SEMI taps 3 for 300mm effort

Electronic News, Jan 22, 1996

Mountain View, Calif.--Semiconductor Equipment & Materials International (SEMI) last week named three new executives who will help guide the organization's efforts in making 300-millimeter (12-inch) silicon wafers a reality for the semiconductor industry.

Murray Bullis joined SEMI as director of standards. Previously head of his own company, Materials & Metrology, Dr. Bullis was once VP of R&D at Siltec, a leading wafer manufacturer, and has also worked at Texas Instruments and Fairchild Semiconductor. He spent 16 years with the National Bureau of Standards (now the National Institute of Standards & Technology), rising to become chief of the Electron Devices Division.

SEMI also named George Lee as 300mm initiative director and Ronald S. Horwath as 300mm special programs director. Mr. Lee was president and CEO of Strata Systems, a software development company he founded, and served in the same posts at OAI, a semiconductor equipment manufacturer. Mr. Horwath was a senior technologist at Sematech, helping develop the consortium's plans for 300mm wafer manufacturing. He earlier co-founded his own company, Network 2001, and worked as a senior engineer for IBM.

SEMI's 300mm Silicon Wafer Initiative, begun last year, is still under the direction of SEMI VP Tom Reed. The semiconductor industry's funding of 300mm wafer R&D remains a question, Mr. Reed said last week. "We don't see anyone stepping forward now," he added. "It's a huge issue for our members--a global issue."

Dr. Bullis said SEMI will continue its joint task force work with representatives of Japanese industry organizations to coordinate standards on 300mm wafers. Task forces on both sides of the Pacific are meeting often to discuss the issues, punctuated by formal standards meetings three times a year in the U.S., he added.

Since SEMI helped drive the worldwide acceptance of 300mm as the next-generation diameter in substrates in 1994, the momentum toward industry implementation of the larger wafer has slowed down, as the largest semiconductor manufacturers have postponed their plans to bring up 300mm fabs. Looming shortages in polysilicon, the raw material used to make silicon wafers, and in 200mm wafers have brought to light the constraints felt by semiconductor materials suppliers to keep up with a booming IC industry.

"The appointment of these three high-level executives to drive our 300mm wafer program is a major commitment on SEMI's part," said SEMI president William H. Reed. "Achieving global agreement requires a senior executive team with strong leadership skills backed by experience and understanding of the many complex and sensitive global industry issues. The appointment of Bullis, Lee and Horwath more than satisfies this criteria.

"The transition to large-diameter wafer production is the most significant challenge facing the global semiconductor industry and one which is expected to cost the industry and its suppliers more than $14 billion. The stakes are too high for individual companies--whether customers or suppliers--to go it alone in this effort."

The migration to 300mm was the topic of an often-lively panel discussion at the recent Industry Strategy Symposium (ISS) in Pebble Beach, Calif. Most participants agreed that no one semiconductor manufacturer wants to be the first in the world with a 300mm fab, since that company will bear the costs and grief associated with being a pioneer, as Intel and IBM did in earlier wafer generations.

"This is like an Olympic race that everyone wants to be second in," said James Bagley, vice chairman of Applied Materials.

He predicted "the first company to convert (to 300mm) will probably be burdened with an underproductive facility. Later fabs will benefit from redesigned equipment."

The next day at ISS, materials analyst Daniel J. Rose said the number of leading IC makers willing to start 300mm production in 1998 has dwindled from seven in mid-1994--Mitsubishi, Hitachi, NEC, Toshiba, Samsung, Intel and Motorola--down to one, Motorola, at the present, and he suggested Motorola is rethinking its position. Bill Reed of SEMI said last week that Motorola remains steadfast on its 1998 goal.