Smoltek Semi has successfully manufactured capacitor prototypes (without carbon nanofibers) on 8-inch wafer format. The processing has been carried out in collaboration with several manufacturing partners, including research institutes, tool vendors as well as high-volume foundries. Most of the processing has been made on standard high-volume production tools used for component production in the semiconductor industry.

The capacitor prototypes have the purpose of developing and validating the stability, repeatability, and overall quality of the fabrication processes necessary for 8-inch wafer format production – not to demonstrate high electrical performance of our CNF-MIM capacitors.

Louise Duker, Chief Product Officer at Smoltek Semi.

Based on the successful results achieved, Smoltek Semi has decided to utilize the developed 8-inch fabrication process to produce the first lot of CNF-MIM engineering samples, incorporating Smoltek’s proprietary and patent-protected carbon nanofibers.

The CNF-MIM engineering samples, that are now being manufactured in this 8-inch process are expected by the end of the fourth quarter this year. The electrical performance, reliability and process stability that Smoltek Semi aims to demonstrate with these CNF-MIM engineering samples will provide information needed to take the next step towards a commercial high-performing capacitor product together with our partner YAGEO.

Development of a more industrial production process
This process development is important for primarily two reasons. The first being the significant increase in the number of capacitors we can produce for development purposes, approximately 27 000 capacitors on one single 8-inch wafer.

The sheer number makes it possible to conduct more data-driven development, and hence accelerate the development pace towards a commercial product.

Karl Lundahl, COO and Head of R&D at Smoltek Semi.

The second reason why the 8-inch form factor is important is that the format is compatible with high-volume production.

We are quite confident that the 8-inch wafer format that we now have migrated to in our development will enable us to more effectively expedite the tech-transfer of the fabrication processes to a future high-volume production setting.

Karl Lundahl, concludes.