Copper wire bond investigation on multiple surface finishes - enabling wire bond packages without gold

During the past two years, fine pitch copper wire bonding has finally entered high volume production. It is estimated that nearly 15% of all wire bonders used in production are now equipped for copper wire bonding. Most of these are used exclusively for copper wire bonding. In terms of pitch, copper wire is only barely lagging behind the most advanced gold applications. The most commonly used copper wire is 20um in diameter and 18um copper wire is entering final qualification. Evaluations with even finer wire are underway.