A substrate processing apparatus includes a process station for processing a substrate; a cassette station integrated with the process station; a substrate carriage equipped for transferring the substrate between said process station and the cassette station through a passage located at an interface between the process station and said cassette station; and a substrate scanner equipped at said interface between the process station and the cassette station for capturing surface image data during transportation of the substrate that passes through the passage.

The invention relates to an apparatus for mounting components on a substrate. The apparatus comprises a bond head with a component gripper, a first drive system for moving a carrier over relatively long distances, a second drive system which is attached to the carrier for moving the bond head back and forth between a nominal working position and a stand-by position, a drive attached to the bond head for rotating the component gripper or a rotary drive for rotating the substrate about an axis, at least one substrate camera attached to the carrier and at least one component camera. Either the second drive system is also designed to perform high-precision correction movements with the bond head, or a third drive system is provided to perform high-precision correction movements with the substrate. At least one reference mark is attached to the bond head or the component gripper.

A method of guiding a semiconductor manufacturing process includes receiving semiconductor manufacturing process data corresponding to a target semiconductor product, generating first semiconductor characteristic data corresponding to the semiconductor manufacturing process data by using a technology computer-aided design (TCAD) model trained through machine learning based on training data including TCAD simulation data, generating second semiconductor characteristic data corresponding to the semiconductor manufacturing process data by using a compact model generated based on information of measurement of at least one semiconductor characteristic of a first semiconductor product, generating, based on the first semiconductor characteristic data and the second semiconductor characteristic data, a plurality of process policies respectively corresponding to a plurality of strategic references, by using a plurality of strategy models; and providing a final process policy corresponding to the target semiconductor product based on the plurality of process policies.

Embodiments of the invention include methods and structures for controlling developer critical dimension (DCD) variations across a wafer surface. Aspects of the invention include an apparatus having developer tubing and an internal cam. The internal cam is coupled to a fixed axis. A flexible divider is positioned between the developer tubing and the internal cam. The flexible divider is coupled to the internal cam such that rotation of the internal cam about the fixed axis is operable to change an inner diameter of the developer tubing.

A mounting state informing apparatus includes a database, an acquisition unit, a first specifying unit, a comparison unit and an output unit. The database stores information upon a mounting position and a direction of each of multiple components belonging to a processing apparatus. The acquisition unit acquires first appearance data, which is obtained by a 3D scanner, indicating a state of an appearance of the processing apparatus. The first specifying unit identifies the multiple components based on the first appearance data and specifies a mounting position and a direction of each of the identified components. The comparison unit compares the specified mounting position and the specified direction of each of the identified components with the information upon the mounting position and the direction stored in the database. The output unit is configured to output a comparison result obtained by the comparison unit.

A registration means for storing an image of a product as a registration image in association with information representing the passing sequence that the product passed through an upstream side process; a management means for managing the matching sequence in a downstream side process; and a matching means for performing matching between an image of a product carried into the downstream side process and the registration image according to the matching sequence, are included. Each time the matching means succeeds in matching, the management means updates the matching sequence to sequence in which registration images not having succeeded in matching with any matching image are put in order on the basis of the passing sequence that the products passed through the upstream side process.

A gantry drive system includes: a first motor configured to drive a driving object along a first axis; a second motor configured to drive the driving object along a second axis parallel with the first axis; and a motor control system configured to control the first and second motors. The motor control system includes a mode switch that performs a switching between a first control mode in which a position of the driving object on each of the first and second axes is individually controlled while reducing an inter-axis positional deviation between the first and second axes, and a second control mode in which a rotational state of the driving object is controlled while controlling a position of the driving object, based on detected positions of the driving object on the first and second axes.

A system and method include dividing, by a processor of a manufacturing execution system (MES), a time axis associated with a time window into a plurality of time slots, assigning an integer value to an integer variable indexed by a slot identifier, a machine identifier, and a wafer lot identifier, specifying one or more constraints based on the integer variable, wherein the one or more constraints comprise a wafer quantity constraint and a Q-time constraint, executing an optimization solver under the one or more constraints to determine a time and a quantity of wafer lots to be provided to each machine associated with the time window, and issuing a request to a controller to cause provision of the quantity of wafer lots to each machine associated with each step in the time window.

Methods and systems for reducing substrate particle scratching using machine learning are provided. A machine learning model is trained to predict process recipe settings for a substrate temperature control process to be performed for a current substrate at a manufacturing system. First training data and second training data are generated for the machine learning model. The first training data includes historical data associated with prior process recipe settings for a prior substrate temperature control process performed for a prior substrate at a prior process chamber. The second training data is associated with a historical scratch profile of one or more surfaces of the prior substrate after performance of the prior substrate temperature control process according to the prior process recipe settings. The first training data and the second training data are provided to train the machine learning model to predict which process recipe settings for the substrate temperature control process to be performed for the current substrate correspond to a target scratch profile for one or more surfaces of the current substrate.

A method of inspecting a semiconductor processing chamber includes providing a vision sensor into the semiconductor processing chamber, aligning the vision sensor on a target in the semiconductor processing chamber, obtaining an object image of the target using an image scanning module of the vision sensor, generating a three dimensional model of the target based on the object image, and obtaining a physical quantity of the target from the three dimensional model. The obtaining of the object image of the target includes projecting a pattern onto the target using an illuminator of the image scanning module, and scanning an image of the target in which the pattern is projected, using a camera of the image scanning module.