A system and method for forming a novel C4 solder bump for BLM (Ball
Limiting Metallurgy) includes a novel damascene technique is implemented
to eliminate the Cu undercut problem and improve the C4 pitch. In the
process, a barrier layer metal stack is deposited above a metal pad
layer. A top layer of the barrier layer metals (e.g., Cu) is patterned by
CMP. Only bottom layers of the barrier metal stack are patterned by a wet
etching. The wet etch time for the Cu-based metals is greatly reduced
resulting in a reduced undercut. This allows the pitch of the C4 solder
bumps to be reduced. An alternate method includes use of multiple vias at
the solder bump terminal.