Polyimide-related design considerations in a bipolar technology

It is found that a spurious leakage path from the emitter to the collector of a lateral p-n-p or a trench-defined n-p-n device may be induced by the applied collector voltage. This voltage influences the surface potential at the emitter-base junction through the charging of the polyimide used as interlevel dielectric or as trench fill, respectively. A simple model of the effect is developed, and several successful process features are discussed.>