About Valley Design Corp.

Valley Design is an AS9100D / ISO 9001:2015, ITAR Registered manufacturer of stock and custom substrates, windows, wafers, precision shims and spacers, flat optics, semiconductor wafer chucks, flat optics, beamsplitters, polarizers, glass rods and spacers, solar cells, lenses, wedges, waveguides, subassemblies and other components. For 50 years, Valley Design has been a world class leader in precision materials processing, offering CNC Machining, Lapping, Optical Polishing, Dicing, Backgrinding, hole/core drilling and shaping services. We work with both stocked and customer supplied materials, and particularly specialize in ultra-thin 10-15um, ultra-flat (1/10 wave), super-polishing (<5/3 scratch/dig; <1A) and tight tolerances (+ .1um). Other capabilities include:

• Precision 4 & 5 Axis CNC Machining
• Metals lapping and polishing
• Optical edge polishing with chips < 1um
• Lapping up to 48", larger can be accommodated with custom fixtures up to 64"
• Dicing as small as 0.127mm sq.
• Parallelism to .1um
• TTV (Total Thickness Variation) < 1um
• Routinely processing parts up to 300mm diameter
• Core / hole drilling
• Low kerf wafering

Valley has enjoyed extensive experience with a wide variety of materials, and is willing to work with proprietary materials as well. Materials such as Fused Silica, Quartz, Optical Glasses, Pyrex, Sapphire, Aluminum Nitride, Germanium, Ceramics, Borosilicates, Silicon, Crystals and Metals are routinely processed. Exotics such as Luag, Plastic Polymers, Titanium, InP, Tantalates, Fluorides, crystals, metal alloys, glass ceramics, and others are lapped, polished and diced by Valley Design. Many substrates of various materials are also in stock.

History

Valley Design was incorporated in 1975, with the mission of developing and designing unique manufacturing processes of materials shaping of Ceramics, Silicon, Germanium, Glass and Quartz for the semiconductor and hybrid circuit industries. Facilities initially opened in Merrimac Valley, Massachusetts and later moved to Nashoba Valley, Massachusetts. In addition, in 2000, West coast facilities were opened in the Silicon Valley area (Santa Cruz, California). Initially, the company set up capabilities in ID cutting and wafering of non-semiconductor materials. Working with Intel, Hewlett Packard and Owens, further developments included Fused Silica windows for e-proms, lapping and polishing of Macor and Boron substrates.Silicon and Germanium backlapping and polishing were also offered employing traditional techniques. Later, new process developments involving Alumina substrate polishing for thin film hybrid circuit applications led to expertise in ultra-thin optical materials processing. In 1978, the first ultra-thin project was successfully completed for IBM: Fused Silica wafers 6" diameter x 25um thick,optically polished both sides. During the early 1980's, Valley began offering non-Silicon wafers to SEMI standards. Over the next 50 years, the company continued to expand and build upon the knowledge gained from its ever increasing body of experience. Valley collaborated on projects for multiple industries including semiconductor, medical, aerospace, communications, optoelectronics, photonics and also became an important resource for research projects conducted around the world. Today, Valley Design offers a unique value to its customers with the ability to process materials of all types to some of the most exacting specifications, and has established a reputation worldwide for excellence in quality, service, R&D and state-of-the-art lapping, polishing and dicing capabilities.

Technology

Some of the diverse technology achievements Valley Design has accomplished range from the manufacture of Sapphire 12" x 3" x .003" polished on both sides for solar cell covers, to aluminum reflectors 18" x 26" x 2" thick with a flatness of .00040" used in a 30 meter diameter telescope, to polished Sapphire dies 1 cm square x 12.5um thick.Valley has also produced ceramics for electro-static chucks 300mm diameter x .004" thick polished both sides, and Germanium wafers 4" diameter x 30um thick optically polished. In production quantities Valley produced 10,000 pieces per month of 96% Alumina 4" square x .004" thick lapped both sides for one customer, and during that same period for another customer, produced 2,500 pieces per month of Aluminum Nitride 3.75" x 4.5" x .015" thick polished both sides 1u" Ra.The company also manufactured over a year time frame, 5,000 pieces per month of Fused Silica 1" x 2.5" x .006" thick optically polished both sides < 10A, all without a single reject. As an ongoing product line, Valley also offers production quantities of hardcoated aluminum semiconductor chucks with superior flatness and surface finishes. For a comprehensive look at Valley's diverse technical capabilities, please click on the following link to visit our websites: Affiliate Sites Recent process developments include Luag slicing and optical polishing, Titanium polishing, further improved optical surface finishes on Sapphire, Germanium, GaAs, and LiF, work with NeoFlon (an acrylic Teflon) as well as availability of 0/0 scratch/dig surfaces on glass, Fused Silica and Quartz. Other state-of-the-art processes available are optical edge/angle polishing, individual die and bonded wafer thinning, O.D. polishing, smart card thinning, CMP polishing, thin/thick film layer polishing of glass, oxides, gold, and fiber array polishing.

Valley Design is Ready to Serve You

Valley Design is an AS9100D / ISO 9001:2015, ITAR Registered, US manufacturer. Valley has consolidated the two facilities back to the East Coast, and now operates from 35,000 square feet in Shirley, Massachusetts. The company provides custom parts as well as in stock items from prototype stages through to full production. Valley is ready to serve its customers worldwide from 7:30 a.m. EST to 5:00 p.m. PST. Since 1975, Valley has performed all processes in-house, enabling timely responses to RFQ's and some of the quickest lead times in the industry. Satisfied customers include such companies as Aeroflex, Agilent Technologies, Applied Materials, AVX, BAE, Boeing, General Electric, JDS Uniphase, Kyocera, LAM Research, Lockheed Martin, Newport Corporation, Philips, Raytheon, Teledyne, Texas Instruments, and Tyco Electronics among others. Valley Design is here to serve your precision requirements.