Our mission is our statement
|
|
|
Wafers to get bigger
APPARENTLY 12 INCHES is not enough in the semiconductor wafer industry.
Joo-Tai Moon, senior vice president of Samsung Electronics, said that the industry will move to 18-inch wafer technology by 2015.
This seems quite soon given that 12-inch wafer plants are still fairly new, however it is part of a two-pronged technology attack on chips. The first tactic is to get the size of the chips smaller and the second is to make the wafers bigger.
Shrinking the transistors is becoming more and more problematic the closer they get to the size of an atom. However the 18-inch wafer plan is another way forward.
The 12-inch, 300mm wafers used today can yield 2.25 times more chips per wafer than the older 8-inch, 200mm wafers, yet they take just about the same amount of time to pass through a factory, reducing the cost per chip and significantly boosting total monthly output. An 18-inch wafer plant would show a similar reduction in per-chip cost and increase in output.
It has been estimated that a factory designed to make chips on 18-inch wafers could cost between $12 billion and $15 billion to build, nearly triple the price of an equivalent 12-inch wafer factory.
According to Digitimes, Moon believes phase-change RAM (PRAM), oxide-based memory and spin-torque-transfer magnetic-random-access-memory (STT-MRAM) will be the stars of tomorrow.
These next-generation technologies could all be seen as high-efficiency and low-cost alternatives to today's memory standard.
Samsung is spending $7 billion upgrading its plants with a large chunk going to upgrading to 30nm process technology. µ
Share this:
Share
How are the odds on the fact that, once this increase in wafer-size/chip output is in place, we won't see any drop in RAM prices or CPU prices ?
I must be getting old.
When I were a lad and joined Mullards Semiconductors they were proud to explain to me how they 'grew' sticks of silicon from which 2in wafers were sliced. And as I recall those wafers weren't exactly reliable.
Ever since those heady days they've obviously added a secret Viagra chemical to the mix.
However, for the hard of hearing its best to remember that it isn't what you've got, but it's what you do with it that counts. Allegedly.
Those Golden Glowing Pizza Wafers, Glo & Flo. Pizza F.D.&C. Number 1,2,3,4,5,6,7&8 colour, texture & Heart Throbing Pizza delights for PEEPER Pleasers' to Digest.
16" would be Xtra large so 18" Is ULTIMAT WAFER OF ALL TIME. Make Sure Chip hs Good Pizza Colourings' Don't Discount Bright Red & Desert Greens. Look To Konnby Textures. Its ALL In Scale.
Probably bee ten thousands chips EA.
I hope the valence bands in these semiconductors are in an excited state during this size measurement (or I will feel wholly inadequate).