Disco Corporation

Kentaro Iizuka

Naoki Omiya

Kazuya Hirata

Takashi Mori

Yusuke Nagai

Ryohei Yamamoto

Masaru Nakamura

Yutaka Kobayashi

Satoshi Yamanaka

Hirokazu Matsumoto

Hiroshi Kitamura

Nobuyasu Kitahara

Ryugo Oba

Yohei Yamashita

Naoki Ohmiya

Takashi Sampei

Shuichi Torii

Koyo Honoki

Motomi Kitano

Masato Terajima

A holding table assembly has a base that includes three or more cylinder sections spaced apart at regular intervals in a circumferential direction, a circular recess formed at an upper part thereof, and a flow channel communicating with the cylinder sections and the circular recess. A holding table includes a holding surface inserted into the circular recess of the base that holds an ingot under suction. A circular plate has a plurality of minute holes and insertion holes formed at positions corresponding to each of the cylinder sections and spaced apart at regular intervals in the circumferential direction. Pistons are inserted in the cylinder sections, the number of pistons being equal to the number of cylinder sections, and support pins of which base ends abut against the pistons and tip ends are inserted in the insertion holes.

Holding table assembly and processing method

A processing apparatus includes a chuck table for holding a bonded wafer thereon, a grinding unit for grinding the bonded wafer, a cleaning unit for cleaning the bonded wafer, and a processing unit for removing a beveled portion of an outer circumferential end portion of the bonded wafer before the grinding unit grinds the bonded wafer. The processing unit includes a support for supporting the bonded wafer with a surface thereof being exposed and a laser beam applying unit for emitting a laser beam having a wavelength transmittable through the wafer. The laser beam applying unit applies the laser beam to the wafer supported on the support, from the exposed surface, while positioning a focused spot thereof within the outer circumferential excessive region of the wafer, to form a modified layer in the wafer along which to remove the beveled portion from the wafer.

Wafer processing apparatus

A carrier tray includes a housing, an ingot accommodating recess that accommodates a semiconductor ingot, and a wafer accommodating recess that accommodates a wafer. The housing has an upper wall, a lower wall, a pair of side walls connecting the upper wall and the lower wall to each other, and a tunnel defined by the upper wall, the lower wall, and the pair of side walls. A plurality of levers each of which has a point of application projecting from a bottom surface of the ingot accommodating recess, a point of action projecting from a side surface of the ingot accommodating recess, and a fulcrum formed between the point of application and the point of action are each attached to the housing so as to be rotatable around the fulcrum.

Carrier tray

A workpiece processing method includes a holding step of holding a workpiece with a front surface of the workpiece directed downward so as to face an upper surface side of a base supplied with a fluid curable resin, a coating step of moving the workpiece downward to press the workpiece against the curable resin, thereby coating the whole of the front surface of the workpiece with the curable resin such that the curable resin enters gaps between bumps and the front surface and the bumps are embedded in the curable resin, a curing step of curing the curable resin to form a resin film, a laser beam applying step of removing the resin film on each street, and a dividing step of supplying a gas plasma to the workpiece to divide the workpiece along each street into individual device chips with the resin film as a mask.

Workpiece processing method

A wafer forming apparatus includes a conveying tray having an ingot accommodating section that accommodates a semiconductor ingot and a wafer accommodating section that accommodates a wafer formed from the semiconductor ingot, a belt conveyor unit that conveys the conveying tray to each processing apparatus, a cassette rack on which cassettes accommodating the wafers are placed correspondingly to the conveying trays, and a transferring unit that transfers the wafer from the wafer accommodating section of the conveying tray to the cassette placed on the cassette rack. The conveying tray is provided with an identification mark. The cassette rack or the cassette corresponding to the conveying tray is provided with the same identification mark as the identification mark provided on the conveying tray.

Wafer forming apparatus

A SiC wafer is produced from a single crystal SiC ingot. Wafer producing apparatus includes a holding unit for holding the ingot, a flattening unit for grinding the upper surface of the ingot, thereby flattening the upper surface, a laser applying unit for setting the focal point of a laser beam having a transmission wavelength to the ingot inside the ingot at a predetermined depth from the upper surface of the ingot, the predetermined depth corresponding to the thickness of the wafer to be produced, and next applying the laser beam to the ingot to thereby form a separation layer for separating the wafer from the ingot, a wafer separating unit for holding the upper surface of the ingot to separate the wafer from the ingot along the separation layer, and a wafer storing unit for storing the wafer separated from the ingot.

Wafer producing apparatus

A wafer producing apparatus for producing an SiC wafer from a single-crystal SiC ingot includes an ingot grinding unit, a laser applying unit that applies a pulsed laser beam having a wavelength that is transmittable through the single-crystal SiC ingot while positioning a focal point of the pulsed laser beam in the single-crystal SiC ingot at a depth corresponding to the thickness of the SiC wafer to be produced from an upper surface of the single-crystal SiC ingot, thereby forming a peel-off layer in the single-crystal SiC ingot, a wafer peeling unit that peels the SiC wafer off the peel-off layer in the single-crystal SiC ingot, and a delivery unit assembly that delivers the single-crystal SiC ingot between the ingot grinding unit, the laser applying unit, and the wafer peeling unit.

A wafer producing apparatus includes: an ingot grinding unit configured to grind and planarize an upper surface of an ingot held by a first holding table; a laser applying unit configured to apply a laser beam of such a wavelength as to be transmitted through the ingot to the ingot, with a focal point of the laser beam positioned at a depth corresponding to the thickness of a wafer to be produced from an upper surface of the ingot held by a second holding table, to form a peel-off layer; a wafer peeling unit configured to hold the upper surface of the ingot held by a third holding table and peel off the wafer from the peel-off layer; and a carrying tray having an ingot support section configured to support the ingot and a wafer support section configured to support the wafer.

Wafer producing apparatus and carrying tray

A wafer producing apparatus includes an ingot grinding unit that grinds the upper surface of an ingot to planarize the upper surface, a laser irradiation unit that positions the focal point of a laser beam with such a wavelength as to be transmitted through the ingot to a depth corresponding to the thickness of a wafer to be produced from the upper surface of the ingot and irradiates the ingot with the laser beam to form a separation layer, a wafer separating unit that separates the wafer from the ingot, and a tray having a support part that supports the separated wafer.

Disclosed herein is a laser processing apparatus for forming a separation layer inside an ingot by applying a laser beam to an end surface of the ingot in the condition where the focal point of the laser beam is set inside the ingot, the laser beam having a transmission wavelength to the ingot. The laser processing apparatus includes a holding unit for holding the ingot, a moving unit for moving the holding unit in a direction parallel to the end surface of the ingot held by the holding unit, a laser beam applying unit for applying the laser beam to the ingot held by the holding unit, an imaging unit for detecting the position of the ingot in the direction parallel to the end surface of the ingot, and a height detecting unit for detecting the height of the end surface of the ingot held by the holding unit.

Laser processing apparatus

A chuck table holds a workpiece having a warp. The chuck table includes a suction holding member having a suction holding surface for holding the workpiece under suction, and an annular seal member provided around the outer circumference of the suction holding member for supporting a peripheral portion of the workpiece. The annular seal member is formed from an elastic member. The upper surface of the annular seal member is set higher in level than the suction holding surface according to the warp of the workpiece. In holding the workpiece on the chuck table under suction, vacuum leaking from the gap between the workpiece and the suction holding surface due to the warp of the workpiece is applied to the space defined by the workpiece and the annular seal member, thereby elastically deforming the annular seal member to flatten the upper surface of the workpiece.

Chuck table

A separating apparatus for separating a composite substrate into a first substrate and a second substrate previously bonded to each other. The separating apparatus includes a support base having a supporting surface for supporting the composite substrate, a pair of side surface supporting rollers for supporting the peripheral side surface of the composite substrate placed on the supporting surface, and a separating unit for applying a separating force to the boundary between the first substrate and the second substrate constituting the composite substrate supported to the supporting surface of the support base and the side surface supporting rollers, thereby separating the composite substrate into the first substrate and the second substrate.

Separating apparatus

A method of processing a wafer having a plurality of devices which are composed of a laminate consisting of an insulating film and a functional film laminated on the front surface of a substrate, along streets for sectioning the devices, comprising a first trip blocking groove forming step for activating a first laser beam application means to form a blocking groove for dividing the laminate along a street of the wafer while moving the chuck table in a first direction in the processing-feed direction; a second trip blocking groove and dividing groove forming step for activating the first laser beam application means to form a blocking groove for dividing the laminate along a street and also to form a dividing groove along the blocking groove formed by the first trip blocking groove step while moving the chuck table in a second direction in the processing-feed direction.

Wafer processing method including forming blocking and dividing grooves

A method for applying a resin film to the face of a semiconductor wafer, comprising: an assembly holding step of holding an assembly on the surface of chuck means, with the back of the assembly being opposed to the surface of the chuck means, the assembly including a frame having a mounting opening formed in a central portion of the frame, and a semiconductor wafer mounted in the mounting opening of the frame by sticking a mounting tape to the back of the frame and the back of the semiconductor wafer; a liquid droplet supply step of supplying liquid droplets of a solution having a resin dissolved therein onto the face of the semiconductor wafer in the assembly after the assembly holding step; and a spreading step of rotating the chuck means subsequently to the liquid droplet supply step, thereby spreading the liquid droplets throughout the face of the semiconductor wafer. The method further comprises a cleaning step of rotating the chuck means and also supplying a cleaning fluid to the surface of the frame after the spreading step, thereby cleaning the solution which has adhered to the surface of the frame.

Method for applying resin film to face of semiconductor wafer

A method of processing a wafer having a plurality of devices which are composed of a laminate consisting of an insulating film and a functional film on the front surface of a substrate, along streets for sectioning the plurality of devices, the method comprising a first blocking groove forming step for forming a first blocking groove for dividing the laminate in a one-side portion in the width direction of a street of the wafer held on a chuck table by moving the chuck table in a first direction in the processing-feed direction while activating a first laser beam application means; and a second blocking groove and dividing groove forming step for forming a second blocking groove which divides the laminate in the other-side portion in the width direction of the street of the wafer which has undergone the first blocking groove forming step by moving the chuck table in a second direction in the processing-feed direction while activating the first laser beam application means and at the same time, forming a dividing groove in the laminate and the substrate along an intermediate portion between the first blocking groove and the second blocking groove formed in the street of the wafer by activating second laser beam application means.

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Tokyo, Japan

Kentaro Iizuka