The Precision Machinery Company of Ebara Corporation has achieved 1500 cumulative shipments of our featured product, Chemical Mechanical Polishing (CMP) equipment, this July, 2010. The CMP equipment is one of the critical semiconductor manufacturing systems that enables the planarity demanded in nanometer (one nanometer is millionth of a millimeter) scale by providing chemical and mechanical polishing. Ebara shipped the world’s first “Dry-in/Dry-out”^* CMP equipment in 1993 and is continuing to grow its CMP equipment business today.

　Electronic devices serve us in our daily lives – PCs, mobile phones, home electrical appliances, automobiles etc. These products are continually being driven to provide more functionality, and consumers are demanding they become smaller, lighter and more energy efficient. To meet this demand, today’s semiconductor chip manufacturers must provide an ever increasing amount of transistors and wires to enable these electronic devices. The size of such transistors and wires on a semiconductor chip today can be as small as 45 or 32 nanometers. In order to accomplish this increased density integration, today’s semiconductor chips must also have a multilayer structure analogous to the floors of a high-rise building, which can be 10 or more layers in high-performance semiconductor chips.
　To make such fine transistors and wires and a more multilayer structure, it is critical to provide an advanced planarity in a range of 20 to 30 nanometers in thickness on a 30 centimeter diameter wafer to each of these levels. Ebara’s CMP equipment has been successfully providing advanced planarity solutions to meet these technical challenges.

　Ebara’s latest CMP equipment, the F-REX300S/SII series, which combines our unique “1-head per 1-table” architecture and the 4-table platform, has been well received by customers. These products have achieved both the advanced process performance and high productivity with processing each individual wafer delicately with “1-head per 1-table” architecture while the 4-table platform generates high throughput. Ebara’s achievement of shipping 1500 CMP systems is truly a result of widespread market adoption with a recent trend of increased adoption for copper wiring application.

　Looking forward, with the accelerating speed of an advanced information society and increasing demand for high functionality and size reduction of electronic devices, Ebara’s Precision Machinery Company is dedicated to continuously develop advanced technology to meet higher process requirements for advanced semiconductors, improve a value of our product to customers and enhance customer satisfaction.
　By doing so, Ebara serves a vital role as a manufacturer of production equipment in the field of semiconductors and contribute to the realization of a rich and comfortable society.

*	Dry-in/Dry-out: “Method and Apparatus for Dry-in/Dry-out Polishing and Cleaning of a Semiconductor Device” is patented in the United States (U.S. Patent Number: 5,885,138).

F-REX300S/SII