MLA300 Maskless Aligner
Optimized for industrial manufacturing, ensuring high throughput and seamless production line integration
The Maskless Aligner MLA 300 is designed for high-volume production, offering unmatched flexibility and precision in industrial lithography. Supporting wafers up to 300 x 300 mm, it dynamically adapts to surface variations, eliminating the need for costly and time-consuming mask production. By replacing traditional masks with direct data exposure, the MLA 300 enables innovative solutions for complex lithography challenges, such as advanced packaging, sensor calibration, and MEMS fabrication. Its high throughput, 1.5 μm resolution, simplified workflow, and seamless integration with manufacturing execution systems (MES) make it the ideal choice for diverse applications, including microfluidic devices and other advanced technologies.
Key Features
Your work isn’t standard — and your lithography tool shouldn’t be either. Whether you’re advancing cutting-edge research, accelerating innovation through rapid prototyping, or producing high-quality small series, the MLA 150 adapts to your needs, not the other way around.
Handle a Broad Range of Resists: Install one or two different laser wavelengths (375 nm and/or 405 nm) simultaneously to expose the entire range of broadband, g-, h-, and i-line photoresists without hardware changes.
Work with Challenging Substrates: Specialized vacuum chucks allow you to easily handle difficult samples, including small substrate pieces down to 3×3 mm², thin foils, and warped wafers.
Create 2.5D and High-Aspect-Ratio Structures: Use the integrated Grayscale Exposure Mode to fabricate complex 2.5D microstructures, or the High-Aspect-Ratio Mode to pattern thick resists with steep sidewalls, ideal for MEMS and microfluidics.
Interactive ‘Draw Mode’: Directly draw and expose patterns onto the live camera image of your sample—perfect for quick prototyping or precisely placing electrodes onto unique features like graphene flakes or nanowires.
Applications
Advanced Packaging: Capable of fan-out wafer-level packaging with compensation for die shift and chip height variations.
Sensors and Sensor ICs: Tailored for high-precision sensor manufacturing, ensuring accurate and customizable patterning.
MEMS and Microfluidic Devices: Ideal for the complex designs required in MEMS and microfluidic applications.
Discrete Electronic Components: Supports the production of various electronic components with high precision and adaptability.
Integrated Circuits and ASICs: Optimized for efficient production of both analog and digital ICs, as well as ASICs.
Probe Cards: Enables high-precision probe card production by ensuring accurate patterning and alignment for efficient testing and inspection.
Power Electronics: Optimized for substrates such as ceramics, overcoming warpage and thickness variations to deliver consistent quality.
OLED Displays: High precision and flexibility make the MLA 300 an excellent choice for OLED display manufacturing.
Workflow and Cost Efficiency
Maskless Lithography overcomes limitations of mask-based systems, offering a flexible framework for per-die pattern corrections, serialization for quality control, or calibration tracing in sensor applications.
By eliminating the need for mask procurement, verification, and management, the MLA 300 streamlines the production process, reducing both time and complexity as designs are exposed directly from data.
The MLA 300 increases yield, particularly with challenging substrate applications, such as those affected by thermal processing, thanks to its advanced capabilities.
A real-time autofocus system compensates for substrate warping or corrugations, ensuring flawless patterning even on uneven surfaces.
Operating costs are minimized by the long-lifetime diode laser, estimated to last up to 10 years in 24/7 production, and the system’s minimal consumable requirements.
Modularity allows for quick maintenance, keeping downtime to a minimum.
Customer applications
Heidelberg Instruments‘ MLA 300 enables higher interconnect densities by exposing tailored designs matching the exact position of each die.
Resolution pattern exposed in a 500 nm layer of AZ1500 showing a minimum feature size of 1.5 µm. (SEM image, viewed with a 45° angle)
Test structures exposed in a 10 µm layer of AZ 10XT. (SEM image, viewed with a 45° angle)
Why customers choose our systems
“The MLA 300 is a perfect tool for our R&D facility. Without having to make masks the cycle time for design iterations has step changed from days to minutes. The quick turnaround and versatility has made the MLA the preferred exposure tool for ourselves and internal customers rendering our other projection and contact aligners redundant.”
John McLean, Principle Process Development Engineer
Centre for Process Innovation (CPI),Sedgefield, England
Technical Data
Writing performance | Write Mode II | Write Mode III |
|---|---|---|
Minimum lines and spaces [µm] | 2 | 3 |
Minimum feature size [µm] | 1.5 | 3 |
CD uniformity [3σ, nm] | 200 | 300 |
Edge roughness [3σ, nm] | 80 | 100 |
2nd layer alignment [3σ, nm] | 500 | 700 |
Backside alignment [3σ, nm] | 1000 | 1000 |
Exposure time (80 mJ/cm² and 405 nm laser) for 100 x 100 mm² | 2.75 min (one exposure module installed) | 1.5 min (one exposure module installed) |
Exposure time (80 mJ/cm² and 405 nm laser) for 200 x 200 mm² | 9 min (one exposure module installed)
4.7 min (two exposure modules installed) | 4.6 min (one exposure module installed)
2.5 min (two exposure modules installed) |
Exposure time (80 mJ/cm² and 405 nm laser) for 300 x 300 mm² | 19.5 min (one exposure module installed)
10 min (two exposure modules installed) | 9.6 min (one exposure module installed)
5 min (two exposure modules installed) |
Maximum write speed (405 nm laser) [mm²/min] | 4615 (one exposure module installed)
9000 (two exposure modules installed) | 9375 (one exposure module installed)
18000 (two exposure modules installed) |
System features | -- |
|---|---|
Light source | High-power diode laser with long life-time at 375 nm and/or 405 nm |
Maximum substrate size | 300 x 300 mm² |
Maximum exposure area | 300 x 300 mm² |
Substrate thickness | 0.1 - 10 mm |
Internal temperature stability | ± 0.1°C |
Real-time autofocus | Optical and pneumatic autofocus |
Autofocus dynamic range | Up to 150 µm |
Alignment | Advanced alignment; backside alignment optional |
Automation | Automatic wafer handling and pre-alignment |
System dimensions (excluding loader) | -- |
|---|---|
Height × width × depth | 1980 mm x 1200 mm x 2310 mm |
Weight | 2600 kg |
Installation requirements | -- |
|---|---|
Electrical | 400 VAC, 50/60 Hz, 16 A |
Compressed air | 7 - 10 bar |
