When can we expect 450mm wafers

[DavidB]

Does anyone know which process nodes the major players are planning to switch from 300mm to 450mm wafers? Has anyone heard what the larger wafers are likely to do to yields on the initial nodes they are introduced at?

[Seronx]

1. 2013-2019+
2. Increase...?

[DavidB]

Originally Posted by Seronx

2. Increase...?

What I was talking about was defects as a percentage of wafer area. When I first read about 450mm wafers, there was a lot of talk about increased defects due to the problems of dealing with a larger surface that has to be perfectly flat and with layers that are only a few atoms thick. IIRC, there was some speculation that it would be almost impossible to get 450mm wafers to work with any decent yields. Back then, I think Intel was the only one talking about doing it.

For instance, if a 300mm wafer yielded 70% usable dies, might a 450mm wafer be expected to yield only 55% to 65% usable dies of the exact same chip using the exact same processing steps?

I'm a software guy so I might not be using the proper lingo but I hope that what I'm asking is now understandable.

[Seronx]

I would put it down as the same but the first six months is probably going to have a lot of problems.

40-50% - six months -> 60-70%