About Nova

Nova Ltd. (Nova) engages in the design, development, and production of integrated process control systems for use in the manufacture of semiconductors, also known as integrated circuits or chips. As of December 31, 2022, the company had six direct fully owned subsidiaries, in the U.S., Taiwan, Korea, China, Japan and Germany, and one indirect fully owned subsidiary in Germany. Nova is a leading innovator and key provider of metrology solutions for advanced process control used in semiconductor manufacturing. Nova delivers continuous innovation by providing high-performance metrology solutions for effective process control throughout the semiconductor fabrication process. The company brings pioneering metrology solutions to semiconductors process control, by industrializing lab and research-grade technologies and developing emerging metrology solutions. Nova’s product portfolio, deployed at the world’s largest integrated-circuit manufacturers, combines high-precision hardware and cutting-edge software, and provides its customers with deep insight into the development and production of the most advanced semiconductor devices. Nova’s capability to deliver OPTICAL, X-ray, SIMS and Chemical analysis technology solutions enables its customers to improve performance, enhance product yields and accelerate time to market. Nova’s market offering is driven by three product divisions: The Dimensional Metrology Division (DMD), which is responsible for optical technology-based metrology solutions (integrated and standalone), the Materials Metrology Division (MMD), which is responsible for X-ray and SIMS (Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry) based solutions, and the Chemical Metrology Division (CMD), which is responsible for chemical metrology and replenishment solutions. The corporate units, such as marketing, next generation technology, human resources, finance and global business group, support both divisions. This structure allows the company to focus management attention on each product line separately, as well as to facilitate the integration of additional businesses or technologies in the future. In January 2022, the company acquired ancosys GmbH (ancosys), a privately held company headquartered in Pliezhausen Germany, which is a leading provider of chemical analysis and metrology solutions for advanced semiconductor manufacturing, supporting both frontend and backend semiconductor manufacturing. Products and Technologies The company’s product portfolio includes a complete set of metrology platforms suited for dimensional, films, materials and chemical metrology measurements for process control across multiple semiconductor manufacturing process steps, including lithography, Etch, CMP, deposition, electrochemical plating and advanced packaging. The company’s offering consisted of several key product lines, spanning multiple technologies and addressing key challenges in semiconductor process control, from R&D to High-Volume-Manufacturing. The company’s strategy to offer holistic and diversified portfolio supports the industry’s frequent transitions, establishing the advantages and unique value it brings to its customers. With the introduction of new technologies and products, the company covers a wider variety of applications, which increase its served and available markets and footprint in the semiconductor manufacturing market. The company’s product portfolio is composed from 4 major product lines. Dimensional Metrology Nova’s integrated metrology (IM) - Integrated platforms that enable advanced process control (APC) required for the most advanced logic and memory technology nodes. Nova’ IM solutions offer fast metrology with high productivity, targeting manufacturing of advanced logic and memory device technologies. Integrated metrology systems are directly integrated with manufacturing process equipment and provide semiconductor manufacturers with effective and efficient process control by measuring wafers within the process environment. This family of products allows within-wafer and within-die variation control. Enriched with Nova’s advanced modeling and algorithmic solutions, Nova’s integrated metrology provides enhancements in metrology accuracy, precision, and tool matching. Nova’s stand-alone metrology platforms are utilized to characterize critical dimensions, such as width, shape and profile with high precision and accuracy and are used in multiple areas of the fabrication process, such as photolithography, etch, CMP and deposition steps. Nova’s stand-alone platforms are targeted for critical dimensions (CD) and thin films measurements at the most advanced logic and memory technology nodes across all semiconductor leading customers. The expression ‘stand-alone metrology’ generically describes free standing metrology equipment, located in line, i.e., next to the processing equipment measuring wafer samples in a station of its own. Nova’s stand-alone metrology product line consisted of several platforms, ranging from normal channel only to multiple channels of information in one tool. Nova’s unique channels of information enables high metrology performance combined with high productivity. When incorporating Nova’s advanced suite of modeling and machine learning solutions, the Optical CD stand-alone platform provides cutting-edge performance for critical dimensions (CD) and thin films measurements of the most complex layer stacks and 3D structures. Modeling and Software Some of Nova’s hardware products, mainly as related to Dimensional Metrology, are combined with the company’s suite of advanced algorithms and software modeling solutions. Nova’s software modeling solutions combine top notch algorithms in the field of Artificial Intelligence and machine learning. Nova’s suite of software modeling products consisted of Nova MARS physical and geometrical modeling and Nova FIT data driven machine learning modeling solutions. These solutions are supported by Nova HPC, a computational management layer, which also serves as the foundation for Nova’s Centralized Fleet Management and Control. The company’s comprehensive software modeling portfolio provides customers with a complete modeling and application development solution designed for complex 3D and HAR structures in the most advanced logic and memory technology nodes: Nova MARS - Nova MARS software package is a multi-channel metrology modeling engine designed for the most advanced 3D structures in advanced process nodes of semiconductor manufacturing. It’s a complete modeling solution for scatterometry and interferometry models’ development, material characterization and recipe optimization which is crucial for facing increasing challenges in semiconductor metrology. The Nova MARS also injects physical and process related knowledge to solve complex structures. Nova FIT - Nova FIT modeling suite complements traditional modeling of Optical Critical Dimensions by machine learning and data driven algorithmic solutions. The algorithmic suite works in conjunction with Nova MARS physical modeling engine and Nova’s fleet management solution to improve metrology performance, speed up time to solution and expand metrology envelope for enriched process control. Nova FIT embeds advanced machine learning and big data architecture into optical modeling, enhancing the way customers utilize metrology measurement data to tighten process windows, avoid process excursions and improve yield. Nova’s Centralized Fleet Management and Control - Nova’s Fleet Management and Performance Monitoring Center simplify the management and enhance the productivity of Nova tools in the fabrication site. The platform’s ability to process and analyze large amounts of fleet and metrology data using advanced data analytic tools provides the company’s customers with intelligent and predictive insights on tool performance and process trends. Nova HPC - The Nova HPC is a High-Performance Computing solution, which is designed to accelerate Nova MARS and Nova FIT work processes. Nova HPC significantly expedites application development by accelerating library-building, real time regression and recipe-setting processes. Its advanced computing hardware design enables optimization of Nova’s proprietary algorithm performance, thus enabling the most calculation-demanding application development. Materials Metrology Materials are considered the next frontier in advancing integrated circuits beyond dimensional and architectural scaling. The growing usage of complex and novel materials in advanced technology nodes has increased the demand for metrology solutions that can measure materials properties, In Line and In Die, with high precision and accuracy. Nova’s materials metrology offering utilizes powerful X-ray, Raman and SIMS technologies that have been optimized to provide the automation, speed and reliability required in advanced semiconductor production environment. As part of Nova’s strategic plan, Nova intends to increase its focus on the evolving materials engineering market. The demand to precisely characterize and control materials composition, thickness, stress and more, is growing in advanced Memory and Logic nodes and requires innovative metrology solutions. The company’s Nova ELIPSON, METRION and VERAFLEX platforms aim to provide such capabilities. VERAFLEX - Nova’s VERAFLEX combines enhanced XPS (X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy) capability with an optional unique low energy XRF (X-ray fluorescence) channel to address logic and memory device fabrication challenges. This innovative inline technology is a surface-sensitive quantitative spectroscopic technique that is used to determine the elemental composition and thickness of thin films. Nova METRION - Nova METRION- targets process control of 3D logic and memory semiconductor devices. The technology enables advanced materials profile measurements by bringing secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) into semiconductor production lines on both monitor and product wafer. The Nova METRION provides quantitative and actionable results on depth profiling of compositional information with high-depth resolution and precision. Nova ELIPSON - Nova ELIPSON utilizes Raman spectroscopy, a vibrational spectroscopy technique, to detect multiple material properties, such as strain, crystallinity, phases, grain size and composition. The combination of a small spot and high speed of this non-destructive, optical method makes it a metrology of choice for both memory and logic segments. Chemical Metrology With the acquisition of ancosys GmbH, Nova offers a market-leading portfolio of advanced, open and flexible chemical metrology platforms for backend wafer-level packaging and front-end dual-damascene process steps. The growing number of interconnect steps that require plating at the front-end of the process, as well as the substantial increase in the number of organic alloys and compounds used in advanced packaging are increasing the need for advanced chemical metrology solutions. Furthermore, the higher material costs, and tighter environmental regulations are driving up the cost of operations and increasing the need for manufacturers to perform chemical process control on more elements and with increasing intensity. The company’s portfolio helps manufacturers ensure high-quality electroplating processes by carrying out chemical analysis and replenishment in real time. Nova ancolyzer Damascene – the Nova ancolyzer Damascene is an industry-standard chemical metrology solution for Damascene copper plating interconnects applications, qualified by leading global manufacturers for operation in advanced nodes production processes. The solution supports a continuously growing range of copper baths and applications and offers a fully automated analysis of bath components, overall plating performance, excursions, trends alarms and warnings, and overall process control. Nova ANCOLYZER – the ancolyzer is a fully automated online chemical metrology platform designed with the most flexible architecture for advanced packaging processes. Nova’s ancolyzer offers superior analytical performance and supports a wide variety of analytical techniques for process control. The platform’s flexible and scalable architecture is configured to the specific process analysis and replenishment requirements. The platform’s superior accuracy and precision are coupled with uncompromising reliability and the highest availability. Nova DMR – the Nova DMR offers economical replenishment of metals in a plating bath. This significantly extends the bath chemicals’ lifetime and improves the plater utilization. DMR provides fully automatic powder container docking for uninterrupted operation and eliminates the constant increase in bath volume, reducing the need for bleed and feed or full bath dump. Thus, reducing environmental impact and minimizing operational risks. The platform integrates with Nova ANCOLYZER and can directly connect to any process tools. Customers, Sales and Marketing The company’s sales and marketing strategy is based mostly on direct sales channels where it engages with its customers from the early stages of process development, to address their challenges in the development phase, and later on support their technology transition to high volume production. The company seeks to establish and maintain tight cooperative relationships with its customers by consistently providing them with a high level of service, support and new capabilities. The company has a global network of sales and marketing, customer service and applications support offices worldwide. The company serves all leading manufacturers in the logic, foundry and memory sectors of the integrated circuit manufacturing industry. The company’s customers are located across Asia, Europe, and North America. Research and Development The company’s net research and development expenses were $90.5 million in 2022. Competition The company competes mainly with Onto Innovation Inc., and KLA Corp., which manufacture and sell CD, thin films and chemical metrology and process control systems. In addition, the company competes with process equipment manufacturers (PEMs), such as ASML Holdings N.V., and Applied Materials Inc., which develop (or might as well acquire companies which develop) in-situ sensors and metrology products. History The company was founded in 1993. It was incorporated in 1993 under the laws of the state of Israel. The company was formerly known as Nova Measuring Instruments Ltd. and changed its name to Nova Ltd. in 2021.