Patents Assigned to Creative Technologies, Corporation
  • Patent number: 9536709
    Abstract: A large-sized plasma generator is suited to various surface shapes and has a longer service life and improved energy conservation. An example of the plasma generator (1-1) has a dielectric layer (3), first and second electrodes (4, 5) that are formed within the dielectric layer, an alternating-current power supply (6), and a first metal layer (7). The dielectric layer (3) is composed of polymer resin layers (31, 32) that are formed of a polyimide resin. The electrodes are arranged side by side within the dielectric layer. The first metal layer is formed of a metal having a sterilization effect, and has a plurality of pores (71) in the surface. The first metal layer spans between supporting parts (33, 34) of the polymer resin layer (32), and faces the whole of the electrodes. A gap (S) is formed between the first metal layer and the polymer resin layer.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 9, 2014
    Date of Patent: January 3, 2017
    Assignee: CREATIVE TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
    Inventors: Satomi Koyama, Li Luo, Yoshiaki Tatsumi
  • Publication number: 20160207051
    Abstract: Provided are a particle collector system and a dust collection method whereby particles can be almost completely removed without periodic performance of a particle removal operation. A particle collector system (1-1) is provided with a dust collection unit (2), a power source unit (3), and a capacitance measurement unit (4). The dust collection unit (2) comprises first and second electrodes (21, 22) a second electrode (22), and a dielectric body (20) covering the electrodes. The power source unit (3) is a component for supplying power source voltage to the first and second electrodes (21, 22). The capacitance measurement unit (1), which is a component for measuring the capacitance of the dust collection unit (2), measures the capacitance between the first and second electrodes (21, 22).
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 2, 2014
    Publication date: July 21, 2016
    Applicant: CREATIVE TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
    Inventors: Yoshiaki Tatsumi, Yu Saito, Toshifumi Sugawara
  • Publication number: 20150371829
    Abstract: A large-sized plasma generator is suited to various surface shapes and has a longer service life and improved energy conservation. An example of the plasma generator (1-1) has a dielectric layer (3), first and second electrodes (4, 5) that are formed within the dielectric layer, an alternating-current power supply (6), and a first metal layer (7). The dielectric layer (3) is composed of polymer resin layers (31, 32) that are formed of a polyimide resin. The electrodes are arranged side by side within the dielectric layer. The first metal layer is formed of a metal having a sterilization effect, and has a plurality of pores (71) in the surface. The first metal layer spans between supporting parts (33, 34) of the polymer resin layer (32), and faces the whole of the electrodes. A gap (S) is formed between the first metal layer and the polymer resin layer.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 9, 2014
    Publication date: December 24, 2015
    Applicant: CREATIVE TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
    Inventors: Satomi Koyama, Li Luo, Yoshiaki Tatsumi
  • Publication number: 20150295521
    Abstract: In an electrostatic chuck and a power supply system, high-voltage drive is performed without generating electrical discharge even in a vacuum atmosphere, and a structure of the power supply system for the electrostatic chuck is simplified. This power supply system includes: an electrostatic chuck (2) having a booster circuit (3); and an electric contact mechanism (4). Terminals (31a, 32a) of the booster circuit (3) are exposed to the outside. The terminals (31b, 32b) are connected to an attraction electrode (23). The electric contact mechanism (4) is configured from rails (41, 42), and flexible contacts (43, 44) in contact with the rails. The rails (41, 42) are connected to an external power supply (40), and the flexible contacts (43, 44) are provided on conductive plates (45, 46) of the electrostatic chuck (2). The conductive plates (45, 46) are connected to the terminals (31a, 32a) of the booster circuit (3).
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 24, 2013
    Publication date: October 15, 2015
    Applicant: CREATIVE TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
    Inventors: Yoshiaki Tatsumi, Toshifumi Sugawara
  • Publication number: 20150288302
    Abstract: An electrostatic chuck that enables high speed and high quality processing of a plate to be processed, and in which the weight of a base member is reduced and the strength thereof increased so as to maintain the flatness of the base member and prevent the plate to be processed from falling; a glass substrate processing method; and said glass substrate. An electrostatic chuck (1) provided with a base member (2) and an electrostatic suction layer (3). The base member (2) is formed by a lower-surface plate (20), side-surface plates (21-24), and an upper-surface plate (25), and has a part (4) for a plurality of individual structures configured therein. The part (4) for a plurality of individual structures has a honeycomb structure that is caused by regular hexagonal tubes (40) and enables the weight of the base member (2) to be reduced and the strength thereof increased.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 21, 2013
    Publication date: October 8, 2015
    Applicant: CREATIVE TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
    Inventors: Yoshiaki Tatsumi, Toshifumi Sugawara
  • Publication number: 20150268026
    Abstract: Provided are a workpiece holding apparatus capable of detecting lateral displacement of a workpiece (w) in a planar direction, and a method of detecting lateral displacement of a workpiece (w) with use of the workpiece holding apparatus. The workpiece holding apparatus, which is configured to hold the workpiece (w), with an adhesive pad (2) mounted on a support plate, includes: a capacitance measuring device (5) including an electrode pair formed of first and second electrodes (3a, 3b) and arranged at least at a part of a position corresponding to a peripheral edge portion of the workpiece (w), the capacitance measuring device (5) being configured to measure capacitance of the electrode pair; and a comparator circuit (6) configured to compare the measured capacitance with a predetermined reference value, to thereby detect lateral displacement of the workpiece (w) in a planar direction of the support plate (1).
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 1, 2013
    Publication date: September 24, 2015
    Applicant: CREATIVE TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
    Inventors: Toshifumi Sugawara, Eunsun Kim, Yoshiaki Tatsumi
  • Publication number: 20150238879
    Abstract: Embodiments allow a user to connect a central control unit to remote interactive media via wireless network, and allow a client side to connect the remote interactive media to the central control unit via wireless network, after which the user can send to the remote interactive media messages or instructions via the central control unit. At the same time, the remote interactive media collects the information from the client side and transmits it to the central control unit which is directly controlled by the user, enhancing the communications between the central control unit on the control side and the remote interactive media on the client side. This way allows communication to be more interesting and is completely different from traditional media for remote interaction.
    Type: Application
    Filed: May 23, 2014
    Publication date: August 27, 2015
    Applicant: BLUNIZ CREATIVE TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
    Inventors: Zuoguang WU, Yingying SUN
  • Patent number: 8730644
    Abstract: Provided is a bipolar electrostatic chuck, which has excellent substrate attracting/holding performance when a voltage is applied, and excellent residual charges reducing performance when voltage application is stopped. The bipolar electrostatic chuck includes at least an electrode layer including a first electrode and a second electrode, and an upper insulating layer which forms a substrate attracting surface for attracting a substrate. In a case where a surface of the electrode layer is regarded to be divided into a plurality of virtual cells having a predetermined width (L) in an x direction and a y direction, first electrode sections forming the first electrode and second electrode sections forming the second electrode are alternately arranged in the plurality of virtual cells in the x direction, and are alternately arranged in the plurality of virtual cells in the y direction.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 30, 2009
    Date of Patent: May 20, 2014
    Assignee: Creative Technology Corporation
    Inventors: Hiroshi Fujisawa, Yoshiaki Tatsumi
  • Patent number: 8690997
    Abstract: A two-sided attraction structure including an electrostatic chuck portion (2) and a power supply portion (5), the electrostatic chuck portion (2) including a dielectric member (3) in a plate-like shape, which is made of an insulating material and has a front side and a back side, and an internal electrode (4) mounted into the dielectric member, the front side and the back side of the dielectric member each serving as an attraction surface when voltage is applied to the internal electrode (4), the power supply portion (5) applying the voltage to the internal electrode, of the electrostatic chuck portion (2), in which the power supply portion (5) includes a solar cell (6) and a voltage boost circuit (7) for boosting power generated by the solar cell (6).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 10, 2009
    Date of Patent: April 8, 2014
    Assignee: Creative Technology Corporation
    Inventors: Yoshiaki Tatsumi, Hiroshi Fujisawa, Megumu Kawae
  • Publication number: 20140009861
    Abstract: Provided is a detachable generator device which can change the installation location with ease and which can effectively use a solar cell to generate electric power. The detachable generator device includes: a film-like solar cell; and attaching/detaching means for allowing the film-like solar cell to be attached to and detached from an attachment object at an installation location. The attaching/detaching means includes an adhesive film having an attaching/detaching surface which develops Van der Waals force to enable repeated affixation, or an electrostatic chuck for forming an attaching/detaching surface by turning on/off a voltage source connected to an attraction electrode sandwiched between two insulating layers to freely develop electrostatic attraction on a surface of at least one of the insulating layers.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 14, 2012
    Publication date: January 9, 2014
    Applicant: CREATIVE TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
    Inventors: Yoshiaki Tatsumi, Megumu Kawae, Hiroyuki Moriyama, Toshifumi Sugawara
  • Patent number: 8581598
    Abstract: Provided are a method and an apparatus capable of determining which attracting electrode in an electrostatic chuck of bipolar type has a capacitance abnormality occurring in its vicinity. In this inspection method, a positive auxiliary electrode (12) and a negative auxiliary electrode (14) are provided in a dielectric body (6) of an electrostatic chuck (4), and are connected to a ground potential portion. Then, transient currents (I1 to I4) flowing through the attracting electrodes (8 and 10) and the auxiliary electrodes (12 and 14) are measured when direct current voltages (+V and ?V) are applied or cease to be applied from a chuck power supply (26) to the electrostatic chuck (4) under a state in which an object (2) to be attracted is not mounted, and a transient current (I5) (=I1?I2 or I3?I4) is calculated. The obtained transient currents are compared to respective predetermined reference values, to thereby determine a capacitance abnormality in the electrostatic chuck (4).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 19, 2009
    Date of Patent: November 12, 2013
    Assignee: Creative Technology Corporation
    Inventor: Hiroshi Fujisawa
  • Publication number: 20130277357
    Abstract: Provided are a work heating device which is capable of heating a work piece with high soaking properties as well as fine temperature control and which remains highly reliable over a long-term use by preventing the deformation or the like of a chuck member, and a work treating device that uses the work heating device. The work heating device is a work heating device in which the chuck member including a work attraction electrode for work attraction and a heater member including a heating element for work heating are layered, and which is capable of heating with the heater member the work piece stuck by attraction on the chuck member side, in which the heater member includes a chuck attraction electrode for causing the chuck member to stick by attraction, between a surface of the heater member that is opposed to the chuck member and the heating element, so that the chuck member and the heater member are layered detachably.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 20, 2011
    Publication date: October 24, 2013
    Applicant: CREATIVE TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
    Inventors: Yoshiaki Tatsumi, Megumu Kawae, Yasuyuki Temma, Toshifumi Sugawara
  • Patent number: 8469342
    Abstract: Provided is a substrate suction apparatus which has a vacuum suction mechanism and an electrostatic attraction mechanism, and improves planarity of a subject to be processed by improving uniformity in vacuum suction power. A method for manufacturing such substrate suction apparatus is also provided. A substrate suction apparatus (1) is provided with a base board (2), a dielectric body (3), an electrostatic attraction mechanism (4) and a vacuum suction mechanism (5). Specifically, the dielectric body (3) is composed of a downmost dielectric layer (31), an intermediate dielectric layer (32) and a topmost dielectric layer (33). The electrostatic attraction mechanism (4) is composed of attraction electrodes (41, 42) and a direct current power supply. The vacuum suction mechanism (5) is composed of a groove (51), a suction channel (52), a porous dielectric body (3) and the porous attraction electrodes (41, 42).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 5, 2008
    Date of Patent: June 25, 2013
    Assignee: Creative Technology Corporation
    Inventors: Yoshiaki Tatsumi, Kinya Miyashita
  • Patent number: 8411408
    Abstract: Provided is an electrostatic chuck (8) of self power supply type, which is capable of supplying power while generating power to be used by an attraction electrode (3) during processing of a substrate. The electrostatic chuck (8) attracts and holds a substrate in a substrate processing apparatus (11) that processes the substrate while generating optical energy. The electrostatic chuck (8) includes: an electrode sheet (5) including an attraction electrode (3); a metal base (1) having the electrode sheet (5) laminated on an upper surface side thereof; an internal power supply for obtaining power to be supplied to the attraction electrode (3); and a voltage boost circuit (7) for boosting voltage of the power obtained by the internal power supply. The internal power supply includes a solar cell (6), and converts the optical energy into the power during the processing of the substrate, to thereby cause the electrode sheet (5) to attract and hold the substrate.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 14, 2009
    Date of Patent: April 2, 2013
    Assignee: Creative Technology Corporation
    Inventors: Yoshiaki Tatsumi, Hiroshi Fujisawa
  • Patent number: 8238072
    Abstract: A bipolar electrostatic chuck which has excellent dielectric breakdown strength and provides excellent attracting performance. The bipolar electrostatic chuck eliminates difficulty in dismounting a sample from a sample attracting plane as much as possible after application of a voltage to electrodes is finished. The bipolar electrostatic chuck is provided with a first electrode and a second electrode in an insulator and permits a surface of the insulator to be the sample attracting plane. The insulator has the first electrode, an interelectrode insulating layer and the second electrode in this order from the sample attracting plane in the depth direction. The second electrode has a region not overlapping with the first electrode in a normal line direction of the sample attracting plane.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 21, 2010
    Date of Patent: August 7, 2012
    Assignee: Creative Technology Corporation
    Inventors: Hiroshi Fujisawa, Kinya Miyashita
  • Patent number: 8196594
    Abstract: Provided are an apparatus for and a method of removing foreign materials from a substrate which reliably remove the foreign materials, eliminate a chance of redeposition of the foreign materials, and are applicable even to large-size substrates. The apparatus for removing foreign materials includes electrostatic chucks (2, 3) forming a substrate chucking surface (4) to which the substrate (1) is attracted; a resin sheet supplying means (9) for supplying a resin sheet (5) to the substrate chucking surface (4); resin sheet collecting means (13) for collecting the supplied resin sheet (5); and a substrate transfer means for transferring the substrate (1). The substrate (1) supplied to the electrostatic chucks (2, 3) by the substrate transfer means is attracted to the substrate chucking surface (4) through the resin sheet (5), and a foreign material (22) deposited on a side of the substrate chucking surface (4) of the substrate (1) is transferred onto the resin sheet (5) and removed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 11, 2006
    Date of Patent: June 12, 2012
    Assignee: Creative Technology Corporation
    Inventors: Riichiro Harano, Yoshiaki Tatsumi, Kinya Miyashita, Hiroshi Fujisawa
  • Patent number: 8158238
    Abstract: An electrostatic chuck having excellent chucking force and holding force is provided. The electrostatic chuck includes a laminate structure in which a first insulating layer, a first electrode layer, an interelectrode insulating layer, a second electrode layer and a second insulating layer are successively laminated on a metal base in an order of increasing distance from the metal base. The second electrode layer includes a pattern electrode having a plurality of opening portions within a flat area, and a shortest distance X between mutually opening portions and a length L of a line segment formed by feet of perpendiculars when barycenters of the adjacent opening portions are projected to a virtual line which is a straight line parallel to the shortest distance X satisfy L/X?1.5 and L<2.6 mm.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 7, 2006
    Date of Patent: April 17, 2012
    Assignee: Creative Technology Corporation
    Inventors: Kinya Miyashita, Hiroshi Fujisawa, Riichiro Harano
  • Patent number: 8051548
    Abstract: Provided is a method of manufacturing a gas supply structure for use in an electrostatic chuck apparatus having an electrostatic chuck on the upper surface side of a metal base (1), the gas supply structure being capable of eliminating contamination due to nonuniform cooling gas jetting quantities and deposition of a thermally spraying material and the like.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 3, 2008
    Date of Patent: November 8, 2011
    Assignee: Creative Technology Corporation
    Inventors: Kinya Miyashita, Yoshihiro Watanabe
  • Patent number: 8027171
    Abstract: Provided is a power feeding structure of an electrostatic chuck including a lower insulation layer, an electrode layer and a surface insulation dielectric layer formed on an upper surface side of a metal substrate in order from the metal substrate, in which the lower insulation layer, the electrode layer and the surface insulation dielectric layer are not cracked easily.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 19, 2006
    Date of Patent: September 27, 2011
    Assignee: Creative Technology Corporation
    Inventors: Kinya Miyashita, Yoshihiro Watanabe
  • Publication number: 20110162526
    Abstract: Provided is a two-sided attraction structure that can be used repeatedly with remarkable ease, thereby being free from the problem of material wasting or the like, is free from the problem of energy, and can be employed for various uses including an exhibition/information apparatus and a dust collecting apparatus.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 10, 2009
    Publication date: July 7, 2011
    Applicant: CREATIVE TECHNOLOGY CORPORATION
    Inventors: Yoshiaki Tatsumi, Hiroshi Fujisawa, Megumu Kawae