This interview with Dr. Per-Ove (Peo) Hansson, General Manager of ASM America, focuses on how performance improvements are becoming more about materials innovation than simple scaling. Advanced strained silicon films are discussed as well as the latest advancements in ALD that are allowing chip makers to uniformly deposit 5 angstrom thick films, molecule by molecule. New materials mean new ways must be developed to tune transistor properties. Peo talks about the new ways that they have found to tune threshold voltage with Lanthanum and Aluminum depositions, as well as the development of binary oxides.
Click here if you are wondering What's ALD? It's a quick and easy-to-understand tutorial on Atomic Layer Deposition from the Kid's Korner section of ChipHistory.org.