Integrated Materials Solution^® Technologies

As dimensions become smaller, interface properties such as resistance become more significant than the bulk properties of the material. Every atomic layer is critical, and variability becomes a showstopper. This requires integration of multiple processes in vacuum, to protect and carefully engineer interfaces essential to solve the critical roadblocks to performance, power and scaling.

Integrated Materials Solution^® or IMS^™ technologies combine multiple processes and customized metrology and sensors in a single platform–almost like a fab within a fab. Applied Materials is using its broad portfolio of process technologies, unit process leadership, and domain expertise to develop integrated solutions for transistors, interconnects, memory, and packaging.

One of the best examples of IMS technologies from Applied Materials is the materials engineering solution called the Endura^® Copper Barrier Seed IMS^® system. It is an integrated materials solution that combines seven different process technologies in one system under high vacuum: ALD, PVD, CVD, copper reflow, surface treatment, interface engineering and metrology. The combination replaces conformal ALD with selective ALD, eliminating a high-resistivity barrier at the via interface. The solution also includes copper reflow technology that enables void free gap fill in narrow features. Electrical resistance at the via contact interface is reduced significantly, improving chip performance and power consumption, and enabling logic scaling to continue to 3nm and beyond. The Endura Copper Barrier Seed IMS system is now being used by leading foundry-logic customers worldwide.