Overview

The Herent™ Chimera™ system is designed specifically for back-end-of-line (BEOL) TiN metal hardmask opening processes. In 300 mm IC fabs, the hardmask opening process is repeated multiple times during wafer fabrication. While the high selectivity afforded by metal hardmasks allows feature size to keep shrinking, the unique challenges of metal hardmask etch require a new set of technical solutions. Herent™ Chimera™ meets the hardmask etch specification down to 14 nm technology node. Additionally, for LMEC-300™ systems with Chimera™ hardmask opening chambers, the ability to process both magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs) and hardmasks makes them an upgraded solution for magnetic random access memory (MRAM) applications.