What is silicon wafer?

Silicon Wafer is often used as a substrate material for semiconductor electronic devices. It is a key component and high-cost upstream raw material for manufacturing chips in the semiconductor industry. Indeed, it is a vital component for all electronic products, such as computers, communications products, automobiles, consumer electronics, etc.

The manufacture of silicon wafers are drawn and refined from ordinary silica sand. After the sand has passed through a series of steps in dissolving, purifying and distilling, single crystalline silicon rods are created. The single crystalline silicon rods are sliced, etched, polished, cleaned and packaged to produce silicon wafers that meet the performance requirements of their semiconductor fabs.

Silicon wafer manufacturing process

The diameter of the silicon wafer has been developed from the 1 inch in 1960 to the matured 12-inch technology of today. The larger the diameter, the more chips can be produced on the same wafer, so that the final cost of a single chip is lower. However, the larger the diameter, the higher the technical requirements for the production and processing of materials, such as the issues of uniformity and purity. This is especially so for semiconductor-grade silicon wafers used in chip manufacturing, the silicon purity is required to reach 99.999999999%.

Silicon wafer diameter size development

Wafer Manufacturing and Development

Since the second half of 2020, the capacity of the global foundry market has continued to be in short supply, which has also boosted the demand for semiconductor silicon wafers. According to the latest quarter of wafer industry analytical report from the Silicon Manufacturers Group (SMG), a subsidiary of the International Semiconductor Equipment Association (SEMI), the global silicon wafer shipment in area has increased by 6% in the second quarter of this year compared with the previous quarter. It had reached an area of 3,534 million square inches (MSI), and had surpassed historical record of 3,337MSI in the previous quarter. Again, reaching a new high record, it has increased by 12% in like comparison to 3,152MSI, from the same quarter of previous year to 2020Q2. In addition to the continuous tight supply of 12-inch large silicon wafers for logic chips, the rapid growth of applications such as automotive electronics has also led to a shortage of 8-inch silicon wafers. However, the growth in the supply of semiconductor silicon wafers is relatively slow. Thus, this exacerbates the supply shortage of global semiconductor.

Domestic wafer manufacturers emerge, shatters the silicon wafers monopoly stronghold

Due to challenges, such as high degree of technical difficulty, long R&D cycle, huge investment capital outlay and long customer certification cycle, existing in the semiconductor wafer industry, the global wafer market is oligopolized by the top five wafer manufacturers, with a market share of nearly 90%. In the silicon wafer manufacturing process, the focus on single crystal growth technology is to ensure that the drawn silicon ingot maintains an extremely high purity level, while effectively controlling the density of crystal defects. In the production process, in addition to good control of resistivity, flatness, particles, COP, metal contamination, etc., Airborne Molecular Contamination (AMC) is also a part of the control measure. This is to ensure that product defects due to defective silicon wafers will not occur, in the process of manufacturing integrated circuit wafers, when silicon wafers are delivered to downstream customers for use.

Safeguarding the environment for extreme manufacturing process of semiconductors

In the past few years, with the large-scale mass production of 12-inch large silicon wafers in China, the production capacity of domestic large silicon wafers has also continued to increase, and silicon wafer manufacturers have also realized that the control of AMC is a key driver in improving product yield. Relying on more than 20 years of experience in semiconductor wafer factories at home and abroad, MayAir AMC Chemical Filtration Division provides AMC solutions and helps customers to improve their product yields, as well as contributes to the local wafer industry, and breaks the monopoly stronghold of imported wafers into China's large semiconductor wafer material market. MayAir’s track record experience includes serving overseas wafer factories such as MEMC, and also several leading domestic wafer factories, such as National Silicon Industry Group Co,. Ltd, Zhonghuan Semiconductor Co., Ltd., Wafer Works Corporation, and Ferroctec.

Innovation, breakthrough, bottleneck challenges, yes we can! MayAir has always adhered to the responsibility of air purification. In the future, we will continue to develop towards the direction of specialisation and intelligence, to meet the various high-end customisation needs put forward by customers, and to help the semiconductor industry to continue to expand.