The continued drive for ever shrinking features in semiconductor manufacturing poses significant challenges for tool manufacturers and process developers alike. Requirements such as higher uniformity, tighter control of critical dimensions, reduced plasma damage, thinner layers, and shorter process times, combined with the introduction of new materials demand higher sophistication in the development of semiconductor processing tools, starting at the plasma chambers and going all the way down to the power delivery systems. As an example, major advances in etch processes have been enabled by the introduction of a recent generation of RF power supplies with advanced capabilities, including frequency tuning while pulsing and multi-generator synchronized pulsing [1]. While significant improvement to a variety of plasma processes has been realized through the use of these high performance generators, a more holistic analysis of current power delivery systems seems to indicate that the characteristics and quality of the power delivered to the plasma load could be partly limited by power delivery system architectures based on autonomous building blocks. This observation suggests that a higher level of integration in communication, measurement and control among the components of the power delivery system could further benefit the development of next generation processes and tools. In this presentation we will show results from a new generation of power delivery systems where the matching networks and generators are fully integrated from a communication, measurement and control point of view. Although certainly possible, this integration scheme does not necessarily imply full physical integration. The performance of the integrated hardware combined with high performance control algorithms on both fixed and dynamic loads will be discussed in terms of electrical measurements performed at the loads under various operating regimes, including match and frequency tuning while pulsing. The results will demonstrate the potential for these integrated systems to enable processes with stringent requirements such as highly accurate power regulation in a wide dynamic range, faster power stabilization during transients, and minimal reflected power, both in pulsing and CW modes.

 

[1] C. Petit-Etienne, M. Darnon, L. Vallier, E. Pargon, G. Cunge, F. Boulard, O. Joubert, S. Banna, and T. Lill, J. Vac. Sci. Technol. B 28(5), 926 (2010).