Lam Research

Last updated

Lam Research Corporation
Company type Public company
Industry Semiconductors
Founded1980;44 years ago (1980)
Founder David K. Lam
Headquarters Fremont, California, U.S.
Key people
Tim Archer
(CEO and President)
Abhi Talwalkar
(Chairman)
ProductsSemiconductor manufacturing products
RevenueIncrease2.svg US$17.4 billion (2023)
Decrease2.svg US$5.17 billion (2023)
Decrease2.svg US$4.51 billion (2023)
Total assets Increase2.svg US$18.8 billion (2023)
Total equity Increase2.svg US$8.21 billion (2023)
Number of employees
c. 17,200 (2023)
Website lamresearch.com
Footnotes /references
Financials as of June 25,2023. [1]

Lam Research Corporation is an American supplier of wafer-fabrication equipment and related services to the semiconductor industry. [2] Its products are used primarily in front-end wafer processing, which involves the steps that create the active components of semiconductor devices (transistors, capacitors) and their wiring (interconnects). The company also builds equipment for back-end wafer-level packaging (WLP) and for related manufacturing markets such as for microelectromechanical systems (MEMS).

Contents

Lam Research was founded in 1980 by David K. Lam and is headquartered in Fremont, California. [3] As of 2023, it was the third largest manufacturer in the Bay Area, after Tesla and Intuitive Surgical. [4]

History

Lam Research was founded in 1980 by David K. Lam, a Chinese-born engineer who had previously worked at Xerox, Hewlett-Packard, and Texas Instruments. [5] It was while he was at Hewlett Packard that he saw the need for better plasma etching equipment, to keep up with the rapid miniaturization of semiconductor wafers. [5] He credited Bob Noyce, founder of Intel, for assisting him in getting funding by ensuring his business plan made sense. [5]

In 1981, the company introduced its first product, the AutoEtch 480, an automated polysilicon plasma etcher. The name AutoEtch was chosen to convey that the etcher was automated, while the 80 in 480 came from 1980, the year the company was founded. [6] The first system was sold in January 1982. [7] In 1982, Roger Emerick was appointed CEO. [8]

In May 1984, the company issued an initial public offering and was listed on Nasdaq under the symbol LRCX. [9] In 1985, David Lam left the company to join Link Technologies, which eventually was bought by Wyse [10] and is now Dell Wyse. [11] In the mid-1980s, Lam Research continued its global expansion, concentrating on Taiwan and also opening customer support centers throughout Europe, the United States and Japan. [11]

By the early 1990s, the company had a presence in China, Korea, Singapore, and Taiwan. [11] In March 1997, the company purchased OnTrak Systems Inc., a chip equipment manufacturer that specialized in chemical-mechanical planarization (CMP) cleaning, for $225 million. [12] CMP cleaning is a hybrid process to smooth surfaces using both etching and mechanical polishing. In August 1997, the company named OnTrak's CEO Jim Bagley as its CEO. [11] [13] In 1998, Bagley was named chairman of the board. [13]

In 2005, Steve Newberry was appointed as CEO. [14] In 2006, Lam Research acquired Bullen Semiconductor, now Silfex, Inc. [15] In 2008, Lam Research acquired SEZ AG, [16] now Lam Research AG. [17] In 2011, Lam Research agreed to buy San Jose, California chip equipment manufacturer Novellus Systems, for $3.3 billion. [18] The deal was completed in June 2012. [19] In 2012, Martin Anstice was appointed as CEO. [14] In October 2015, Lam Research announced plans to buy Milpitas, California-based wafer inspection equipment vendor KLA-Tencor for $10.6bn, in what was viewed as a semiconductor industry consolidation move. [20] In June 2016, it was announced that Lam Research had joined the Fortune 500 for the first time. [21] In October 2016, the company announced it had terminated its offer for KLA-Tencor amidst concerns that the deal would not meet regulatory approval from the U.S. Department of Justice [22] over antitrust concerns. [23]

In September 2017, the company announced the acquisition of Cary, North Carolina-based chip simulation firm Coventor. The company's software reportedly would allow Lam to reduce the time to market for its new chips. [24] In November, the company launched Lam Research Capital (Lam Capital), a venture capital group chartered to invest in companies. [25]

In January 2018, the company announced that COO Tim Archer was being promoted to president, and CEO Martin Anstice remained in the CEO role. [26]

In December 2018, Martin Anstice resigned as CEO due to allegations of personal misconduct, and the Board of Directors of Lam Research named Tim Archer as president and chief executive officer. [27] Archer was also appointed to the Board of Directors of Lam Research. Before this appointment, Archer was the company's president and chief operating officer. [28]

In August 2021, Lam opened a manufacturing facility in Batu Kawan, Malaysia to meet the growing demand for wafer fabrication equipment and to work more closely with key customers and supply chain partners. [29]

In November 2022, it was announced Lam had acquired the Salzburg-headquartered, wet processing semiconductor equipment provider, Semsysco GmbH. [30] That same month, Lam also acquired the Texas-based plasma simulation company, Esgee Technologies, Inc. [31]

Products

Lam Research designs and builds products for semiconductor manufacturing, including equipment for thin film deposition, plasma etch, photoresist strip, and wafer cleaning processes. Throughout semiconductor manufacturing, these technologies help create transistors, interconnects, advanced memory, and packaging structures. They are also used for applications in related markets like microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) and light-emitting diodes (LEDs). [1]

Thin film deposition

Lam's thin film deposition systems lay down the sub-microscopic layers of conducting (metal) or insulating (dielectric) materials that make up an integrated circuit. The processes require uniformity at the nanoscale level. [32]

The company employs electrochemical deposition (ECD) and chemical vapor deposition (CVD) technologies to form copper and other metal films for conducting structures. [33] [34] Atomic layer deposition (ALD) is also used for tungsten metal films in features like contacts and plugs, which are vertical connections between metal lines in multilevel interconnect chip designs.

Plasma-enhanced (PE) CVD and ALD technologies create dielectric films for a wide range of insulating parts. For gapfill processes, which require depositing dielectric material into narrow spaces, Lam uses high-density plasma (HDP) CVD technology. PECVD and ALD are also used to form hardmasks, layers that can be removed to improve circuit patterning processes.[ citation needed ]

Plasma etch

Lam Research uses proprietary technology in its equipment for plasma etch, [35] the process of selectively removing materials from the surface of a wafer to create the semiconductor device's features and patterns. The equipment helps chip manufacturers carve small parts such as those needed for the latest multiple patterning sequences, transistors, and advanced memory structures, which involve increasingly complex film stacks and ever higher aspect ratio structures.

The company uses reactive ion etch (RIE) and atomic layer etching (ALE) to shape a variety of conductive and dielectric features. [35] The company's deep RIE technologies help create structures for applications like MEMS and through-silicon vias (TSVs).

Photoresist strip

Lam's dry strip systems use plasma technology to selectively remove the photoresist mask following a range of front-end wafer processing and advanced packaging applications. [36]

Wafer cleaning

Lam Research's wet spin clean and plasma-based bevel clean products remove particles, residues, and films from the wafer surface before or after adjacent processes. [37]

The company's spin wet clean technology is used between chip-processing steps to remove yield-limiting residues and defects. Lam's bevel clean technology directs a plasma at the very edge of the wafer to clean unwanted particles, residues, and films. If not removed, these materials can impact yield if they flake off and re-deposit on the device area during subsequent manufacturing steps.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">MEMS</span> Very small devices that incorporate moving components

MEMS is the technology of microscopic devices incorporating both electronic and moving parts. MEMS are made up of components between 1 and 100 micrometres in size, and MEMS devices generally range in size from 20 micrometres to a millimetre, although components arranged in arrays can be more than 1000 mm2. They usually consist of a central unit that processes data and several components that interact with the surroundings.

Photolithography is a process used in the manufacturing of integrated circuits. It involves using light to transfer a pattern onto a substrate, typically a silicon wafer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Semiconductor device fabrication</span> Manufacturing process used to create integrated circuits

Semiconductor device fabrication is the process used to manufacture semiconductor devices, typically integrated circuits (ICs) such as computer processors, microcontrollers, and memory chips that are present in everyday electronic devices. It is a multiple-step photolithographic and physio-chemical process during which electronic circuits are gradually created on a wafer, typically made of pure single-crystal semiconducting material. Silicon is almost always used, but various compound semiconductors are used for specialized applications.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wafer (electronics)</span> Thin slice of semiconductor used for the fabrication of integrated circuits

In electronics, a wafer is a thin slice of semiconductor, such as a crystalline silicon, used for the fabrication of integrated circuits and, in photovoltaics, to manufacture solar cells.

Applied Materials, Inc. is an American corporation that supplies equipment, services and software for the manufacture of semiconductor chips for electronics, flat panel displays for computers, smartphones, televisions, and solar products. The company also supplies equipment to produce coatings for flexible electronics, packaging and other applications. The company is headquartered in Santa Clara, California, and is the second largest supplier of semiconductor equipment in the world based on revenue behind ASML of Netherlands.

Dry etching refers to the removal of material, typically a masked pattern of semiconductor material, by exposing the material to a bombardment of ions that dislodge portions of the material from the exposed surface. A common type of dry etching is reactive-ion etching. Unlike with many of the wet chemical etchants used in wet etching, the dry etching process typically etches directionally or anisotropically.

Wafer fabrication is a procedure composed of many repeated sequential processes to produce complete electrical or photonic circuits on semiconductor wafers in semiconductor device fabrication process. Examples include production of radio frequency (RF) amplifiers, LEDs, optical computer components, and microprocessors for computers. Wafer fabrication is used to build components with the necessary electrical structures.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stepper</span> Photolithographic Tool

A stepper or wafer stepper is a device used in the manufacture of integrated circuits (ICs). It is an essential part of the process of photolithography, which creates millions of microscopic circuit elements on the surface of silicon wafers out of which chips are made. It is similar in operation to a slide projector or a photographic enlarger. The ICs that are made form the heart of computer processors, memory chips, and many other electronic devices.

Deep reactive-ion etching (DRIE) is a highly anisotropic etch process used to create deep penetration, steep-sided holes and trenches in wafers/substrates, typically with high aspect ratios. It was developed for microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), which require these features, but is also used to excavate trenches for high-density capacitors for DRAM and more recently for creating through silicon vias (TSVs) in advanced 3D wafer level packaging technology. In DRIE, the substrate is placed inside a reactor, and several gases are introduced. A plasma is struck in the gas mixture which breaks the gas molecules into ions. The ions accelerated towards, and react with the surface of the material being etched, forming another gaseous element. This is known as the chemical part of the reactive ion etching. There is also a physical part, if ions have enough energy, they can knock atoms out of the material to be etched without chemical reaction.

KLA Corporation is an American capital equipment company based in Milpitas, California. It supplies process control and yield management systems for the semiconductor industry and other related nanoelectronics industries. The company's products and services are intended for all phases of wafer, reticle, integrated circuit (IC) and packaging production, from research and development to final volume manufacturing.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Microfabrication</span> Fabrication at micrometre scales and smaller

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Semiconductor fabrication plant</span> Factory where integrated circuits are manufactured

In the microelectronics industry, a semiconductor fabrication plant is a factory for semiconductor device fabrication.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Novellus Systems</span> Company

Novellus Systems Inc. was a company founded by Brad Mattson that developed, manufactured, sold, and serviced semiconductor equipment used in the fabrication of integrated circuits. It was a supplier of chemical vapor deposition (CVD), plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD), physical vapor deposition (PVD), electrochemical deposition (ECD), ultraviolet thermal processing (UVTP), and surface preparation equipment used in the manufacturing of semiconductors.

ASM is a Dutch headquartered multinational corporation that specializes in the design, manufacturing, sales and service of semiconductor wafer processing equipment for the fabrication of semiconductor devices. ASM's products are used by semiconductor manufacturers in front-end wafer processing in their semiconductor fabrication plants. ASM's technologies include atomic layer deposition, epitaxy, chemical vapor deposition and diffusion.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Veeco</span> American manufacturing company

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tokyo Electron</span> Japanese semiconductor equipment manufacturer

Tokyo Electron Limited, or TEL, is a Japanese electronics and semiconductor company headquartered in Akasaka, Minato-ku, Tokyo, Japan. The company was founded as Tokyo Electron Laboratories, Inc. in 1963. TEL is best known as a supplier of equipment to fabricate integrated circuits (IC), flat panel displays (FPD), and photovoltaic cells (PV). Tokyo Electron Device, or TED, is a subsidiary of TEL specializing in semiconductor devices, electronic components, and networking devices. As of 2011, TEL was the largest manufacturer of IC and FPD production equipment. Listed on the Nikkei 225, in 2024, Tokyo Electron had a market cap of US$114.6 billion, making it the third-most valuable company in Japan in terms of market cap, and the 12th ranked semiconductor-related company worldwide.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kenneth L. Schroeder</span>

Kenneth L. Schroeder was an American technology-focused corporate executive. Schroeder served as CEO of KLA-Tencor, a supplier of process control and yield management products for the semiconductor and related microelectronics industries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Brad Mattson</span> American engineer and entrepreneur

Brad Mattson is an American engineer and entrepreneur. He started two publicly traded semiconductor companies, Novellus Systems and Mattson Technology, and has also worked in the solar power industry. He currently serves as Chairman of Husk Power and is a board director at Siva Power, a thin film solar cell company based in Silicon Valley, and is involved with several other private companies and non-profits. Mattson holds 12 patents.

Multibeam is an American corporation that engages in the design, manufacture, and sale of semiconductor processing equipment used in the fabrication of integrated circuits. Headquartered in Santa Clara, in the Silicon Valley, Multibeam is led by Dr. David K. Lam, the founder and first CEO of Lam Research.

Glossary of microelectronics manufacturing terms

References

  1. 1 2 "Lam Research Corporation FY2023 Annual Report (Form 10-K)". U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. 15 August 2023.
  2. ↑ "LAM RESEARCH CORP (LRCX:NASDAQ GS): Company Description". Bloomberg L.P. Retrieved 19 May 2016.
  3. ↑ "Lam Research on the Forbes America's Largest Public Companies List". Forbes. Retrieved 10 May 2018.
  4. ↑ "Largest Manufacturers in the Greater Bay Area". San Francisco Business Times. 13 October 2023. Retrieved 30 March 2024.
  5. 1 2 3 "Oral History: David K. Lam" (PDF). Computer History Museum. 21 January 2004. Retrieved 9 August 2023.
  6. ↑ "SEMI Oral History Interview". stanford.edu. 24 July 2007. Archived from the original on 11 November 2013. Retrieved 12 May 2016.
  7. ↑ "Lam Research Corporation – 10-K". lamresearch.com. 18 September 1996. Retrieved 12 May 2016.
  8. ↑ "Executive Profile – Roger D. Emerick". Bloomberg L.P. Retrieved 2 June 2016.
  9. ↑ "Small Company Initial Public Offerings: May 1984". Inc. August 1984. Retrieved 10 March 2022.
  10. ↑ "PCs Trigger New Response". Computerworld. 11 January 1988. Retrieved 12 May 2016.
  11. 1 2 3 4 "Lam Research Corporation History". fundinguniverse.com. Retrieved 12 May 2016.
  12. ↑ "Lam Research Agrees to Acquire OnTrak". Los Angeles Times. 25 March 1997. Retrieved 12 May 2016.
  13. 1 2 "lam research corp (LRCX:NASDAQ GS)". Bloomberg L.P. Retrieved 12 May 2016.
  14. 1 2 "Lam's Newberry to resign CEO post". eetimes.com. 8 September 2011. Retrieved 3 June 2016.
  15. ↑ "Company Overview of Silfex, Inc". Bloomberg L.P. Retrieved 3 June 2016.
  16. ↑ "Lam buys SEZ for $568 million". eetimes.com. 11 December 2007. Retrieved 3 June 2016.
  17. ↑ "LAM Research AG". ecsel-austria.net. Retrieved 3 June 2016.
  18. ↑ "Lam Research Agrees to Buy Novellus Systems for $3.3 Billion". Bloomberg L.P. 15 December 2011. Retrieved 12 May 2016.
  19. ↑ "Lam Research (LRCX) Completes Acquisition of Novellus Systems (NVLS)". streetinsider.com. 4 June 2012. Retrieved 12 May 2016.
  20. ↑ "Lam Buys KLA-Tencor as Chip-Sector Deals Mount". The Wall Street Journal. 21 October 2015. Retrieved 13 May 2016.
  21. ↑ "Here Are The 15 New Companies Joining The Fortune 500". Fortune. 6 June 2016. Retrieved 7 June 2016.
  22. ↑ "Chip equipment maker Lam Research calls off KLA-Tencor deal". Reuters. 5 October 2016. Retrieved 6 October 2016.
  23. ↑ Mattioli, Dana; Benoit, David (19 January 2017). "Activist Investor Presses Rudolph Technologies, Nanometrics to Merge". The Wall Street Journal. New York. Retrieved 23 January 2017.
  24. ↑ "Lam Buys Simulation Software Firm Coventor". eetimes.com. 1 September 2017. Retrieved 8 June 2018.
  25. ↑ "The Week In Review: Manufacturing". semiengineering.com. 17 November 2017. Retrieved 8 June 2018.
  26. ↑ "BRIEF-Lam Research Promotes Tim Archer To President". Reuters. 24 January 2018. Retrieved 8 June 2018.
  27. ↑ "Lam Research Corporation Announces Martin Anstice Resigns as Chief Executive Officer; Tim Archer Appointed as President and Chief Executive Officer | Lam Research Corporation".
  28. ↑ "Lam Research CEO Martin Anstice Resigns". Business Insider. 12 May 2018. Retrieved 6 December 2018.
  29. ↑ PRNewswire, Staff Writer (4 August 2021). "Lam Research Strengthens Global Manufacturing Network by Opening Its Largest Manufacturing Facility in Malaysia". Yahoo Finance. PRNewswire.
  30. ↑ "Evertiq - Lam Research acquires SEMSYSCO". evertiq.com. Retrieved 16 November 2022.
  31. ↑ "Reynolds Advisory Partners Acts as Exclusive Financial Advisor to Esgee Technologies on Its Sale to Lam Research". www.businesswire.com. 23 January 2023. Retrieved 18 February 2023.
  32. ↑ "The Week In Review: Manufacturing". semiengineering.com. 11 April 2014. Retrieved 19 May 2016.
  33. ↑ "Tool Order: Novellus ships 300th SABRE ECD system". fabtech.com. 23 September 2008. Retrieved 13 May 2016.
  34. ↑ "Dealing With Atoms". semiengineering.com. 13 July 2015. Retrieved 19 May 2016.
  35. 1 2 "Atomic Layer Etch now in Fab Evaluations". semimd.com. 4 August 2014. Archived from the original on 15 July 2017. Retrieved 3 June 2016.
  36. ↑ "Photoresist strip method for low-k dielectrics US 8058178 B1". 15 November 2011. Retrieved 3 June 2016.
  37. ↑ "Etch+clean: Lam Research widening scope with SEZ buy". electroiq.com. 11 December 2007. Retrieved 3 June 2016.
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