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Target materials for semiconductors

In semiconductor manufacturing processes, sputtering targets are undoubtedly the most important raw materials, and their quality and purity play a key role in the subsequent production quality of the semiconductor industry chain.

Targets, especially high-purity sputtering targets used in the Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD) process for the manufacture of electronic components, are key materials for the preparation of surface electronic films such as wafers, panels, and solar cells.

The so-called sputtering is the main technology for preparing thin film materials and is also a kind of PVD. It bombards the target object with ions in the PVD device, so that the metal atoms in the target material escape with a certain energy, so as to deposit on the wafer surface, sputtering to form a metal film, in which the bombarded solid is the raw material for deposition of the film by sputtering method, called the sputtering target.

Compared with another PVD process - vacuum coating, sputtering coating process has good repeatability, controllable film thickness, and can obtain a uniform thickness film on a large area of substrate material. The prepared film has the advantages of high purity, good density, and strong bonding force with the substrate material, and has become the main technology for preparing film materials.

There are various classification methods for targets, such as classification by chemical composition, classification by shape, and classification by application field. The content of this paper is classified according to the application field.

Application requirement

The industries with a large amount of target material are mainly semiconductor integrated circuits, flat panel displays, solar cells, magnetic recording media, optical devices, etc. (These are classified by application). Among them, high-purity sputtering targets are mainly used in fields with higher requirements for material purity and stability, such as semiconductors, flat panel displays, solar cells, magnetic recording media, etc.

In all applications, semiconductors have the highest technical requirements and purity for sputtering targets, and the most expensive prices, which are significantly higher than other application areas such as flat displays and solar cells. Semiconductor chip sputtering target metal material purity, internal microstructure and other aspects have set extremely demanding standards, if the impurity content of the sputtering target is too high, the formed film can not achieve the required electrical properties, and in the sputtering process is easy to form particles on the wafer, resulting in short circuit or damage, will seriously affect the performance of the film.

Chip manufacturing has the highest requirements for sputtering target metal purity, usually reaching more than 99.9995%, while flat panel displays and solar cells are required to reach 99.999% and 99.995%, respectively.and the materials refer on titanium，tantalum and hafnium；

In addition to the purity, the chip has also set extremely demanding standards for the internal microstructure of the sputtering target, and it is necessary to master the key technologies in the production process, and through long-term practice to make products that meet the process requirements.

Ultra-high purity metal and sputtering target is an important part of electronic materials, sputtering target industry chain mainly includes metal purification, target manufacturing, sputtering coating and terminal applications, among which, target manufacturing and sputtering coating process is the key link in the entire sputtering target industry chain.