Shuttles cut the cost of custom circuits

Shuttle runs of application specific microwave thin film circuits allow designers to low-volume experiments with different designs on a portion of a wafer without the cost of a full wafer run.

US Microwaves is now offering shuttle runs of application specific microwave thin film circuits (ASMICs).

Shuttle runs are regularly scheduled fabrication runs of multiple-project wafers.

With this service, designers can share wafer runs of standard thin film circuits, conducting inexpensive low-volume experiments with different designs on a portion of a wafer without the cost of a full wafer run.

Multiproject shuttle runs (MPSRs) present significant cost advantage in prototyping phase as there is no tooling cost associated (in fact the tooling cost is shared between 50 different projects per shuttle run).

Each customer purchases a 2in square space on a wafer out of a total 100in square in a weekly shuttle run.

The multiple-project service is available for US Microwaves standard microwave thin film circuit process, featuring 120uin gold plated conductor and 50ohm/sq tantalum nitride resistors.

Multiproject shuttle runs have a maximum of two masks.

Each shuttle run is a mix of ceramic wafers of different thicknesses - 5, 10, 15, 20 and 25mil - as fired, thin film grade.

No via or laser machining is available for shuttle runs.

Thin film MICs are delivered diced and packaged in chip carriers or waffle packs.

New shuttle runs are started every Monday.

Cutoff for receiving data is Friday 1700 Pacific Time.

The cost for ASMIC with one mask (conductor) or with two masks (conductor and resistor) is US $147.00/in2.

Minimum order is for 2in2 ($294.00).

Lead-time for shuttle runs is 4 weeks ARO.

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