ADE WaferSight System Selected as Top Product of 2003; Solid State Technology Editorial Advisory Board Confers Honor.

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

WESTWOOD, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 16, 2003

ADE Corporation (Nasdaq: ADEX) today announced the selection of WaferSight(TM) optical flatness metrology tool as one of the "Top Ten Products of 2003" by Solid State Technology, in the December 2003 issue. Solid State Technology is a technical magazine published by PennWell Corporation, of Tulsa Oklahoma. The ranking, the magazine said, is for "the highest-rated semiconductor/thin-film processing products introduced this year, as selected by our editorial advisory board."

Headlined in the magazine as "Wafer geometry tool handles 90nm and below," the award acknowledges that WaferSight "provides high throughput wafer mapping of shape, flatness and thickness variations." Cited for its use of high-grade optics and precision engineering, WaferSight is the first tool of its kind to simultaneously map both sides of a 300mm wafer during a single acquisition, ensuring highly precise measurements. Also commendable were advanced factory automation features to support high volume manufacturing. WaferSight systems for both 300mm and advanced 200mm wafers are available. "Both models," said the award citation, "meet industry roadmap requirements for wafer flatness metrology" well beyond current production needs.

ADE is gratified by the recognition granted WaferSight by this board of industry experts. Using non-contact interferometric techniques to measure relative surface height variations on both sides of a wafer simultaneously, WaferSight provides a direct measurement of the wafer's thickness and shape, creating three-dimensional models from a contiguous data set in the x, y, and z directions. Absolute thickness gauging technology combined with the measurement of localized height variation provides topography visualization and statistical evaluation while the use of proprietary wafer handling technology allows for minimal edge exclusion without inducing stress, distorting the wafer shape.

WaferSight optical flatness system enables next-generation wafer production and supports the semiconductor ITRS roadmap to the 45nm technology node. The high precision measurement (better than one nanometer for site flatness) provides wafer manufacturers with better control of the polishing process, which, in turn, supports improved yields for fine-line geometry devices at advanced integrated circuit fabs.

WaferSight extends, through optical technologies, ADE's market leadership of wafer dimensional metrology, leveraging its long historic experience with detailed knowledge of current semiconductor wafer process and market requirements.

About ADE Corporation

ADE Corporation is a leading supplier of metrology and inspection systems required for production in the silicon wafer, semiconductor device, magnetic data storage and optics manufacturing industries. The Company's systems analyze and report product quality at critical manufacturing process steps for yield enhancement, providing quality certification data that is relied upon by semiconductor wafer, device and computer disk manufacturers. The Company's systems also are used for production measurements in the semiconductor chip fabrication process. To learn more about ADE, visit the Company's Web site at http://www.ade.com.