Kimmel, an assignee from IBM, said the mask industry is generally "10 years behind" in terms of process controls, cleaning, inspection and repair. Even though the mask suppliers are closely linked to semiconductor fabs, many of the yield-enhancing techniques used in fabs have yet to make their way into most mask shops, he said.

At least half of all bad masks are caused by defects, either "hard defects," contaminants that end up on the chrome and are then etched into the pattern, or "soft defects," such as haze from residual chemicals.

"A lot of hard defects start out as soft defects," he said, arguing that better cleaning techniques could make a big dent in the major yield killer for the mask industry.

The most advanced mask shops, for example, are just now adopting standard mechanical-interface environments for the resist and coating steps, at least a decade after SMIF was widely adopted by the chip industry.

Repair techniques can be improved to deal with defects that do occur. Here, there is plenty of activity, ranging from startups to the established equipment vendors. KLA Instruments is working on a much-improved mask inspection tool, Lightning, which is expected to hit the market soon. The Etec Systems division of Applied Materials has a new type of aerial-imaging mask inspection tool in development that uses a lithographic-type laser for mask inspection.

A Delray Beach, Fla., company called Rave LLC is among the startups. It is fielding a repair system based on an atomic-force microscope, which first scans the mask and then switches to cutting mode to remove the defect. Infineon's mask subsidiary in Munich, Germany, is an early adopter.

Progress is being made in process control, another area in which the mask industry is a decade behind. EG Soft, a division of Electroglass, has developed a process control package aimed specifically at mask fabrication facilities, many of which use "homegrown" software that lacks the sophistication that a commercial product can offer.

All of this will cost mask shops new investments of "tens of millions," Kimmel said. But at least there is hope that solid engineering advances can reduce mask costs somewhat.

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