Future of silicon integrated circuit technology

Abstract

CMOS technology has been developed into the sub-100 nm range. It is expected that the nano-CMOS technology will governed the IC manufacturing for at least another couple of decades. Though there are many challenges ahead, further down-sizing the device to a few nanometers is still on the schedule of International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS). Several technological options for manufacturing nano-CMOS microchips have been available or will soon be available. This paper reviews the challenges of nano-CMOS downsizing and manufacturing. We shall focus on the recent progress on the key technologies for the nano-CMOS IC fabrication in the next fifteen years.