Chemical Mechanical Polishing Pad

[0016]Described herein is a CMP polishing pad which allows for establishing a predefined, non-planar material removal profile. In one embodiment, the pad includes polishing elements, which are placed on an underlying compressible foam and protrude through holes in a guide plate overlaid on that foam. The nominal size of each polishing element is 0.25 inches and the height thereof is 0.160 inches. The compressible foam is nominally 0.060″ thick.

[0017]Note that although the present polishing pad is discussed with reference to certain illustrated embodiments, the scope of the present invention is not intended to be limited thereby. Instead, the present invention should only be measured in terms of the claims, which follow this description.

[0018]The present pad design enables the application very uniform pressure onto a wafer and eliminates (or at least substantially reduces) edge effect typically associated with full sheet polishing pads. This translates to a very uniform material removal