The present invention relates to lead frames and methods for fabricating semiconductor packages with the lead frames, and more particularly, to a lead frame for use in a QFN (quad flat non-leaded) semiconductor package and a fabrication method of the semiconductor package.
Generally, a QFN (quad flat non-leaded) semiconductor package is basically configured by mounting at least a chip on a die pad of a lead frame, and forming a plurality of conductive elements such as bonding wires for electrically connecting the chip to leads of the lead frame, wherein the chip, bonding wires and lead frame are encapsulated by an encapsulating resin to form an encapsulant. As compared with a QFP (quad flat package) having outer leads that are exposed to outside of the package and used to establish external electrical connection, this QFN semiconductor package, as named, is characterized to be free of exposed outer leads, and thus relatively lower in overall package profile. Moreover, the QFN semiconductor package is adapted to expose bottom surfaces of the die pad and leads to outside of the encapsulant. These exposed surfaces directly urge the semiconductor package to be electrically coupled to an external device such as a printed circuit board (PCB), by which no other conductive elements e.g. solder balls or bumps are necessarily provided for the semiconductor package to serve as I/O (input/output) connections for communicating with the external device, making process complexity and costs of fabrication both considerably reduced.
However, the above conventional QFN semiconductor package is still inherent with significant drawbacks, for example, relatively weak bonding between the encapsulant and lead frame, bridging of adjacent leads during singulation, and so on. This is because that, as described above, the die pad and leads of the QFN semiconductor package are partly exposed and not entirely enclosed by the encapsulant, which thereby weakens bonding strength between the encapsulant and lead frame, and tends to cause delamination between the encapsulant and the die pad or leads, making quality and reliability of the semiconductor package adversely affected.
In accordance with the delamination problem, U.S. Pat. No. 6,081,029 teaches a semiconductor package 1 shown in
As shown in
However, those above disclosed semiconductor packages are still in concern of the lead bridging problem. During a singulation process, by virtue of metal affinity to a cutting tool, cut-side burrs of the metal-made leads are usually generated when the cutting tool cuts through the leads. As shown in
Therefore, how to effectively eliminate the drawback of lead bridging caused by diffusion of lead burrs during singulation, and to assure quality and reliability of fabricated products, are significant problems to solve.
A primary objective of the present invention is to provide a lead frame and a method for fabrication a semiconductor package with the lead frame, in which lead pitch or space between adjacent leads is increased, so as to prevent bridging and short-circuiting of the leads from occurrence during lead singulation, and to assure singulation quality and reliability of fabricated products.
In accordance with the above and other objectives, the present invention proposes a short-prevented lead frame and a method for fabrication a semiconductor package with the lead frame.
The short-prevented lead frame of the invention comprises a plurality of leads extending toward a center of the lead frame, each lead having a top surface and a bottom surface opposed to the top surface, and each lead being formed with a thickness-reduced portion at an end thereof situated at periphery of the lead frame, in a manner that a lead is removed from a top surface of a peripheral end thereof by a predetermined thickness to form a thickness-reduced portion, and an adjacent lead is removed from a bottom surface of a peripheral end thereof by a predetermined thickness to form a thickness-reduced portion, so as to allow the thickness-reduced portion to be smaller in thickness than the lead.
A method for fabricating a semiconductor package with the above-proposed lead frame, comprises the steps of: preparing a lead-frame plate composed of a plurality of array-arranged lead frames and a plurality of connecting portions for interconnecting adjacent lead frames, each lead frame having a centrally-situated die pad and a plurality of leads that extend from periphery toward a center of the lead frame and surround the die pad, and leads of a lead frame being connected to leads of an adjacent lead frame by a corresponding connecting portion, wherein each lead has a top surface, a bottom surface opposed to the top surface, and an end that is situated at periphery of a lead frame and associated with a connecting portion, and wherein the end of the lead and the connecting portion are removed by a predetermined thickness to form a thickness-reduced portion, in a manner that a lead is removed from a top surface of a peripheral end thereof by the predetermined thickness to form a thickness-reduced portion, and an adjacent lead is removed from a bottom surface of a peripheral end thereof by the predetermined thickness to form a thickness-reduced portion, so as to allow the thickness-reduced portion to be smaller in thickness than the lead; mounting at least a chip respectively on the die pad of each lead frame of the lead-frame plate; forming a plurality of conductive elements for electrically connecting the chip to the corresponding leads; forming an encapsulant on the lead-frame plate for encapsulating the lead frame, chips and conductive elements, wherein the bottom surfaces of the leads are exposed to outside of the encapsulant; and performing a singulation process for cutting away the connecting portions, so as to singulate the leads and form individual semiconductor packages.
The invention is characterized in the forming of thickness-reduced portions at ends of leads situated at periphery of a lead frame, wherein thickness-reduced portions are formed by partly removing top or bottom surfaces of the leads, allowing thickness-reduced portions of adjacent leads to be arranged in a stagger manner. This stagger arrangement provides significant benefits. For example, pitch or space between adjacent leads is effectively increased up to three times larger than conventional lead pitch distance. During a singulation process for cutting through the leads, it helps preventing the occurrence of lead bridging or short-circuiting caused by diffusion of cut-side burrs of densely-packed leads as previously discussed for the prior arts. Thereby, in the use of the lead frame of the invention, fabricated semiconductor packages with the lead frames are well assured with singulation quality and product yield and reliability.
The present invention can be more filly understood by reading the following detailed description of the preferred embodiments, with reference made to the accompanying drawings, wherein:
The following description is made with reference to
A method for fabricating a semiconductor package in the use of the above-described lead frame 31, is detailed for its process steps with reference to
Referring to
As shown in
Each of the leads 33 has a top surface 330, a bottom surface 331 opposed to the top surface 330, and an end 332 that is situated at periphery of a lead frame 31 and associated with a connecting portion 34. The end 332 of the lead 33 and the connecting portion 34 are removed by a predetermined thickness to form a thickness-reduced portion 333. Thickness-reduced portions 333 are formed by half-etching top or bottom surfaces 330, 331 of the leads 33, and thereby the leads 33 are divided into two types of leads 33a, 33b according to forming positions of corresponding thickness-reduced portions 333. As shown in
Referring to
Referring further to
Finally, a singulation process is performed through the use of a conventional cutting machine, which cuts along the cutting lines S-S defined on the lead frames 31 to form individual semiconductor packages 3. The cutting lines S-S go through the leads 33 (or the thickness-reduced portions 333); in other words, a package site defined on a lead frame 31 by the cutting lines S-S is slightly smaller than area encompassed by periphery of the lead frame 31, and thereby, connecting portions 34 and small part of leads 33 are cut away during singulation. As such, the leads 33 of each lead frame 31 can be surely singulated and completely separated from each other, and this completes fabrication of the semiconductor packages 3 of the invention, as shown in
In conclusion, the invention is characterized in the forming of thickness-reduced portions at ends of leads situated at periphery of a lead frame, wherein thickness-reduced portions are formed by partly removing top or bottom surfaces of the leads, allowing thickness-reduced portions of adjacent leads to be arranged in a stagger manner. This stagger arrangement provides significant benefits. For example, pitch or space between adjacent leads is effectively increased up to three times larger than conventional lead pitch distance because of the stagger arrangement for thickness reduced. During a singulation process for cutting through the leads, it helps preventing the occurrence of lead bridging or short-circuiting caused by diffusion of cut-side burrs of densely-packed leads as previously discussed for the prior arts. Thereby, in the use of the lead frame of the invention, fabricated semiconductor packages with the lead frames are well assured with singulation quality and product yield and reliability.
The invention has been described using exemplary preferred embodiments. However, it is to be understood that the scope of the invention is not limited to the disclosed embodiments. On the contrary, it is intended to cover various modifications and similar arrangements. The scope of the claims, therefore, should be accorded the broadest interpretation so as to encompass all such modifications and similar arrangements.
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