A MEMS Probe Card with High Aspect Ratio Electroplated Posts

In this paper, a MEMS probe card developed with high aspect ratio post in order to implement high speed and high frequency testing and reduce thermal deformation effect during hot test of device under test (DUT) is discussed. High aspect ratio posts were fabricated by nickel electroplating after silicon etching and oxidation performed by a deep RIE etcher and furnace, respectively. Probe card makes contact with the metal pads of the DUT, thereby transmitting the test signals to the DUT. According to reliability test, there was no mechanical bending to cantilever beam and position difference to tips after the 350,000 time touchdowns. The proposed probe card is suitable for wafer-level testing and fine pitch device testing.