HERCULES^® C smartM

ROBUST SENSOR for MANUFACTURING CONTROL

     Quality Management by Process Control

Product:

• Hercules^® smartM C (10 - 40 MHz)
  no DC bias or RF peak voltage measurement point required.

Applications:

• Routine manufacturing control
• Quality control
• Faults Detection and Classification
• Conditioning (seasoning) control
• Chamber matching
• Virtual Metrology
• Pre-process fault detection
• Product monitoring
• Maintenance

Parameters:

• Electron collision rate as effective collision rate for momentum transfer
  including stochastic heating
• Electron density is calculated by a complete model with a reduced model
  with given (predetermined) sheath thickness. Systematic deviations are possible,
  the repeatability is not concerned.
• Sheath width (fixed)
• RF current (1st harmonic)
• Asymmetry, the ratio of sheath voltage at the chamber wall to sheath
  voltage at the wafer
• Electron SheathHeating equals the net energy of electrons per cycle
  over maximum energy of electrons
  
• RF peak voltage estimated form a given sheath width

Measurement range:

• Electron density: 10⁹ - 10¹¹ cm^-3
• Electron collision rate: 10⁷ - 5 10⁹ s^-1

Pressure range:

• Depends on gas, reactor geometry, and RF power
• Upper limit: typical 35 Pa (260 mTorr), 50 Pa (380 mTorr) for the most electropositive gases

Pre-conditions:

• Cylindrical chamber geometry
• Flange above wafer in process position, not in shadow of other parts
• Well grounded chamber wall and liner

Etch and PECVD:

• RIE-, MERIE-family
• TCP, ICP 
• Dual frequency tools (only Hercules^® C 1000)
• HDP tools
• Please see also REFERENCES/Tool and Process.

Model:

• Non-iterative SEERS algorithm with low pressure extension

Flexible and small:

• appr. 4 kg
• H: 210 mm, D: 250 mm, W: 210 mm

Data analysis and process control:

• Hercules^® Master
  GUI (Graphical User Interface) for Configuration of Hercules^® and data visualization
• HercView
• HercLotView
• SAPC Server

Interface:

• SEMI 54.24 (Modbus^® TCP)
• Lam^® Plug and Play (optional)
• SECS/HSMS (optional via Hercules^® Master)