Axcelis Technologies on Wednesday said it had received a follow-on order from Advanced Micro Devices for its single wafer Optima MD ion implanter. The system will ship in September to AMD’s 300mm fab in Dresden, Germany, where it will enable production of processors using 65nm and 45nm device technologies.

The ion beam implanters are used to alter the near surface properties of semiconductor materials in order to save them from possible damages. The Optima MD is the only low energy, mid-dose ion implanter for all channel engineering applications in the low-dose and mid-dose regimes. The single wafer productivity-driven platform covers traditional medium current processes as well as emerging low energy mid-dose HALO implants.

“The Optima MD provides unmatched precision in the areas of dopant placement and angle control, two key advantages when producing advanced devices. Moreover, the platform’s broad energy range delivers the flexibility and capital efficiency AMD needs to achieve its productivity goals,” said Mary Puma, chairman and CEO of Axcelis.

With a broad energy range of 500eV to 750keV, the system supports a wide array of low energy, mid-dose implant applications, especially HALO processes. The Optima MD also enables customers to cover evolving well and channel implants while still achieving high levels of productivity for more traditional implant applications, according to the maker.

The Optima MD can process 350 300mm wafers per hour. Typically such machines cost several millions of dollars. 

The Fab 36, which started qualification manufacturing in April, will have initial capacity of 13 000 300mm wafers per month, but the building itself allows AMD to expand the foundry to produce up to 20 000 wafers per month.