Cobalt

The Applied Materials platforms that create our Integrated Materials Solution for cobalt have been industry workhorses for several decades, and the innovations being developed show they remain critical for the dimensional and materials scaling necessary to continue improving the power, performance and area/cost (PPAC) of chips.

The first material change in the transistor contact and interconnect in 20 years is required to remove a major performance bottleneck between transistors and the outside world.

As the semiconductor industry begins producing logic devices for the single digit nodes, new conductors are being evaluated as replacements for copper to manage resistance scaling. Applied Materials’ Mehul Naik highlights one of the leading contenders. 

Applied Materials introduces the biggest materials change in interconnect technology in 15 years with the announcement of the new Endura® Volta™ CVD system. Its unique cobalt processes ease critical interconnect scaling bottlenecks to enable continued momentum of Moore’s Law.