Plasma process equipment maker Plasma-Therm LLC of St Petersburg, FL, USA says that an MDS-100 MicroDie Singulator plasma dicing system has been ordered by a global LED maker for high-volume LED production.
The manufacturer produces LEDs for residential, commercial and automotive lighting, and placed the order after extensive testing and qualification, according to Jim Pollock, executive VP of sales & service. "We demonstrated that plasma singulation is better, faster and very cost-effective for LED production," he says. "We anticipate more orders from this customer and from other manufacturers in the near future as market forces drive plasma dicing into the mainstream."
Plasma dicing has multiple advantages over sawing and laser ablation, Pollock says, including speed, minimum street width, chip integrity, elimination of chipping and cracking, and higher die strength. Also, plasma dicing enables dies with rounded corners and non-orthogonal shapes.
"Plasma singulation is a revolutionary development that enables greater manufacturing efficiencies," claims Thierry Lazerand, director of business development. Plasma dicing allows streets to be reduced from 90μm wide to less than 10μm, which increases die yield by 15% per wafer, he adds.
This is the third MDS-100 ordered for volume production use, with a fourth system ordered recently by a global sensor and imaging company. MDS-100 systems perform plasma dicing of wafers up to 200mm on industry-standard tape frames. The systems accommodate up to three process modules with cassette-to-cassette material handling. Systems are also available with manual load-lock modules for R&D and pilot production applications.
Developed in partnership with On Semiconductor, Plasma-Therm's plasma singulator technology was introduced in November 2013 with the launch of the MDS-100 MicroDie Singulator system. PlasmaTherm and On Semiconductor have a cross-licensing agreement for patented technology used in Singulator systems. Plasma-Therm has secured US patents for several aspects of Singulator technology, and additional US and foreign patents are pending.