Process for manufacturing semiconductor wafers containing a gas-phase epitaxial layer in a deposition chamber

A process for producing semiconductor wafers with an epitaxial layer deposited from a gas phase in a deposition chamber, the process comprising:

• removing, from the deposition chamber, material that has been deposited in the deposition chamber in a course of preceding coating operations by etching of the deposition chamber;
• carrying out coating operations in succession, which each entail the deposition of an epitaxial layer on a substrate wafer in the deposition chamber, comprising a first gas stream of first deposition gas being passed over the respective substrate wafer to form a respective semiconductor wafer with the respective epitaxial layer;
• and
• before or after each of the coating operations carried out in succession, passing a second gas stream of a second deposition gas to an edge region of the respective substrate wafer or of the respective semiconductor wafer with the respective epitaxial layer, wherein a change is made in at least one process parameter whose effect is that, through the passing of the second deposition gas, deposition of material in the edge region increases as a function of a number of coating operations carried out since the removal of material from the deposition chamber.