Canon starts selling nano-imprint machines for producing 5nm chips and smaller

Canon announces the release of its first nano-imprinting machine for advanced chip manufacturing. According to Canon, the machine can produce ‘5nm’ chips, with ‘2nm’ on the horizon. The Japanese manufacturer wants to compete with ASML’s EUV machines.

Canon’s first nano-imprint machine is the FPA-1200NZ2C, which is now being sold to customers. The machines work in a different way than traditional chip production equipment. Chips are currently mainly produced via photolithography. Chips are produced by ‘projecting’ patterns onto a wafer using light and a light-sensitive resist layer. However, nano-imprints do not involve light. The chip patterns are printed directly on the wafer, like a kind of stamp.

The Canon FPA-1200NZ2C

The size of the transistors produced is therefore proportional to the accuracy of the mask on which the pattern is depicted. Other matters, such as the wavelength of the light and the numerical aperture, are not involved. This is the case with photolithography. Canon says current masks can currently be used to produce linewidths of 14nm. That is the equivalent of a ‘5nm’ process, the manufacturer writes in its press release. With future improvements in mask production, the nanoimprint system should be able to produce on 2nm nodes.

Currently, EUV lithography is required to produce certain layers of 5nm chips. Such systems are only produced by the Veldhoven-based ASML. With the introduction of nano-imprints, Canon can compete in this most advanced chip manufacturing field for the first time. To date, Canon has only produced less advanced DuV lithography machines.

Furthermore, nano-imprints can be used to produce ‘complex circuits’ with a single imprint, where chips often have to be exposed several times with photolithography. In theory, this makes nano-imprints cheaper to produce, as fewer production steps are required. Power consumption should also be lower, as no special light source with a specific wavelength is required.

Nano-imprints can be susceptible to defects. For example, fine particles can get between the mask and the wafer. This can lead to printing errors and defects. Canon says it has developed a new system that aims to suppress fine particle pollution. This system must also ensure that the mask can be aligned very accurately, which is necessary to produce multi-layer chips without defects. Traditionally this was still a challenge with nano-imprints, also writes SemiEngineering.

Canon has been working on nano-imprint machines for years. In 2014, the Japanese manufacturer acquired Molecular Imprints, an American company that worked on nanopatterning machines. Several companies tested nano-imprinting machines, including memory makers SK hynix and Kioxia.