s leading-precision die placement technology with SUSS’s proven surface activation, automation, and metrology capabilities, will deliver additional customer value through differentiation in terms of throughput and yield, while at the same time enabling friction-less integration into our customers’ fabrication sites.”

Pascal Metzger, PhD, CEO of SET: “Thanks to several partnerships we had & our more than 10 years experience in hybrid bonding, we have succeeded in taking hybrid bonding from a purely laboratory state to an industrial state. Thus in September 2019, SET launched a stand-alone machine – the NEO HB. Thanks to our new partnership with SUSS MicroTec, we are now going to accelerate the integration and automation phase of the process. This will permit to provide a complete industrial solution to our customers, for applications coming in the very near future such as HPC, IA, 5G and many other more, to diversify our offer and address new market segments.”

For more details on Hybrid Bonding at SUSS MicroTec please visit our website: https://www.suss.com/hybrid-bonding

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About SUSS MicroTec

SUSS MicroTec is a leading supplier of equipment and process solutions for microstructuring in the semiconductor industry and related markets. In close cooperation with research institutes and industry partners SUSS MicroTec contributes to the advancement of next-generation technologies such as 3D Integration and nanoimprint lithography as well as key processes for MEMS and LED manufacturing. With a global infrastructure for applications and service SUSS MicroTec supports more than 8.000 installed systems worldwide. SUSS MicroTec is headquartered in Garching near Munich, Germany. For more information, please visit www.suss.com

About SET

Founded in 1975, based in France, SET is a world leading supplier of high accuracy flip-chip bonders (chip-to-chip and chip-to-wafer) and versatile Nanoimprint Lithography (NIL) solutions. SET accompanies laboratories and industries of semiconductor, which look for a high precision and an important reliability in the assembly of their components in their projects, and accelerate their developments of the chips of future. With equipment installed worldwide, SET is globally renowned for the unsurpassed accuracy and the flexibility of its flip-chip bonders. Ranging from manual loading to fully automated version, they adapt to all main bonding techniques: fluxless reflow, thermo-compression, adhesive joining compression, thermosonic, hybrid bonding. www.set-sas.fr