Filtering for 5G (Update 2021) – AlScN and Electrode Metal Deposition for Advanced BAW Filters

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The fifth generation of mobile network is well and truly with us, and the performance benefits over 4G are considerable.  WiFi has also evolved with the onset of WiFi 6E with it’s enormous bandwidth.  This initial phase of 5G and the latest WiFi bands operate in the <10GHz range.  Bulk Acoustic Wave, or BAW, filters are used to filter out the unwanted frequencies of the higher frequency (>3GHz) bands.

Traditionally BAW filters use a layer of piezoelectric material, namely AlN and more recently AlScN, to convert the radio waves to an acoustic signal and filter out the unwanted noise.  As the centre frequency of the bands increases, the piezo layer has to become thinner to filter them.  The thinner films, with increasingly higher piezo coupling capability, become more and more difficult to deposit.  This is also true of the metal electrodes that carry the signal to and from the filters.

In this webinar we present the latest PVD technology solutions to deposit very thin highly doped layers of AlN, and the associated electrode metals.  We discuss how to control the critical aspects of doped AlN deposition such as the control of mis-orientated grains and most importantly the control of the stress state of the piezo layer.  We also discuss the deposition of extremely uniform electrode layers.  We demonstrate outstanding within wafer stress performance and mis-orientated grain control for AlN layers with atomic Sc content up to 30%, and even higher.

Presenter: Dr. Anthony Barker, Senior Product Manager, PVD Products

 Anthony Barker joined Surface Technology Systems (STS) in 1997 as Etch Process Engineer. He went to manager STS’ non-Si based Etch and deposition process groups.  After leaving STS he joined Trikon as Etch Process Engineer in 2005, which became Aviza Technology and then merged with STS in 2009 to form SPTS Technologies. Most recently, Anthony worked as Principal Process Engineer in R &D Accounts group before joining SPTS’s PVD Product Management team in May 2017.

Before STS, Anthony worked as Thin Film Process Engineer at Gems Sensors. Dr. Barker has a B. Eng Honours degree in Materials Engineering and a Ph.D in Electronic Materials in association with Rolls Royce, both from Swansea University