Thomas Schütte, Jan-Peter Urbach, Peter Neiß, Marius Radloff, Hokuto Kikuchi, PLASUS GmbH, Mering, Germany
As specifications in the thin film industry become more and more demanding, high production yields and cost-effective production are major factors in this competitive market. These goals drive the demand for efficient process monitoring and control systems. In addition, data analysis using artificial intelligence and machine learning (ML) technologies has made tremendous progress in recent years, sparking interest in using these methods for the diagnostics and control of plasma applications.
The EMICON plasma monitoring and process control platform provides different cutting-edge sensor techniques combined in a single system at reasonable costs and resources: multi-channel spectroscopic plasma monitoring with unprecedented time resolution, broadband reflectometry for real-time in-situ layer thickness measurement, electrical pulse curve measurement of voltage and current in HIPIMS and pulsed plasma application, signal input from other sensors like plasma (V-I) probes, lambda probes, ion meter probes, etc. The acquired data from all sensors are processed simultaneously in the EMICON system and can be combined and evaluated for controlling the plasma parameters like reactive gas flow or ion density and the product parameters, i.e. layer thickness or color simultaneously and in real-time. This results not only in enhanced production stability and improved product quality but it also provides reliable and comprehensive data for ML analysis.
Examples from different demanding sputtering and PECVD applications are presented demonstrating the powerful benefits of the EMICON platform that combines sensor techniques plasma monitoring, electrical measurements and photometric measurements and real-time data processing.