Semiconductor manufacturing system

Abstract

The present invention provides a system capable of automatically performing diagnosis of semiconductor manufacturing equipment based on inspection results of particles on substrates such as semiconductor wafers. In a preferred embodiment, the wafer surface is divided into minute regions of 0.1 to 0.5 mm, and the presence or absence of particles in each minute region is inspected. Based on the inspection results, data associating the presence or absence of particles in each minute area with the address of each minute area is created. The wafer surface can be divided into tens to hundreds of large evaluation areas. Based on whether or not the number of minute regions in which particles are detected exceeds a predetermined reference value among the plurality of minute regions included in each evaluation region, binary data representing the particle adhesion state of the evaluation region is assigned to each evaluation region. A correspondence table showing the relationship between the distribution state of the binary data and the cause of the particle adhesion, which is created in advance based on experience or experiments, is prepared. The cause of particle adhesion is specified by allocating binary data created based on the inspection to the correspondence table.

Description

technical field [0001] The present invention relates to a semiconductor manufacturing system that detects particles adhering to substrates such as semiconductor wafers that are subjected to predetermined processing by semiconductor manufacturing equipment, and also has a function of determining the cause of particle adhesion based on the detection results. Background technique [0002] As semiconductor manufacturing equipment used in a series of steps of manufacturing semiconductor integrated circuits, there are film forming equipment, etching equipment, coating and developing equipment for coating and developing resists, and cleaning equipment for cleaning wafers. When a failure occurs in a certain semiconductor manufacturing device and an undesired processing result (such as adhering particles) occurs, the subsequent processing will be wasted, so it is necessary to constantly monitor the status of each device. [0003] The permissible particle levels in semiconductor manuf...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

However, as described above, finding the cause of particle generation has to rely on skilled operators, so it is not yet possible to combine the particle countermeasure function with the above-mentioned automatic operation system.

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