Certain types of wafer PRE-ALIGNERS, such as ASYST EDGE GRIP 300, and our DSEG (Dual Slot Edge Grip) 300, have an additional station for buffering wafer. The Advance Wafer Handling takes advantage of this additional buffer station to improve system throughputs.
The process begins with ROBOT putting a wafer onto the wafer station of the ALIGNER. ALIGNER aligns the wafer and the process starts. Once the process is complete, ALIGNER lifts the processed wafer to the buffer station.
While the wafer is being aligned and processed, ROBOT gets an unprocessed wafer. When the process is done and the processed wafer is at the buffer station, ROBOT puts the unprocessed wafer to the wafer station and then gets the processed wafer from the buffer station.
The Advance Wafer Handling can be retrofitted onto the process tools that use ASYST EDGE GRIP ALIGNERS or PRI PRE 300 VACUUM ALIGNERS. Other process tools using similar aligners can also be retrofitted.
Our solutions have been proven on the field that system throughputs are increased by at least 25%.
Optionally, we also offer Cognex OCR attached to the aligners. This further saves wafer handling steps.