Cu wire bonding knows no limit - 28 nm is qualified

Over the course of the last five years, fine pitch Cu wire bonding has gained a very large market share in the wire bond packaging market driven primarily by very high Au commodity prices. Virtually all IDMs and OSATs do offer Cu wire bond products. In ASE the penetration rate is reaching 60% or more than 9.5 billion units in shipment to date. The reliability has reached levels which equate to more than 6X of typical JEDEC package reliability testing protocols, and now, automotive as well as networking customers are ready to accept Cu wire bonded products for their applications. Current shipments do include 40 and 45 nm wafer technology and the question is arising how far can Cu wire bonding go? The ASE Cu wire bonding roadmap will be presented which aims at sustaining wire bonding in Cu to at least the 20 nm node. Qualification data will be presented for the 28 nm node based on collaboration with wafer fabs. Customer die qualifications are in progress.