Image based overlay measurement improvements of 28nm FD-SOI CMOS front-end critical steps

Technology shrinkage leads to tight specifications in advanced semiconductor industries. For several years', metrology for lithography has been a key technology to address this challenge and to improve yield. More specifically overlay metrology is the object of special attention for tool suppliers and semiconductor manufacturers. This work focuses on Image Based Overlay (IBO) metrology for 28 nm FD-SOI CMOS front-end critical steps (gate and contact). With Overlay specifications below 10 nm, accuracy of the measurement is critical. In this study we show specific cases where target designs need to be optimized in order to minimize process effects (CMP, etch, deposition, etc.) that could lead to overlay measurement errors. Another important aspect of the metrology target is that its design must be device-like in order to better control and correct overlay errors leading to yield loss. Methodologies to optimize overlay metrology recipes are also presented. If the process effects cannot be removed entirely by target design optimization, recipe parameters have to be carefully chosen and controlled to minimize the influence of the target imperfection on measured overlay. With target asymmetry being one of the main contributors to those residual overlay measurement errors the Qmerit accuracy flag can be used to quantify the measurement error and recipe parameters can be set accordingly in order to minimize the target asymmetry impact. Reference technique measurements (CD-SEM) were used to check accuracy of the optimized overlay measurements.