Machine Concepts

Our Platform

The design of ALSI machine platform has been made with productive and accurate laser dicing of semiconductor wafers in mind. It incorporates over 12 years of experience in laser dicing of wafers originally at NXP (formerly Philips Semiconductor), and the extensive know-how available in the well-established semiconductor equipment manufacturers in The Netherlands and Germany. This all resulted in a dedicated and extremely efficient laser dicing system, simply outperforming equipment based on conventional mechanical sawing platforms on all relevant accounts:

Accuracy

  •  The ALSI machine platform realizes an extremely accurate and  reproducible positing of the laser relative to the dicing lanes on the wafer, resultingin the following benefits:
  • Die can be placed closer together, enabling more efficient use of thewafer surface area
  • All die will have exactly the same dimensions, facilitating the subsequentprocess steps (die picking, bonding, etc)
  • The process will proceed as planned, not being disturbed by inaccuracyof laser location
  • All contributing machine concepts have been carefully selected, calculated,simulated and meticulously designed to compose the optimal end result.Some specific examples are PlanarMotion System, Active Mount System and Through-lens alignment.

 

Process stability

The machine platform incorporates a variety of monitoring and control features to ensure that all wafers are diced under exactly the same conditions, resulting in robustly reproducible dicing results, even when the recipe is transferred to other machines, by means of Focus Control, Laser Power Control, Active Temperature Control and Debris Control.

Productivity

  1. To attain optimal productivity, the machine platform supports the highly productive dicing processes, combined with extremely high uptime, limited overhead and ease of use. ALSI’s machine is a truly 24/7 production machine, being well recognized in the field as such.
  2. Several machine concepts specifically contribute to this result, like the High Speed Stage, Short Indexing, the Cassette to Cassette Handler and Automatic Calibrations.

 

Flexibility

  • The machine platform incorporates several advanced features to fully support your work flow, both in R&D and production environments. The versatility of the machine enables dicing of your most demanding wafers while maximizing the yield.
  • Some of the included features are:
  • Support for broken wafers, even with several break lines
  • Support for Multi Project Wafers, where the wafer is populated with dies of various sizes.
  • Parts of wafers (partials) can be processed automatically without operator intervention
  • Automatic alignment, which can even handle wafers with test structures in the dicing lanes, or with inaccurate structures (e.g. bond pads) on top.
  • Fast exchange of optics and chuck to switch to other wafer sizes promptly
  • Off line generation of machine independent recipes. Bar code readers are available to automate the recipe selection process