• Silicon Carbide is a semi-conducting or semi-insulating material used in many different types of electronic devices such as diodes, MOSFETS, JFETS, etc.
• It is replacing Silicon based devices for applications that require high power density, high frequency, and high voltage applications
• Electric Vehicles (EVs) and 5G are a major user of these types of devices
• Silicon Carbide is grown via a Physical Vapor Transport (PVT) process in high temperature furnaces and it takes 2-4 weeks to grow a crystal (boule) that is only a few kilograms in size
• The crystal then needs to be shaped into a wafer ready puck and then sliced into wafers for device makers to build on
• It is this post growth processing step taking the as grown boule to a wafer ready puck for which Hardinge has developed an innovative solution

The BoulePro 200 offers an avenue for SiC manufacturers to streamline their boule fabrication process in order to meet the accelerating demand for high quality and lower cost SiC.  Most producers are expanding as quickly as they can to meet this downstream demand and require a means to optimize all aspects of their SiC production facility. The BoulePro 200 checks all the boxes for SiC boule to puck conversion optimization as shown in the silicon carbide manufacturing process below:

1. Crystal growth
2. Boule to Puck conversion through the BoulePro 200
3. Wafering

• Extensive experience machining SiC material meant for semiconductor applications – machines running at SiC producers today
• Have successfully executed all major boule to wafer ready material process steps for 150mm and 200mm material – OD, Flat and Notch, Dome / Seed side removal
• Have optimized all boule to puck steps including the X-ray to determine and compensate for crystal orientation and integrated into a single machine design to provide SiC crystal producers with the most efficient and lowest cost solution to machine boules
• Have worked with a variety of SiC boules from numerous SiC producers

Hardinge’s Solution: The BoulePro 200

Years of experience in machining SiC, quartz, and other advanced materials allow us to achieve:

• Improved part velocity
• Reduced manpower
• Condensed manufacturing footprint
• Superior process repeatability
• Reduction in consumables required

• A – Automated: the machine is fully automated to receive a SiC boule and create a wafer ready SiC puck.
• X – X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) capable: the crystal structure of the SiC boule must be identified so to correctly orient the crystal in the finished SiC puck and the XRD and patent pending Single-Step Dual-plane Compensation (SSDC) capability allows this to be completed
• U – UV light detection: when SiC boules are placed under a UV light, certain foreign polytypes (wrong kind of SiC crystal) will show as a different color. 4H is the polytype desired to grow and 6H is a foreign polytype grown inadvertently in some cases. The UV light shows the location of the 6H grown crystal and the machine removes it so the final SiC puck contains only the desired 4H polytype
• L – Laser scribing: The ability to make a laser scribe on the finished SiC puck surface can be added so the customer can appropriately track the lot #, boule #, etc. for material tracking purposes
• V – Vision system: The vision system can take high end photos of the boule or puck as the customer desires at any stage of the process.