Materials Technology Correlation Between Front-end and Back-end Processes in Advanced Semiconductor Industry

In the advanced semiconductor materials industry, Japan has a competitive edge in the development of photosensitive materials (PM), which is essential for the growth of the industry. Herein, we clarify the technological trend and characteristics of both Front-end (FEOL/BEOL) and Back-end (BOL) processes by analyzing over 9,000 patents and representative conferences information. Subsequently, the trend similarity between the two processes are observed. Moreover, we obtain the disclosure characteristics categorized into defined categories based on the patent quality by visualizing the contents of registered patents and the examination status of each PM. Furthermore, we verify that the combination of both data is conducive to trend investigation.