JULABO

In the semiconductor world, First Silicon is the moment a chip design stops being a file and becomes a physical object. It’s the first time the chip, which has cost hundreds of millions of dollars and taken two-plus years to develop, gets fabricated on a real silicon wafer and tested in the real world. Everything before this was either digital or in-process. Now it’s real, and either it works or it doesn’t. Our film follows a lead design engineer on the morning of her chip’s First Silicon, transitioning into the fabrication facility where chips are physically manufactured. Inside the cleanroom, massive machines execute hundreds of precision steps, including dry etching with plasma, where a JULABO PRESTO W56 holds temperature rock-steady so that features measured in nanometers are carved exactly as she designed them. One degree off and the chip fails. Julabo is the invisible hand that makes precision possible.