BGA business takes on new zest

Electronic News, March 6, 1995 by Bernard Levine

ANAHEIM, CALIF.--Ball grid arrays were the buzzwords throughout Nepcon West here last week, with assembly equipment and test vendors across the exhibit aisles touting capabilities to handle the high-density semiconductor packaging technology, engineers scrutinizing the latest BGA R&D at technical forums, and new product developments and partnership deals surfacing among such firms as IBM Microelectronics, LSI Logic, Amkor and Tessera.

Underscoring the activity were a number of developments centered on plastic BGAs (PBGAs), often viewed as strong contenders for lower cost high-volume applications, but users poised to design-in BGAs had plenty of ceramic and tape models here to choose from as well.

IBM Microelectronics, as expected (EN, Feb. 27), launched a major new thrust into the merchant market for plastic BGAs, complementing its ceramic and tape lines. Use of plastic BGAs "certainly has begun," according to Theresa Doyle, IBM Micro's marketing manager for packaging and interconnect, and Joe Londa, program manager for micro-laminate packages at IBM, predicted the PBGA industry should see large volumes in '96. "Some people are already utilizing it in large volume production."

ASIC houses have reportedly been among the first, many note. LSI Logic introduced what it termed a new high-performance enhanced-plastic BGA (E-PBGA) package family for its ASIC line, and it was learned from sources that the Milpitas, Calif. firm is lining up a number of outside suppliers for LSI Logic-designed laminate substrates, including IBM Micro, and Japan's Ibiden.

A joint agreement between Amkor Electronics and Tessera was disclosed here creating the platform for a high-volume package assembly and test source to Tessera for its "microBGA" packages, expected to compete with chip-on-board packaging techniques. Amkor is making an equity investment in Tessera, and will produce the microBGA packages on Amkor high-volume assembly and test lines, initially in the Philippines, later in Korea and eventually in a new Amkor U.S. plant to be built in Arizona in about a year.

Meanwhile, a host of equipment houses showed off BGA-handling prowess here. While some claimed new enhancements to their lines in such areas as vision and software to accommodate BGAs, others said the gear they have been selling for the past few years can readily handle BGAs.

A number of equipment vendors, packaging and material suppliers and users noted the fact that most BGAs can often be run on existing surface-mount equipment--with perhaps only minor equipment modifications--a major selling point for BGA technology. Several claim this is a key reason the current BGA activity is of real substance and the technology is poised to take off in coming months, unlike some other packaging techniques which have been heavily promoted in recent years but have yet to find widespread use, with the need for major new capital equipment investments often blamed.

IBM unveiled here availability of its micro-laminate chip carrier products, a family of plastic packages with BGA and pin grid array (PGA) configurations. "BGA and PGA packaging technologies, offered by IBM to the merchant market since 1993, provide significant advantages over other available technologies, specifically, quad flat packs. These advantages include greater I/O density, smaller size with higher I/O counts per square inch, and better thermal and electrical performance in support of higher circuit speed," the firm claimed. "The micro-laminates will satisfy design-ins for microprocessors, ASICs, I/O applications and memory in both single and multichip modules. Both single chip and MCMs benefit from the price and performance value of IBM'S plastic packaging. The PBGA menu includes both die-up and cavity-down configurations. The cavity-down packages are constructed with an integrated heat sink to provide better heat dissipation."

IBM's standard PBGAs meet general packaging requirements and custom designs. The company is offering purchasing options for PBGA and PPGA packaging--customers can choose to buy the packaging and do their own assembly, or they can provide their chips to IBM, which will assemble the modules. Because IBM has its own substrate and assembly capabilities, semiconductor manufacturers do not need to work with additional suppliers, IBM said. IBM offers physical design, performance characterization (electrical, thermal and reliability), analysis of manufacturing ability and test support services.

Substrate-only packages are available today in prototype and full production volume. Prototype module assemblies are available now, with full production expected in 2Q. IBM'S general pricing is based upon production volumes of one million pieces per year, said to be provided for the simplest open tool packages to the most complex enhanced cavity-down packages. "We have a lot of interest" in the product, noted Jeff Knight, IBM micro-laminate packaging advisory engineer.

Meanwhile, LSI Logic's new enhanced-plastic ball grid array (E-PBGA) packages range from 313 to 750 leads and are capable of handling high-speed signals up to 600MHz. LSI claimed that in combination with its fully supported PBGA and TBGA product families, it now has one of the most complete lines of "assembly friendly" BGA packages available from any ASIC supplier which is "capable of supporting applications ranging from consumer to super computers."