Why and How ITRS Worked to Recover the Breakdown of “Scaling Law” in 2000s—Structural Frame Analysis of Si-CMOS Semiconductor Technologies

Abstract

International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS) is referred to as one of the most successful roadmapping attempts in high-tech industries. ITRS constantly gave orientation to industries (device/equipment/materials), academia, and governments for continuing miniaturization. The 2000s, the period of utmost attention to ITRS, is also the period of gradual “breakdown” of Dennard's Scaling Law which stipulates the “technological merits” attained by miniaturization of Si-CMOS semiconductors: 1) shrink in chip size; 2) lowered power consumption, and 3) boosted computation speed, simultaneously. The author discusses that ITRS of 2000s had worked for “recovering” the “breakdown” of the Law and that it is attributed to the highly structured nature of Si-CMOS semiconductor technologies in a frame of “(manufacturing) process-device structure-function.” Then, he evaluates the validity of the hypothesis by analyzing wide range of technologies newly introduced in 2000s, namely 1) variety of supplementary methods for “prolonging” the life of Argon Fluoride Laser lithography; 2) high-k dielectric membranes and metal gate for reducing gate-leak current; and 3) low-k dielectric membranes and strained-silicon transistors to boost computation speed. Thus, the author concludes that 1) ITRS at least functioned to let the consensus (among early adopters) be “established” in wide range of research community; 2) under the “gradual breakdown” of Dennard's Scaling Law in 2000s, ITRS worked to keep the Si-CMOS semiconductor's “killing-three-birds-with-one-stone” nature; and 3) the success of ITRS in 2000s is attributed to the structural frame of Si-CMOS semiconductor technologies characterized as “fixed-in-total and disruptive-in-parts.”