SOMA Poised to Serve the Rapidly Growing Copper Bonding Wire Market

SOMA, founded 1987, serves the fine wire industry world wide. SOMA’s focus on active systems for fine wire drawing, annealing, measuring, and rewinding, is expanding to copper bonding wire. Copper is gaining traction as a viable replacement for gold bonding wire. Intense price pressure in ever-cheaper consumer electronics has driven solutions for copper bond wire in a growing number of chip applications. Copper bonding wire is forecast at 50% compound growth, replacing up to US$1Billion of gold wire over the next 5 years in the expanding semiconductor market.
Bare copper bonding wire (~20m diameter) requires a fully annealed final condition, as well as very stringent criteria for surface quality and negligible oxidation. SOMA has standard and customized fine wire solutions for such copper applications.
Machine design technology, software, and set-up are all critical to the high speed drawing of copper bonding wire with virtually perfect surface and sound winding. Both wet and dry capstan designs are used depending on the diameter range. Modern lines today track every minute of production and every piece of wire produced on-line, and machine software can be serviced remotely. SOMA is the market leader for wire drawing machines meeting all of these requirements.
Copper bonding wire annealing and spooling are particularly challenging for negligible oxidation, maximum softness, and surface quality preservation. High run speed is critical for the best return on floor space and machine investment in any fine wire process step. SOMA’s proven high speed PC control systems and annealing oven designs provide the most precise tension control, lowest oxidation, and best wind quality available. SOMA is active with agents world-wide to serve the blossoming copper bonding wire market.
SOMA AG
T +41 44 938 9888
F +41 44 938 9838
info@somafinewire.ch
www.somafinewire.ch