An alignment module for housing and cleaning masks. The alignment module comprises a mask stocker, a cleaning chamber, an alignment chamber, an alignment stage a transfer robot. The mask stocker is configured to house a mask cassette configured to store a plurality of masks. The cleaning chamber is configured to clean the plurality of masks by providing one or more cleaning gases into a chamber after a mask is inserted into the cleaning chamber. The alignment stage is configured to support a carrier and a substrate. The transfer robot is configured to transfer a mask from one or more of the alignment stage and the mask stocker to the cleaning chamber.

A method of fabrication in a vacuum chamber. The method comprises: deploying the wafer within the vacuum chamber; applying a mask in a first position over the wafer in the vacuum chamber; following this, performing a first fabrication step comprising projecting material onto the wafer through the mask while in vacuum in the vacuum chamber; then operating a mask-handling mechanism deployed within the vacuum chamber in order to reposition the mask to a second position while remaining in vacuum in the vacuum chamber, wherein the repositioning comprises receiving readings from one or more sensors sensing a current position of the mask and based thereon aligning the current position of the mask to the second position; and following this repositioning, performing a second fabrication step comprising projecting material onto the wafer through patterned openings in the repositioned mask while still maintaining the vacuum in the vacuum chamber.

A method and an apparatus for bonding semiconductor substrates are provided. The method includes at least the following steps. A first position of a first semiconductor substrate on a first support is gauged by a gauging component embedded in the first support and a first sensor facing towards the gauging component. A second semiconductor substrate is transferred to a position above the first semiconductor substrate by a second support. A second position of the second semiconductor substrate is gauged by a second sensor mounted on the second support and located above the first support. The first semiconductor substrate is positioned based on the second position of the second semiconductor substrate. The second semiconductor substrate is bonded to the first semiconductor substrate.

A workpiece referencing system, the system having a workpiece support assembly for supporting a plurality of workpieces, wherein the support assembly includes a support platform and a plurality of support members which are disposed to the support platform, each support member being configured to support an individual workpiece; and a workpiece referencing assembly for referencing the workpieces, as supported by the support assembly, to predetermined positions; wherein the support members each includes a body which includes a support surface which supports a workpiece and a resilient coupling which resiliently couples at least an upper part of the body relative to the support platform, such that the at least part of the body is displaceable relative to the support platform from a first, unbiased position to a second, biased reference position by operation of the referencing assembly, and, when released, the at least part of the body returns to the first, unbiased position.

An alignment system includes a light source for emitting a light. An alignment mark is disposed on a substrate for receiving the light. The alignment mark includes a first pattern and a second pattern disposed on the substrate. The first pattern includes a first region and a second region. The second pattern includes a third region and a fourth region. The first region and the third region are symmetrical with respective to a symmetrical axis. The second region and the fourth region are symmetrical with respective to the symmetrical axis. The first region includes first mark lines parallel to each other. The second region includes second mark lines parallel to each other. A first pitch is disposed between the first mark lines adjacent to each other. A second pitch is disposed between the second mark lines adjacent to each other. The first pitch is different from the second pitch.

Embodiments of the present disclosure relate to forming multi-depth films for the fabrication of optical devices. One embodiment includes disposing a base layer of a device material on a surface of a substrate. One or more mandrels of the device material are disposed on the base layer. The disposing the one or more mandrels includes positioning a mask over of the base layer. The device material is deposited with the mask positioned over the base layer to form an optical device having the base layer with a base layer depth and the one or more mandrels having a first mandrel depth and a second mandrel depth.

As feature sizes of semiconductor chips shrink there is a need for tighter overlay between layers in a lithography process. This means more advanced and larger overlay corrections may be necessary to ensure that die are properly manufactured into chips, especially in reconstituted substrates where the die can shift in the process of creating the substrate. Systems and methods for correcting these overlay errors in a lithographic process are provided. Additional rotation (theta) and projected image size (mag) corrections can be made to correct overlay errors present in reconstituted substrates by adjusting the stage and the reticle. Furthermore, these adjustments can be made allowing site-by-site or zone-by-zone corrections instead of a one-time adjustment of the reticle chuck as has been done in the past. These corrections can alleviate some of the issues associated with fan-out wafer-level packaging (FOWLP) and fan-out panel-level packaging (FOPLP).

A pellicle removal tool including a stage that holds a photomask and an associated pellicle, two or more arms positioned around the stage and configured to engage pellicle side wells of the pellicle, and two or more actuators each configured to adjust at least a vertical position of a corresponding one of the two or more arms so as to apply a lifting force to the pellicle for removal of the pellicle from the photomask.

A semiconductor method is disclosed. The semiconductor method is performed upon semiconductor wafers, wherein each of the semiconductor wafers includes a first exposure field and a second exposure field, and each of the first exposure field and the second exposure field includes a first alignment mark and a second alignment mark. The method includes: determining a first alignment pattern for a first wafer by selecting one of the alignment marks of the first exposure field, and selecting one of the alignment marks of the second exposure field; performing the aligning operation upon the first semiconductor wafer by using the first alignment pattern; determining a second alignment pattern for a second wafer by selecting one of the alignment marks of the first exposure field, and selecting one of the alignment marks of the second exposure field, wherein the first alignment pattern is different from the second alignment pattern.

A direct-deposition system capable of forming a high-resolution pattern of material on a substrate is disclosed. Vaporized atoms from an evaporation source pass through a pattern of through-holes in a shadow mask to deposit on the substrate in the desired pattern. The shadow mask is held in a mask chuck that enables the shadow mask and substrate to be separated by a distance that can be less than ten microns. As a result, the vaporized atoms that pass through the shadow mask exhibit little or no lateral spread (i.e., feathering) after passing through its apertures and the material deposits on the substrate in a pattern that has very high fidelity with the aperture pattern of the shadow mask.