Achieving good correlation results between bitmap and TENCOR data

Software to correlate memory bitmap to defect data has become a standard tool for yield analysis, because it provides extraordinarily useful information about yield limiters. Currently, this analysis software is limited to process KLA data. Although TENCOR inspection machines are widely used as production inspection tools, defect information provided by the TENCORs has not been used to correlate to bitmap data, because the TENCOR alignment capabilities are not good enough to achieve good correlation results. We present a method to correlate bitmap information to TENCOR data. This method is based on a set of algorithms used to process the TENCOR inspection files to minimize the native misalignment problems present in the TENCOR inspection machines. By means of these algorithms, TENCOR data can be correlated to the bitmap data as well as that of KLAs, opening new possibilities for the yield analyst.