Supercritical Alliance
MIS develops processes and chemical formulations for CO2-based process solutions.
The joint development agreement focuses on the delivery systems of semiconductor grade CO2 at supercritical pressures and sub-fab systems for chemical blending, pressure and temperature control before delivery to the process tools. Additional systems for CO2 recycling and waste recovery are an integral part of the delivery technology. BOC Edwards has full commercial responsibility for the technology.
The initial applications for supercritical CO2 include wafer drying, cleaning and photoresist strip. The advantage of the supercritical fluid is that it can penetrate the fine features of sub-90nm structures, perform the required cleaning or drying function and vacate the features in preparation for the next process step. To perform these processes the industry needs high purity CO2 at pressures ranging from 40 to 200bar.
Since CO2 has to now been little used in the fab, new infrastructure is needed to install these processes. BOC Edwards has the exclusive rights to products derived from Micell's intellectual property (IP) and jointly developed IP in wafer cleaning, stripping and drying for the microelectronics markets.
