At the foundry, eASIC maintains an inventory of wafers pre-processed up to metal 6 for eASIC Nextreme SL and pre-processed up to contacts for eASIC Nextreme VL, awaiting per-customer customization. Because the 30+ layers between silicon and metal 6 are generic for all customer designs, the bulk of the fabrication process is already complete by the time a customer design is submitted. Therefore, turnaround times are cut significantly and manufacturing and yield improvement costs are amortized across multiple designs.

At the completion of a customer design, eASIC’s eTools software suite generates the Via 6 customization data file necessary to finalize the eASIC Nextreme die manufacturing. For prototypes or low to mid-volume runs, the file is fed into a Direct-Write eBeam machine which is used at the foundry to perform the Via 6 customization cost-effectively. This method eliminates the cost of generating a mask and also helps avoid minimum quantity requirements by enabling multiple customer designs to be produced on a single wafer. The same data file is used to generate a single custom via-mask for high volume production.

eASIC Nextreme Production: From Design Completion to Tested Parts

A key feature of the eASIC Nextreme operational flow is that the manufactured silicon for prototypes is identical to the manufactured silicon for production designs. This distinguishes eASIC Nextreme from other ASIC solutions in which the prototyping platform differs from production parts. In eASIC Nextreme’s case, the only difference between prototype and high-volume manufacturing methodology is how the Via 6 layer is written. In the case of prototypes, it is written using a Direct Write eBeam machine and no custom masks. In the case of high-volume production, a custom mask is produced for the Via 6 layer. Regardless, the same GDSII data is used for the Via 6 customization layer, and all other layers are manufactured using standard mask sets.