A study on surface grinding of 300 mm silicon wafers

Abstract Most of today's IC chips are made from 200 mm or 150 mm silicon wafers. It is estimated that the transition from 200 mm to 300 mm wafers will bring a die cost saving of 30–40%. To meet their customers' needs, silicon wafer manufacturers are actively searching for cost-effective ways to manufacture 300 mm wafers with high quality. This paper presents the results of a study on surface grinding of 300 mm silicon wafers. In this study, a three-factor two-level full factorial design is employed to reveal the main effects as well as the interaction effects of three process parameters (wheel rotational speed, chuck rotational speed and feedrate). The process outputs studied include spindle motor current, surface roughness, grinding marks and depth of subsurface cracks.