Sony Licenses Ziptronix Patents for BSI Wafer Bonding

Ziptronix has signed a licensing agreement with Sony for the use of Ziptronix’s patents regarding oxide bonding technology for BSI sensors. “We believe that Ziptronix’s patented oxide bonding technology, called ZiBond, enables the industry’s lowest distortion for imaging systems utilizing backside illumination” said Dan Donabedian, CEO of Ziptronix, Inc. “The result is that pixels can be scaled smaller, resulting in more die per wafer. Users of ZiBond technology benefit because yields are dramatically improved and production costs reduced.”

“Our patented bonding technology revolutionizes how light is received in imaging sensors. This is critically important for backside illumination applications,” said Donabedian. “The market for image sensing products is expected to exceed $16 billion cumulative over the next four years. Because ours is an innovative, enabling technology, I expect Ziptronix to play a leadership role in the backside illumination space as well as several other developing markets.”

No Sony comment is quoted in the PR.

Update: EETimes publishes an article on Ziptronix licensing deals.

The proprietary ZiBond process was a breakthrough in that using a very thin layer of dielectric facilitated direct bonding of multiple materials in previously impossible combinations, according to Ziptronix. Ziptronix has received approximately $45 million in investments from three sources: Intersouth, Grotech; and RTI International, a independent-nonprofit R&D organization.