Semiconductor manufacturing equipment and semiconductor manufacturing method

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-12074072-B2
Application number	US-202117235053-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 20, 2021
Priority date	Dec 21, 2016
Publication date	Aug 27, 2024
Grant date	Aug 27, 2024

Abstract

Semiconductor manufacturing equipment includes a thickness calculation function, the thickness calculation function including a measurement value acquisition unit configured to acquire a plurality of measurement values at different measurement positions of the wafer from a thickness measurement function configured to measure a thickness of the wafer, a histogram data creation unit configured to create histogram data based on the plurality of measurement values, and a grade group extraction unit configured to extract a grade group from the histogram data, the grade group including sequential grades having frequencies equal to or greater than a predetermined frequency, the thickness calculation function further including a representative value calculation unit configured to calculate a representative value of a thickness of a measurement region based on the grades included in the extracted grade group.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. Semiconductor manufacturing equipment configured to perform processing for manufacturing a semiconductor on a wafer, the semiconductor manufacturing equipment comprising
a thickness calculation function,
the thickness calculation function including
a measurement value acquisition unit configured to acquire a plurality of measurement values at different measurement positions of the wafer from a thickness measurement function configured to measure a thickness of the wafer or a thickness measurement object deposited on the wafer along a surface of the wafer,
a histogram data creation unit configured to create histogram data based on the plurality of measurement values, and
a grade group extraction unit configured to extract a grade group from the histogram data,

the grade group including sequential grades having frequencies equal to or greater than a predetermined frequency,
the thickness calculation function further including a representative value calculation unit configured to calculate a representative value of a thickness of a measurement region based on the grades included in the extracted grade group.

2. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein
the representative value calculation unit is configured to calculate the representative value based on the grades included in the grade group including a largest grade.

3. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein
the representative value calculation unit is configured to calculate the representative value based on the grades included in the grade group including a smallest grade.

4. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein
the representative value calculation unit is configured to calculate the representative value based on the grades included in the grade group including a largest grade, and configured to calculate a value obtained by subtracting a predetermined thickness value from the calculated representative value as a substitute value of the representative value to be calculated based on the grade included in the grade group including a smallest grade.

5. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein
the representative value calculation unit is configured to calculate the representative value based on the grades included in the grade group including a smallest grade, and configured to calculate a value obtained by adding a predetermined thickness value to the calculated representative value as a substitute value of the representative value to be calculated based on the grade included in the grade group including a largest grade.

6. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein
the representative value calculation unit is configured to set the representation value by dividing a sum of values each obtained by multiplying a median of each grade in the grade group by the frequency of the grade by a sum of the frequencies included in the grade group.

7. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein
the representative value calculation unit is configured to set an average value of a median of the largest grade and a median of the smallest grade as the representative value.

8. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein
the representative value calculation unit is configured to set a median of the grade having a largest frequency as the representative value in the grade group.

9. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein,
in the grade group including the largest grade, the representative value calculation unit is configured to set a median of the grade at the boundary where the frequencies change from increase to decrease from a larger grade side.

10. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein,
in the grade group including the smallest grade, the representative value calculation unit is configured to set a median of the grade at the boundary where the frequencies change from increase to decrease from a smaller grade side.

11. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein
the representative value calculation unit is configured to calculate the representative value based on a grade newly set from the largest grade included in the grade group to the smaller grade side, that is included in a grade range that is wide on a grade side smaller than the grade group.

12. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein
the representative value calculation unit is configured to calculate the representative value based on a grade newly set from the smallest grade included in the grade group to the largest grade side, that is included in a grade range that is wide on a grade side larger than the grade group.

13. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein
the representative value calculation unit is configured to calculate the representative value based on a grade newly set from the largest grade included in the grade group to the smaller grade side, that is included in a grade range that is narrow on a grade side smaller than the grade group.

14. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 , wherein,
the representative value calculation unit is configured to calculate the representative value based on a grade newly set from the smallest grade included in the grade group to the larger grade side, that is included in a grade range that is narrow on a grade side larger than the grade group.

15. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 ,
wherein the thickness calculation function further includes an etching thickness determination unit,
wherein the measurement value acquisition unit is configured to acquire a plurality of measurement values measured on the thickness measurement object before etching is performed thereon,
wherein the measurement value acquisition unit is configured to acquire the plurality of measurement values measured on the thickness measurement object after the etching is performed thereon,
wherein the representative value calculation unit is configured to calculate the representative values of the thickness measurement object for each before and after the etching based on the grade included in the grade group, and
the etching thickness determination unit is configured to determine whether the thickness measurement object has been etched to a predetermined thickness based on the representative values of the thickness of the thickness measurement object before and after the etching.

16. The semiconductor manufacturing equipment according to claim 1 ,
wherein the thickness calculation function further includes a film thickness determination unit,
wherein the measurement value acquisition unit is configured to acquire the plurality of measurement values measured on the thickness measurement object before film deposition is performed,
wherein the measurement value acquisition unit is configured to acquire the plurality of measurement values measured on the thickness measurement object after the film deposition is performed,
wherein the representative value calculation unit is configured to calculate the representative values of the thickness measurement object for each before and after film deposition process based on the grade included in the grade group, and
the film thickness determination unit is configured to determine whether the film deposition has been performed as predetermined based on the

Assignees

• Mitsubishi Electric Corp

Inventors

• Tanaka Hiroshi

Classifications

• H10P72/0604

  Process monitoring, e.g. flow or thickness monitoring · CPC title

• H10P74/203 Primary

  Structural properties, e.g. testing or measuring thicknesses, line widths, warpage, bond strengths or physical defects · CPC title

• G01B3/004

  Scales; Graduations · CPC title

• H01L21/67253

  Electricity · mapped topic

• H01L22/12 Primary

  Electricity · mapped topic