Abstract
E-beam Maskless activities raised a lot of interest in the past years from semiconductor
companies strongly concerned by the constant cost increase of masked-based lithography (1).
Beginning of 2008, the European Commission started an integrated program called "MAGIC",
Maskless lithography for IC manufacturing, which pushes the development and the insertion
of the European multi-beam technology (2) in the semiconductor industry. This project
supports also to develop the infrastructure for the use of this technology, including resist
processes, data processing and proximity corrections.
Within MAGIC, MAPPER develops its low energy (5keV) massively parallel concept (3).
Compared to a standard single E-Beam machine working classically at 50kV, this low
accelerating voltage requires the use of thin resist film to deal with the lower penetration
depth of the electrons. This paper presents the resist development status, including
Chemically Amplified Resist and non-CAR platforms. Comparisons of the performances of
these resist platforms in terms of resolution, sensitivity, roughness and stability are detailed,
including their potential integration into CMOS technological flow. Finally, a first review of the
state of the art of resist performance for patterning at 5kV will be performed. Based on the
level of achievements presented in this paper, a discussion is also engaged about the needs
of resist developments to fulfill industry targets in 2011.
