Failure Estimation of Semiconductor Chip During Wire Bonding Process

Wire bonding, a process of the connection between a semiconductor chip and a lead frame by a thin metal wire, is one of the important processes of electronic packaging. This paper presents failure estimation of a silicon chip and a GaAS chip during a gold wire bonding process. The gold wire bonding process is carried out by pressing a gold ball made at a tip of the gold wire on a semiconductor chip and vibrating it by ultrasonic. High contact pressure is useful for shortening the process cycle, but it sometimes causes failure of the semiconductor chip. Elastic-plastic large deformation contact analyses are performed and the distributions of the stresses in these semiconductor chips are investigated. The possibility of failure of a semiconductor chip under usual wire bonding pressure is pointed out only for a GaAs chip.