Kurt Ronse
Kurt Ronse, PhD has been working in the field of lithography at imec for almost 30 years. His responsibilities ranged from lithography researcher, lithography group manager, and advanced patterning department director to advanced lithography program director. Currently Ronse is leading the Advanced Patterning Program. That focuses primarily on the insertion of EUV lithography into HVM and on the extendibility of EUVL to the next technology nodes. Over 30 companies worldwide participate in it: chip manufactures, equipment and material suppliers, EDA/software companies, etc. Prior to joining imec, Ronse received a MS and PhD degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Leuven (Belgium). He has authored and co-authored numerous publications and is a frequent conference speaker. He often presents invited and plenary papers, in the field of optical lithography (I-line, deep-UV, 157nm, 193nm, 193nm immersion) and EUVL. He is a member of advisory groups of various lithography conferences and has chaired several lithography conferences. He is a member of the editorial board of the SPIE Journal of Micro/Nanolithography, MEMS and MOEMS (JM3). In 2016, he has been elected Fellow of SPIE for achievements in microlithography and advanced patterning.
Authored articles
High-NA EUV lithography: the next major step forward
In the course of 2025, we expect to see the introduction of the first high-NA extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUVL) equipment in high-volume manufacturing environments. These next-generation lithography systems will be key to advance Moore’s Law towards the logic 2nm technology generation and beyond. In this article, imec scientists and engineers involved in preparing this major engineering project (in partnership with ASML) talk about challenges and opportunities. They highlight recent insights. And they discuss the progress made in developing the patterning processes, metrology and photomasks needed for enabling the high-NA EUV lithography infrastructure.
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