3B001 Category 3B

Equipment for the manufacturing of semiconductor devices, materials, or related equipment, as follows (see List of Items Controlled) and “specially designed” “components” and “accessories” therefor.

Category 3: Electronics

Reasons for control

• NS: National security
• RS: Regional stability
• AT: Anti-terrorism

Country chart

List-based license exceptions

Items

1. a. Equipment designed for epitaxial growth as follows:
2. a.1. Equipment designed or modified to produce a layer of any material other than silicon with a thickness uniform to less than ±2.5% across a distance of 75 mm or more;
3. a.2. Metal Organic Chemical Vapor Deposition (MOCVD) reactors designed for compound semiconductor epitaxial growth of material having two or more of the following elements: aluminum, gallium, indium, arsenic, phosphorus, antimony, oxygen, or nitrogen;
4. a.3. Molecular beam epitaxial growth equipment using gas or solid sources;
5. a.4. Equipment designed for epitaxial growth of silicon (Si) or silicon germanium (SiGe), and having all of the following:
6. a.4.a. At least one preclean chamber designed to provide a surface preparation means to clean the surface of the wafer; and
7. a.4.b. An epitaxial deposition chamber designed to operate at a temperature equal to or below 958 K (685 °C).
8. b. Semiconductor wafer fabrication equipment designed for ion implantation and having any of the following:
9. b.1. [Reserved]
10. b.2. Being designed and optimized to operate at a beam energy of 20 keV or more and a beam current of 10 mA or more for hydrogen, deuterium, or helium implant;
11. b.3. Direct write capability;
12. b.4. A beam energy of 65 keV or more and a beam current of 45 mA or more for high energy oxygen implant into a heated semiconductor material “substrate”; or
13. b.5. Being designed and optimized to operate at beam energy of 20 keV or more and a beam current of 10mA or more for silicon implant into a semiconductor material “substrate” heated to 600 °C or greater;
14. c. Etch equipment.
15. c.1. Equipment designed for dry etching as follows:
16. c.1.a. Equipment designed or modified for isotropic dry etching, having a largest 'silicon germanium-to-silicon (SiGe:Si) etch selectivity' of greater than or equal to 100:1; or
17. c.1.b. [Reserved]
18. c.1.c. Equipment designed or modified for anisotropic dry etching, having all of the following;
19. c.1.c.1. Radio Frequency (RF) power source(s) with at least one pulsed RF output;
20. c.1.c.2. One or more fast gas switching valve(s) with switching time less than 300 milliseconds; and
21. c.1.c.3. Electrostatic chuck with twenty or more individually controllable variable temperature elements;
22. c.2. Equipment designed for wet chemical processing and having a largest 'silicon germanium-to-silicon (SiGe:Si) etch selectivity' of greater than or equal to 100:1;
23. c.3. Equipment designed for anisotropic dry etching having all of following:
24. c.3.a Two or more RF independent sources;
25. c.3.b Two or more independent gas sources;
26. c.3.c 'Process uniformity tuning' for wafer thickness variation compensation; and
27. c.3.d Through Silicon Via (TSV) reveal Endpoint Detection (EPD);
28. c.4. Equipment designed for Through Silicon Via (TSV) etch having all of the following:
29. c.4.a. Silicon etch rate greater than 7 microns per minute;
30. c.4.b. Within wafer (WIW) etch depth non-uniformity of less than or equal 2 percent; and
31. c.4.c. A Through Silicon Via (TSV) aspect ratio greater than or equal to 10:1.
32. d. Semiconductor manufacturing deposition equipment, as follows:
33. d.1. Equipment designed for cobalt (Co) electroplating or cobalt electroless-plating deposition processes;
34. d.2. Equipment designed for:
35. d.2.a. Chemical vapor deposition of cobalt (Co) fill metal; or
36. d.2.b. Selective bottom-up chemical vapor deposition of tungsten (W) fill metal;
37. d.3. Semiconductor manufacturing equipment designed to fabricate a metal contact by multistep processing within a single chamber by performing all of the following:
38. d.3.a. Deposition of a tungsten layer, using an organometallic compound, while maintaining the wafer substrate temperature greater than 100 °C and less than 500 °C; and
39. d.3.b. Surface treatment plasma process using hydrogen (H2), hydrogen and nitrogen (H2+N2), or ammonia (NH3).
40. d.4. Equipment or systems designed for multistep processing in multiple chambers or stations, as follows:
41. d.4.a. Equipment designed to fabricate a metal contact by performing all of the following processes:
42. d.4.a.1. Surface treatment plasma process using hydrogen (H2), including hydrogen and nitrogen (H2 + N2) or ammonia (NH3), while maintaining the wafer substrate at a temperature greater than 100 °C and less than 500 °C;
43. d.4.a.2. Surface treatment plasma process using oxygen (O2) or ozone (O3), while maintaining the wafer substrate at a temperature greater than 40 °C and less than 500 °C; and
44. d.4.a.3. Deposition of a tungsten (W) layer while maintaining the wafer substrate temperature greater than 100 °C and less than 500 °C;
45. d.4.b. Equipment designed to fabricate a metal contact by performing all of the following processes:
46. d.4.b.1 Surface treatment process using a remote plasma generator and an ion filter; and
47. d.4.b.2. Deposition of a cobalt (Co) layer selectively onto copper (Cu) using an organometallic compound;
48. d.4.c. Equipment designed to fabricate a metal contact by performing all the following processes:
49. d.4.c.1. Deposition of a titanium nitride (TiN) or tungsten carbide (WC) layer, using an organometallic compound, while maintaining the wafer substrate at a temperature greater than 20 °C and less than 500 °C;
50. d.4.c.2. Deposition of a cobalt (Co) layer using a physical sputter deposition technique and having a process pressure greater than 133.3 mPa and less than 13.33 Pa, while maintaining the wafer substrate at a temperature below 500 °C; and
51. d.4.c.3. Deposition of a cobalt (Co) layer using an organometallic compound and having a process pressure greater than 133.3 Pa and less than 13.33 kPa, while maintaining the wafer substrate at a temperature greater than 20 °C and less than 500 °C;
52. d.4.d. Equipment designed to fabricate copper (Cu) interconnects by performing all of the following processes:
53. d.4.d.1. Deposition of a cobalt (Co) or ruthenium (Ru) layer using an organometallic compound and having a process pressure greater than 133.3 Pa and less than 13.33 kPa, while maintaining the wafer substrate at a temperature greater than 20 °C and less than 500 °C; and
54. d.4.d.2. Deposition of a copper layer using a physical vapor deposition technique and having a process pressure greater than 133.3 mPa and less than 13.33 Pa, while maintaining the wafer substrate at a temperature below 500 °C;
55. d.5. Equipment designed for plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition of carbon hard masks more than 2 um thick and with density of greater than 1.7g/cc;
56. d.6. Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) equipment designed for area selective deposition of a barrier or liner using an organometallic compound;
57. d.7. Equipment designed for Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) of tungsten (W) to fill an entire interconnect or in a channel less than 40 nm wide, while maintaining the wafer substrate at a temperature less than 500 °C.
58. d.8. Equipment designed for Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) of 'work function metal' having all of the following:
59. d.8.a. More than one metal source of which one is designed for an aluminum (Al) precursor;
60. d.8.b. Precursor vessel designed and enabled to operate at a temperature greater than 30 °C; and

Related controls

See also 3B903 and 3B991. See ECCNs 3D001, 3D992, 3E001, and 3E992 for related “software” and “technology” controls.

Notes

Note: 3B001.a.1 includes atomic layer epitaxy (ALE) equipment.

Note 1: 3B001.c includes etching by 'radicals', ions, sequential reactions, or non-sequential reaction.

Note 2: 3B001.c.1.c includes etching using RF pulse excited plasma, pulsed duty cycle excited plasma, pulsed voltage on electrodes modified plasma, cyclic injection and purging of gases combined with a plasma, plasma atomic layer etching, or plasma quasi-atomic layer etching.

Technical Notes: 1. For the purposes of 3B001.c, 'silicon germanium-to-silicon (SiGe:Si) etch selectivity' is measured for a Ge concentration of greater than or equal to 30% (Si0.70Ge0.30). 2. For the purposes of 3B001.c Note 1 and 3B001.d.14, 'radical' is defined as an atom, molecule, or ion that has an unpaired electron in an open electron shell configuration. 3. For the purposes of 3B001.c.3, 'process uniformity tuning' is the process of compensating for incoming wafer thickness variations after grinding.

Note: 3B001.d.1 controls semiconductor wafer processing equipment.

Note: This control does not apply to equipment that is non-selective.

Note: 3B001.d.6 includes equipment capable of area selective deposition of a barrier layer to enable fill metal contact to an underlying electrical conductor without a barrier layer at the fill metal via interface to an underlying electrical conductor.

Technical Note: For the purposes of 3B001.d.8, 'work function metal' is a material that controls the threshold voltage of a transistor.

Note: For the purposes of paragraph d.18.a, the metal precursor source need not be integrated with the equipment. The metal precursor could be delivered by an on-tool source or from a sub-fab source.

Note: 3B001.e does not control automatic robotic wafer handling systems “specially designed” for parallel wafer processing.

Technical Notes: 1. For the purposes of 3B001.e, 'semiconductor process tools' refers to modular tools that provide physical processes for semiconductor “production” that are functionally different, such as deposition, implant or thermal processing. 2. For the purposes of 3B001.e, 'sequential multiple wafer processing' means the capability to process each wafer in different 'semiconductor process tools', such as by transferring each wafer from one tool to a second tool and on to a third tool with the automatic loading multi-chamber central wafer handling systems.

Technical Notes: For the purposes of 3B001.f.1.b: 1. The 'Minimum Resolvable Feature size' (MRF) (i.e., resolution) is calculated by the following formula:

where, for the purposes of 3B001.f.1.b, the K factor = 0.25 'MRF' is also known as resolution. 2. 'Dedicated chuck overlay' is the alignment accuracy of a new pattern to an existing pattern printed on a wafer by the same lithographic system. 'Dedicated chuck overlay' is also known as single machine overlay.

Note: 3B001.f.2 includes:: Micro contact printing tools: Hot embossing tools: Nano-imprint lithography tools: Step and flash imprint lithography (S-FIL) tools

Note: 3B001.h does not control multi-layer masks with a phase shift layer designed for the fabrication of memory devices not controlled by 3A001.

N.B.: For masks and reticles, “specially designed” for optical sensors, see 6B002.

Technical Notes: For the purposes of 3B001.q, masks or reticles with a mounted pellicle are considered masks and reticles.

Technical Note: For the purposes of 3B001.r, 'pattern shaping' is a deposition or removal process used to improve overall patterning by reshaping or trimming patterns produced using EUV lithography with non-vertical directed particles including ions, neutral particles, clusters, radicals, or light.

Source: eCFR, version 2026-08-01, retrieved 2026-08-20T04:04:59+00:00.