The tremendous impact of APC for plasma etch

Collaborative work among several European fabs is proving the value of adva nced process control, using SEERS data, for identifying arcing, indicating possible particle excursions, and identifying and verifying possible plasma process improvements. In addition, SEERS analysis has proven to correlate well with electrical test data, making this a valuable early warning tool f or keeping a process within specification and improving process yield. Asse t up, this automated system has a supervisory capability that, with an esta blished fault detection system, can stop a process when there is a high lik elihood of a problem.