High output production in a very competitive market environment is the key challenge and requires highest product quality and yield management. Since feature sizes are shrinking to 65 nm and beyond, inspection tools to quickly find nano-scale killer defects on wafers had to be developed. Inspection typically applies to such items as reticles (masks), wafers, etc.

 

Most common technologies used for wafer inspection are scanning electron microscopes (SEM) and laser scanning microscopes (LSM). To get to the highest resolutions, vibration free ultra high vacuum in the range of 10^-11 mbar to be applied for generating the E-beam in the SEM column. The wafer processing chamber needs high vacuum, where a vacuum in the range of 10^-3 - 10^-4 mbar is required for loading and unloading the wafers (L/L).

 

Main fields of application for our products are:
 

 

Our products are used for: