Negevtech 302 Wafer Inspection System Selected for Copper Inspection at Spansion's Fab 25
SANTA CLARA, Calif. - July 12, 2004 - Negevtech, Inc. announced today that Spansion's Fab 25 selected the Negevtech 302 for aluminum backend inspection on its 110nm Flash memory production lines and copper backend inspection on future 90nm production lines. Spansion, formed in 2003 by the integration of AMD's and Fujitsu's Flash memory operations, is the world's leading manufacturer of NOR Flash memory. Spansion's Fab 25 in Austin, Texas, is one of Spansion's most advanced wafer fabrication facilities.
The Negevtech 302, formally introduced at Semicon West last year, is a high-resolution brightfield imaging system with brightfield and darkfield illuminations. It detects the largest variety of critical defects and has superior sensitivity to nanometer defects. The sensitivity, throughput and combined brightfield-darkfield capability of the 302 reduces the number of tools needed in the fab and simplifies inspection, strategy, training and maintenance.
"During our evaluation of the Negevtech 302 wafer inspection system, the tool demonstrated high sensitivity to yield-limiting defects on our critical copper layer while showing a strong capability to filter nuisance defects," said Alfredo Herrera, manager of Contamination-Free Manufacturing at Spansion's Fab 25. "Negevtech combined its
innovative Step&Image™ technology with solid application support to meet Fab 25's current needs as well as our future copper inspection needs at the 90nm node."
The selection of the Negevtech 302 by Spansion marks a major milestone for Negevtech who started to market the Negevtech 302 less than 12 months ago. "In the last year, Negevtech has worked very closely with our customers to cause a shift in wafer inspection," said Dr. Gadi Neumann, Negevtech's co-founder and managing director. "This is a fairly rapid entry into a major fab for a new tool. Such early adoption is a sign of the confidence the market has in our technology and clearly indicates that our vision for wafer inspection is already being embraced by the industry. Spansion's adoption of the Negevtech 302 is a solid indication that we are successfully meeting the needs of leading-edge global semiconductor manufacturers."
The company says that in the semiconductor business, customers need a tool that can stretch over several technology nodes. Negevtech's revolutionary Step&Image technology with brightfield or darkfield illumination delivers unique sensitivity on 90nm and 65nm technology wafers and has become a natural "Tool of Record" for nanometer inspection for several Negevtech customers.
About Negevtech,
Negevtech is an innovative company specializing in wafer inspection and yield control solutions for the semiconductor industry. Negevtech's leading product is the Model 302 inspection system. The company's marketing, demo lab and support facilities are in Santa Clara, California. The R&D center is in Israel in the heart of the "Image Processing Triangle" and in close proximity to the renowned Weizmann Institute of Science. The company is certified ISO 9001:2000. For more information about Negevtech, please visit www.negevtech.com.
PRESS CONTACT:
Trine Pierik
Positio Public Relations, Inc.
T: (408) 453-2400
E: trine@positiopr.com
COMPANY CONTACTS:
Christophe Fouquet
Negevtech, Inc
T: (408) 486-9831
E: Christophe_Fouquet@negevtech.com
Yuval Levin
Negevtech, Ltd
T: +1 972 8 936 6050
E: yuval_levin@negevtech.com
