In semiconductor manufacturing, the success of multi-layer lithography depends on one thing: precision overlay. A nanometer-scale misalignment can trigger a cascade of failures, shorts, opens, or pattern mismatch. Traditional overlay systems, though reliable, are static and can miss real-time deviations.
AI-powered Alignment and Overlay Accuracy solutions use real-time computer vision to detect and correct misalignment during lithography. By continuously comparing new patterns with reference layers, AI vision ensures every overlay falls within strict tolerances, even on advanced nodes.
This reduces overlay-related yield loss, cuts rework cycles, and ensures multi-patterning integrity.
At advanced nodes (5nm/3nm), even tiny overlay shifts can cause electrical shorts or performance drift.
Thermal expansion or tool wear causes gradual shifts that traditional static calibration can’t catch.
Without real-time feedback, overlay errors often go unnoticed until after etching or metrology.
Multiple exposure passes increase the chance of cumulative misalignment, especially on dense layers.
Computer vision verifies overlay precision during exposure, not just in post-processing.
AI models trained to identify and measure overlay deviation at single-digit nanometer tolerances.
Learns and predicts overlay drift based on historical tool movement, exposure conditions, and material response.
Feeds deviation data into stepper/aligner systems for automatic compensation and dynamic realignment.
We begin by integrating CAD-based reference layers or GDSII data to set visual baselines for overlay comparison.
Specialized cameras with nanometer resolution are installed near lithography tools. Calibration includes pixel-level correction and motion compensation for fast-moving wafer stages.
Using archived mismatch incidents, our AI is trained to distinguish between acceptable variation and true overlay faults across complex geometries and resist layers.
As patterns are exposed, real-time visual feedback is compared to reference alignment. Detected deviation values are immediately sent to the scanner or aligner system for correction during the same pass.
Stay updated with the trending and most impactful tech insights. Check out the expert analyses, real-world applications, and forward-thinking ideas that shape the future of AI Computer Vision and innovation.
Every chip in your phone, your laptop, or even in a satellite, begins as a plain slice of silicon. But before that slice can become the heart of advanced electronics, it has to go through a series of complex processes. One of the least understood, yet most critical of these, is called Chemical Mechanical Planarization, […]
CEO & Co-founder
Powering the Next Era of Vision AI Artificial Intelligence has moved from labs and data centers into the real world. Today, cameras on highways are expected to analyze traffic, robots on factory floors make micro-second safety decisions, and drones survey farms with intelligence far beyond simple recording. The challenge? Edge devices have always been limited. […]
CEO & Co-founder
The story of the semiconductor industry is the story of human ambition to make things smaller, faster, and more powerful. We take this progress for granted when we buy a smartphone with a faster processor or a laptop with improved battery life, but behind these leaps lies an unforgiving pursuit of perfection at scales smaller […]
CEO & Co-founder