Philoptics Targets AI Chip Tool Market With 2mm Glass Drilling

Philoptics (161580.KQ) is accelerating its push into the semiconductor equipment market with through-glass via (TGV) technology capable of drilling straight through glass substrates 2.0 millimeters thick in a single pass. The company aims to strengthen its position in the glass substrate market by securing technology that can handle substrates more than twice as thick as the roughly 0.8-millimeter products its customers are currently developing.

Kang Sang-ki, president of Philoptics, met with The Seoul Economic Daily in Songdo, Incheon, on the 29th and said, "As artificial intelligence chips demand higher performance and more power, package sizes grow larger, and glass substrates inevitably have to become thicker and stronger to support them stably." Kang added, "We expect glass substrate demand to take off, so we are securing 2-millimeter TGV technology ahead of the market to take the lead." He also said, "The thickness verified technically so far is around 2 millimeters, but we can handle thicker glass substrates if customers require it."

Philoptics is a mid-sized equipment maker that develops display and semiconductor manufacturing tools based on laser and optical technology. Founded in 2008, it grew on the strength of OLED laser processing equipment and has recently expanded into semiconductor processing tools for glass substrates.

One of the keys to processing 2-millimeter glass substrates is how uniformly shaped the fine, high-aspect-ratio holes can be made. As glass gets thicker, it becomes harder to deliver laser energy evenly to the interior, raising the risk that holes fail to penetrate completely or that a "waist" forms, where the middle section narrows excessively. Philoptics has advanced its optical technology so that holes can be drilled in a single pass with the same shape from the top of the glass to the bottom.

Kang said, "With thick glass, the issue is not simply whether the hole goes through. What matters is keeping the difference between the diameter at the center and the diameters at the top and bottom within a set standard." He added, "We have raised our technology to the level where we can process 2-millimeter thicknesses without defects."

Behind the push into 2-millimeter technology is the growing size of AI chips and similar products. As chiplet technology that integrates graphics processing units (GPUs) and high-bandwidth memory (HBM) into a single package spreads, substrate sizes could expand to around 200 by 200 millimeters. The larger the substrate, the more severe the warping of conventional organic substrates caused by thermal expansion and other factors. Physical stress concentrates at the package edges in particular, which can limit fine wiring and chip integration. That has increased the need for glass substrates, which are stronger and flatter than organic ones.

Kang believes the biggest challenge for commercializing glass substrates is shifting from TGV technology itself to overall process yield. Until a year or two ago, defects frequently occurred in the process of drilling holes in glass, but the company believes it has largely resolved the technical problems at the TGV processing stage. The key now appears to be how much it can reduce defects arising in later steps such as plating, polishing and wiring formation.

"Looking only at our TGV technology, delivering product performance and securing reliability are no longer major issues," Kang said. "The biggest hurdle to commercializing glass substrates is whether customers can achieve the yield levels they want in actual mass production through the other processes."

Philoptics is also continuously improving the performance of its TGV technology. It currently takes about 30 minutes to drill 500,000 to 1 million holes in a single glass substrate, and the company aims to cut that roughly in half next year. Because laser equipment is expensive, the strategy is to raise processing speed and ease customers' capital spending burden.

Philoptics expects the glass substrate market to enter full commercialization around 2028. Since equipment investment for mass production typically takes place about a year in advance, related orders are likely to pick up starting next year. "Next year, we expect semiconductor equipment to surpass display equipment on an order basis," Kang said. "Our goal is to transform from a company centered on displays into a global semiconductor equipment maker centered on glass substrates."