Tokyo Electron Limited (TEL; Head Office: Minato-ku, Tokyo; CEO, President: Tetsuro Higashi) announced today that it received the Prime Minister's Award for its contribution to industry-academia-government collaboration.

This award was given to "Development of a Large-diameter, High-density Plasma Processing System," an industry-academia-government collaboration project. The project was included in the candidates for screening at the recommendation of the New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization and was chosen as the recipient of the Prime Minister's Award after careful selection by the Cabinet Office's screening committee.

TEL President Tetsuro Higashi, together with Professor Tadahiro Ohmi of Tohoku University, the joint recipient of the award, attended the award-giving ceremony held on June 8 during the Second Conference on Promoting Industry-Academia-Government Collaboration, which took place at the Kyoto International Conference Hall under the sponsorship of the following organizations: the Cabinet Office, the Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, Nippon Keidanren and the Science Council of Japan. There were several reasons for winning the award. Firstly, the achievement resulting from industry-academia-government collaboration led to product commercialization, helping enhance the international competitiveness of Japan's semiconductor production equipment industry. Secondly, the development contributed very clearly to industrialization as exemplified by the results of product delivery to major manufacturers in Japan and the rest of the world. Thirdly, it pioneered industry-academia collaboration, bringing positive effects not only to industry, but academia as well. Fourthly, it contributed greatly to industry and represented close industry-academia-government collaboration supported by the government.

Based on the results of research in the application of RLSA (radial line slot antenna) microwave plasma to the semiconductor process, which was initiated at Tohoku University's Ohmi Laboratory in 1995, this development was commissioned to the Association of Super-advanced Electronics Technologies, a technological research union, as a NEDO project following the compilation of the third round of 1998 supplementary budgets for the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (current Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry) with the aim of commercializing semiconductor production equipment. As a member of this industry-academia-government collaboration project, TEL started to work towards commercialization in November 2000, achieving the goal approximately one year later. The company began sales of Trias(R) SPA plasma nitriding equipment in December 2001.

This equipment can be used for diverse applications, including technology for nitriding gate oxidized films, which is in growing demand as a process that enables both higher speed and lower power consumption for cutting-edge semiconductor devices. The equipment has already been delivered to 15 companies worldwide, including Japanese major semiconductor manufacturers.

TEL President Higashi said, "In the NEDO project (government), the technology based on study at Tohoku University (academia) were combined with reliable plasma technology developed by TEL (industry) for joint development, and as a result, unique SPA (slot plane antenna) plasma generation technology was established and low-temperature (lower than 500 degrees) and damage-free plasma processing was realized for commercialization by generating high-density plasma whose electrons have a low temperature. I am delighted that this has been highly appraised as an example of successful industry-academia-government collaboration. I firmly believe that the results of this collaboration will create great value in the form of products and contribute greatly to industrial circles in Japan and at the same time make our product overwhelming distinct from other products in the world market."