Process Flow, Sizing and Key Downstream Applications of Wet Electronic Chemicals

Wet Electronic Chemical Process Flow

The main process flow of electronic wet chemicals includes raw material receiving, purification, absorption, mixing and other processes, and the finished products are packed into packaging barrels or tank trucks, and put into storage after passing the inspection. Deliver goods according to customer order requirements. After use, return the packaging barrel or tank car to the factory, repackage after treatment, and recycle. In addition to selling new liquid, manufacturers will also use waste liquid recycling to achieve internal circulation with specific customers (usually panel manufacturers with relatively low cleanliness requirements).

Wet electronic chemicals have extremely high requirements on purity and cleanliness, and there are strict requirements in production, testing, packaging, and transportation. The key production technologies of wet electronic chemicals include purification technology, mixing technology, separation technology, analysis and inspection technology, environmental treatment and monitoring technology, packaging technology and so on.

Purification technology: There are many kinds of wet electronic chemicals, and the product preparation process and equipment requirements are different. The process route needs to be determined according to the characteristics of different varieties. The purification process section mainly adopts distillation, sub-boiling distillation, isothermal distillation, vacuum distillation, sublimation, chemical treatment, gas absorption and other technologies to separate metal impurities. Use an ultra-micro filter (PTFE membrane) to remove particulate impurities. Combining different analysis and testing techniques for particles, metallic impurities, and non-metallic impurities to achieve the corresponding standards of cleanliness.

Mixing technology: The core of functional material production lies in the precise mixing of purified finished products. The key to mixing lies in the formula, which needs to be customized and developed according to different customer needs, requiring long-term deployment, trial production, and online testing.

Wet Electronic Chemicals Classification and Key Downstream Applications

At present, wet electronic chemicals usually implement the SEMI international standard, and its key technical indicators include single metal impurities, non-metallic ions, particle number, etc. In addition, some other technical indicators will be added correspondingly according to different product characteristics.

According to the classification of SEMI grades, wet electronic chemicals can be divided into five grades of G1-G5. Depending on the field of application, the purity requirements for microelectronic chemicals are also different.

The main downstream application fields of wet electronic chemicals include semiconductors, display panels and photovoltaics, etc., and the terminal scenarios are mainly used in electronic information products, such as smart phones, smart TVs, smart cars, computers, etc. There are three main application areas for wet electronics chemicals that require different product grades:

Semiconductor field: The purity requirements are relatively high, basically concentrated at SEMIG3, G4, and G5 levels. There is still a big gap between my country's R&D level and the international level. Among them, the requirements for the purity of ultra-clean and high-purity reagents for discrete devices are lower than those for integrated circuits, and are basically concentrated at the SEMIG2 level. The production technology of domestic enterprises can meet most of the production needs; the low-end areas of 8-inch and below wafer processes require G3 and G4 levels, and some high-end areas of large silicon wafers and 12-inch wafer processes require G5 levels.

Flat panel display and LED fields: The grade requirements are SEMIG2 and G3 levels, and the production technology of domestic enterprises can meet most of the production needs.

Photovoltaic solar cell field: Generally, only SEMIG1 level is required, which is the main market for domestic ultra-clean and high-purity reagents.

The industry drivers of wet electronic chemicals mainly come from the promotion of semiconductor manufacturing process, the transfer of display panel production capacity and the continuous increase in demand for photovoltaics.

1. The continuous advancement of integrated circuit manufacturing processes and the transfer of industrial structure have boosted the demand for wet electronic chemicals industry.

2. Display panel production capacity transfer, with the high-generation panel production line put into production, the demand for wet electronic chemicals increased In recent years, global LCD panel production capacity has been concentrated in South Korea, mainland China, and Taiwan. At the same time, as the speed of new production lines in South Korea and Taiwan has slowed down, Chinese domestic manufacturers have begun to emerge. As the size of the liquid crystal display panel increases, the required area increases. At the same time, the production process of OLED display panels is more complicated than that of LCD display panels, and requires more processes, so the consumption of wet electronic chemicals per unit area will be more than that of LCD display panels. With the increasing demand in the display panel market, the maturity of related technologies, and the expansion of production capacity of major panel manufacturers, the wet electronic chemicals industry has gained considerable development opportunities.

3. The demand for solar cells is on a continuous upward path, and the increase in production drives the growth of the wet electronic chemicals industry.

Solar cells, also known as "solar chips" or "photovoltaic cells", are photoelectric semiconductor sheets that use sunlight to generate electricity directly. Under the combined effect of factors such as upstream raw material supply, downstream market space and production resources, in recent years, the layout of the global solar cell industry has continued to concentrate on Asia. Therefore, the demand growth of wet electronic chemicals in the solar cell field mainly depends on the output growth of solar cell enterprises.