Loading patent…
AssigneesInternational Business Machines Corporation, Infineon Technologies North America Corp.
InventorsTimothy J. Dalton, Andrew P. Cowley, Peter A. Emmi, Erdem Kaltalioglu, Vincent J. McGahay
Estimating the term…
An on-chip vertically stacked decoupling capacitor includes a hardmask film formed between the capacitor dielectric and the lower electrode. The manufacturing process used to form the capacitor takes advantage of the hardmask film and enables the capacitor to be formed over a low-k dielectric material. Attack of the underlying low-k dielectric material is suppressed during the etching and stripping processes used to form the capacitor, due to the presence of the hardmask. The low-k dielectric film provides for a reduced parasitic capacitance between adjacent conductive wires formed in the low-k dielectric material and therefore provides for increased levels of integration.
A method for forming a capacitor within a semiconductor device including the steps of:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.