三星电机与高通联合开发2.1D封装“有机桥(Organic Bridge)”技术，绕开Intel EMIB专利，处早期验证阶段无订单

Samsung Electro-Mechanics and Qualcomm Form 2.1D Packaging Alliance, Jointly Developing an "Organic Bridge" That Bypasses Intel's EMIB

Samsung Electro-Mechanics is teaming up with Qualcomm to develop "organic bridge" technology for advanced packaging of artificial intelligence (AI) chips. Beyond Qualcomm, Samsung Electro-Mechanics is also co-developing organic bridge technology with several other customers in parallel.

An organic bridge is similar to the silicon bridge used in Intel's EMIB (Embedded Multi-die Interconnect Bridge) packaging, but it uses organic materials, the kind commonly found in printed circuit boards (PCBs), instead of silicon.

According to industry sources on the 14th, Samsung Electro-Mechanics is jointly developing organic bridge technology with Qualcomm for use in 2.1D packaging. Development and validation work has been under way for more than a year. The evaluation involves embedding an organic bridge into a flip-chip ball grid array (FC-BGA) substrate that connects Qualcomm chips, and then assessing the substrate's performance and reliability.

Qualcomm is understood to be considering the organic bridge for large multi-die chips for data centers, among other applications. In October 2024, the company filed a patent for an "Interconnect Bridge" technology, in which a separately fabricated organic material based bridge is embedded in a package substrate to connect multiple dies. In March this year, Qualcomm also hired organic bridge personnel in Korea.

An organic bridge is a component that connects multiple semiconductor dies integrated in a single package. It can be thought of as an ultra small substrate with ultra fine circuitry. It is made by forming multiple layers of fine circuits on an organic dielectric using a redistribution layer (RDL) process. Because it enables finer wiring than the build-up circuitry of a conventional FC-BGA, it can carry more signals across a smaller area. Its role is to raise input/output (I/O) density and bandwidth between dies such as graphics processing units (GPUs) and high bandwidth memory (HBM). It serves a similar function to the silicon bridge used in Intel's EMIB, but it is built on organic material using substrate manufacturing processes rather than semiconductor processes.

Samsung Electro-Mechanics produces the FC-BGA substrate with a recess (cavity) formed at the location where the organic bridge is embedded. For the organic bridge itself, the company is weighing two options: in house production and external sourcing. It produces small quantities of organic bridges for evaluation on its own pilot line, and samples are also made at DSRJ (Device Solutions R&D Japan), the Japanese R&D organization under the Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology (SAIT). The company is also evaluating an approach in which organic bridges manufactured by outside partners are supplied and embedded into its FC-BGA substrates.

In addition to Qualcomm, Samsung Electro-Mechanics is developing organic bridge based 2.1D package substrates with multiple other customers. The strategy is to bypass Intel's EMIB packaging IP. Intel developed EMIB to address the cost and productivity issues of silicon interposers, placing small bridges only where high density connections are required. Intel has applied the technology in mass production since 2017 and has secured the related IP. Several big tech companies are now looking at organic bridges as an alternative to silicon bridges.

Samsung Electro-Mechanics' organic bridge based 2.1D package substrate technology embeds an organic bridge with five to seven redistribution layers (RDL) of circuitry into an FC-BGA. The goal is to shrink the organic bridge's line width and spacing to 1.5 to 2 micrometers (㎛) each, with via sizes of 4 to 5 ㎛. Die to die pattern density is targeted at 500 to 1,000 per millimeter (mm).

Collaboration with Samsung Foundry is also drawing attention. Once Samsung Electro-Mechanics manufactures the organic bridge based FC-BGA, Samsung Foundry evaluates the package's performance and reliability. Samsung Foundry is developing advanced packaging technologies including "2.3D Cube-E," which uses a silicon bridge, and "2.3D Cube-R," which is based on an organic RDL interposer. Samsung Electro-Mechanics' organic bridge substrate is expected to lead to an expansion of Samsung Foundry's packaging services.

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