Introduction To Semiconductor Technology

An integrated circuit is a small but sophisticated device implementing several electronic functions. It is made up of two major parts: a tiny and very fragile silicon chip (die) and a package which is intended to protect the internal silicon chip and to provide users with a practical way of handling the component. This note describes the various "front-end" and "back-end" manufacturing processes and takes the transistor as an example, because it uses the MOS technology. Actually, this technology is used for the majority of the ICs manufactured at STMicroelectronics.