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In the engineering world, many ideas and plans are conceived in the
information exchanges that occur over lunch. In the summer of 1997, one of
the editors (Shin Hwa Li) was assigned to assist our CMP module at the
Crolles facility of STMicroelectronics near Grenoble, France. One day, in
the company cafeteria, while sitting near the window and taking in the
gorgeous sub-Alpine scenery with a delicious French meal, he was joined by
several site engineers. Having become aware that he was the CMP engineer
responsible for both oxide and metal processes in another fab, they asked
him questions regarding CMP fundamentals, equipment, consumables,
application and the like. At that moment, the thought occurred to him that
a CMP textbook would be very useful. To his knowledge, such a book did
not yet exist. Ironically, while he was fielding and responding to the many
questions, one of the engineers (Jimmy Huang) remarked somewhat jokingly
that he should write a book about CMP.
The idea remained fixed in Li’s mind, and after returning to the United
States, he seriously considered the possibility. He discussed this with his
manager (and coeditor, Bob Miller), who, being of the mindset that almost
any idea is worth pursuing, immediately liked the idea. In performing a
literature search, we found only one such book extant (Chemical Mechanical
Planarization of Microelectronic Materials, by J. M. Steigerwald, S . P.
Murarka, and R. J. Gutmann, John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1997). We
read it and discovered that the book, although an excellent reference, is
academically oriented. We felt that since the CMP technology was becoming
a major and critical part of the semiconductor manufacturing
environment, a practical, industrially oriented text, directed more toward
the level of sustaining engineers, should be made available. |
