US Patent Issued to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing on May 20 for "Semiconductor substrate boat and methods of using the same" (Taiwanese Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 16 -- United States Patent no. 12,308,266, issued on May 20, was assigned to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (Hsinchu, Taiwan).

"Semiconductor substrate boat and methods of using the same" was invented by Tung-Huang Chen (Hsinchu, Taiwan), Chi-Hao Kung (Hsinchu, Taiwan) and Yen-Yu Chen (Hsinchu, Taiwan).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A substrate boat for use in heat treatment of semiconductor wafers includes support rods and fingers for supporting a substrate in a horizontal orientation in process tools, e.g., furnaces. The substrate is supported in the substrate boat by groups of fingers lying in a common horizontal plane. The fingers contact the substrate at...