INDUSTRY NEWS

Expansions and Acquisitions

TI plans second 300-mm fab

Texas Instruments plans to build its second 300-mm fab in the North Texas suburb of Richardson. Groundbreaking for the $3 billion plant will take place by the end of 2005, the chipmaker says. Located a few miles north of TI's corporate headquarters in Dallas, the fab will accommodate approximately 1000 workers producing DSP and system-on-chip devices. The company has been processing 300-mm wafers at its DMOS 6 fab in Dallas since 2001.

Governor Rick Perry says TI's decision marks the "largest modern-day private-sector economic development project ever undertaken" in the state. TI, the state government, and the University of Texas (UT) system collaborated with local governmental and economic aid agencies to select the site. As a result of the chipmaker's decision to build the fab in Texas, the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science at UT Dallas will receive more than $300 million in funds from private and public sources, TI reports.

Cabot opens films center

Cabot Supermetals has opened a facility for developing high-performance thin-film materials. A unit of Boston-based Cabot, the company plans to use the facility to develop tantalum materials for semiconductor, optics, FPD, and magnetics applications. The unit will also use the site to refine tantalum materials for use as barrier metals in copper-based interconnect structures.

The facility is located in the Business Technology Center in Columbus, OH, a noted business incubator close to Ohio State University and the Battelle Memorial Institute. Both institutions have extensive resources in materials science, according to Cabot.

Axcelis accesses Matrix

Axcelis Technologies has purchased a Northern California–based supplier of photoresist dry-strip equipment for $14 million. The acquisition of Matrix Integrated Systems of Richmond enables Axcelis to expand its line of front-end tools and further diversify, the company says. Axcelis plans to combine Matrix's dry-strip platform and its own BEOL ES3Lk dry stripper to give the supplier solid offerings for transistor and interconnect processes.

Axcelis says it moved up one ranking to third place among global dry-strip system suppliers in 2002 from the previous year. The company attributed the growth to its strength in 300-mm wafer processing and BEOL stripping technology. Matrix has made its reputation in FEOL plasma-based dry-strip technology, Axcelis notes. Because Matrix has installed 300-mm FEOL tools at the 130-nm node, Axcelis expects to benefit from a predicted 29% increase in the market for FEOL 300-mm dry-strip systems by 2005.

California 'snow' unit sold

The BOC Group has purchased the IP and operating assets of a California-based precision cleaning company. BOC paid $6.4 million for Eco-Snow Systems as part of a strategic alliance to expand the markets for the carbon-dioxide cleaning technology. Eco-Snow is a subsidiary of ATS Automation Tooling Systems of Ontario, Canada.

An additional five-year contract calls for ATS to manufacture Eco-Snow equipment for use in high-volume production. BOC and Eco-Snow have been collaborating for five years, and BOC began exclusively distributing Eco-Snow equipment in Asia in mid-2002.

Matheson to double capacity

Matheson Tri-Gas plans to double the production capacity at its electronics group hydride gases plant in New Johnsonville, TN. Matheson says the expanded plant will incorporate new purification methods. The expansion plans are driven by a growing MOCVD market. The Tennessee plant contains a separate building for making arsine, phosphine, and related products.

ATMI buys surface prep firm

ATMI of Danbury, CT, has purchased a supplier of surface preparation and cleaning materials for an undisclosed sum. The acquisition of Pennsylvania-based ESC will enhance ATMI's capabilities in copper and interconnect materials, the vendor claims. "A key step in advanced interconnect processing is surface preparation and cleaning, especially post-CMP processing," says Gene Banucci, ATMI's CEO. ESC's tools facilitate copper metallization and low-k dielectric processes, according to Shahri Naghshineh, ESC's president.

Implant ups Class 100 space

Implant Sciences expects to triple production capacity after the company installs two new medium-current ion implanters in its recently expanded Massachusetts plant. Hoping to tap an outsourcing trend, the ion implantation specialist added 2000 sq ft of Class 100 space for two MC3 systems from Axcelis Technologies.