In the IC packaging industry, IC chips are packaged in
encapsulation molds with epoxy molding compound (EMC).
The EMC contain many ingredients such as inert fillers, epoxy
resin, release agents, etc. The sticking and wear problems
between EMC and encapsulation molds are important issues
and can be costly to solve.
Electroplated hard chromium has been used to protect mold
surface for many years, although with limited success.
Furthermore, the electroplating process is regarded as environmentally
unfriendly. Therefore, physical vapor deposition
(PVD) has been used as an alternative technique and, recently,
the CrN, Cr3C2, Cr2O3 and TiN coatings have been evaluated
as alternative as a wear-resistance coating [1 – 3]. However,
there have been few reports on the measuring of the mold
adhesion force with EMC [4]. No systematic research has been
reported on the effects of IC encapsulation process parameters
on the mold/EMC adhesion force.