Allvia integrates embedded capacitors

LONDON: Allvia Incorporated, which claims itself as the first through-silicon via (TSV) foundry in the world, has announced that it has integrated embedded capacitors on silicon interposer substrates.

In a statement, Allvia, based in Sunnyvale, California, the United States, said capacitance values higher than 1.5 microfarad per square centimeter have been achieved for the embedded capacitors.

Separate thin-film capacitor components have been used earlier, but TSV interposers with embedded capacitors offer the shortest electrical path between devices and power supply decoupling capacitors. TSVs, by virtue of having very low inductance interconnects, enable high electrical performance when integrated with embedded thin-film capacitors.

Allvia says its silicon TSV interposers enable interconnect pitch matching between a high-density IC chip and an organic or a ceramic substrate.

Sergey Savastiouk, CEO of Allvia, said in the statement that the capacitance value of 15 nanofarads per millimeter square is not a limit of the company’s process and claimed that the integration of capacitors with TSVs and silicon interposers is a technological breakthrough. The capacitance from the die or package, Savastiouk added, can now be transferred to the interposer.

Allvia had, in January 2010, announced it had completed the integration of a silicon interposer between a semiconductor die and an organic or ceramic substrate and also had finished reliability testing.

The company is making available samples and reliability data to interested customers, the statement said.