Survey: No EUV until 2015 or later

By Ann Steffora Mutschler, Senior Editor -- Electronic News, 9/7/2007

According to a semiconductor manufacturing survey conducted by WeSRCH, the social networking site of market research firm VLSI Research Inc., 85 percent of respondents said that extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography will not make it to production until 2015 or later, with 74 percent of respondents saying that EUV will reach production between 2015 and 2024.

This creates an interesting dilemma for the semiconductor manufacturers, WeSRCH points out as some current projections indicate that the 22-nm semiconductor manufacturing processing node will be the last node using optical lithography with high numerical aperture (NA) 193-nm immersion and double exposure.

The firm notes that this would place NAND flash manufacturing in 22-nm at about 2012, and given that only 15 percent of respondents believe that EUV will be in manufacturing at that time, there is a gap between what the industry needs from lithography and what industry members believe are able to be deliverable.


Source: WeSRCH