SAN FRANCISCO—Applied Materials Inc. said Monday (March 19) it has developed new plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) technology for use in the production of higher-performance, high-resolution displays for next-generation tablet computers and TVs.
Applied (Santa Clara, Calif.) said the new advanced insulating films, available on its AKT-PECVD system, enable the use of metal-oxide based transistors that produce smaller, faster-switching pixels to enable higher resolution displays.
According to Doug Hayden, senior director of global product management at Applied Materials' AKT unit, the display industry is in the midst of one of its most significant technical transitions in the past 20 years, with manufacturers transitioning to for metal oxide transistors to support increased resolution requirements.
Applied's new PECVD films provide a dielectric-layer interface for metal oxide transistors that minimizes hydrogen impurities to improve transistor stability and deliver optimized screen performance, according to the company. These silicon oxide films can be deposited by Applied's AKT-PECVD system with precise uniformity on sheets of glass up to 9m2 in size, according to the company.
Applied said it is also developing advanced PVD solutions, including Indium gallium zinc oxide (IGZO) deposition, for metal oxide manufacturing. Using rotary cathode array technology, Applied is demonstrating highly-uniform, homogeneous and low-defect, active-layer deposition at higher productivity rates and lower material consumption costs than currently available PVD solutions, according to the company.
IGZO is a good material for transistors, but the performance of such transistors can be ruined if the material is exposed to hydrogen, according to Hayden. Applied's solution is to deposit an etch stop layer of silicon oxide, he said. Even with the extra layer, the cost of using IGZO is only about 30 percent higher than using amorphous silicon, he said. Sometime in the next three years, Applied expects the cost of using IGZO to achieve cost parity with amorphous silicon, he said.
Applied said it is showcasing its solutions for metal oxide, thin film transistor liquid crystal display manufacturing at FPD China 2012 this week in Shanghai.