FORMING METHOD FOR CRACK STOP AND SEMICONDUCTOR WAFER STRUCTURE

摘要

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To form a simplified crack stop compatible with a shallow fuse etching treatment usable for the present low-cost redundant structure using a high level metal fuse. SOLUTION: A final level metallization(LLM) etching is modified to enable a bond pad/fuse/crack-stop etching in a high productivity single step. A stack formed on the edge of a dicing channel at metallization levels M0, M1, M2 easily removed after the modified LLM etching before dicing to physically separate an insulation film covering dicing channels from an insulator covering electrically active chip regions. The separation prevents the crack from expanding to the active chip region via the insulator in the dicing channel.