News: Suppliers
23 January 2020
Shin-Etsu licenses Qromis’ GaN substrate technology
Shin-Etsu Chemical Co Ltd of Tokyo, Japan has agreed to license the patented gallium nitride (GaN)-related technology of fabless firm Qromis Inc of Santa Clara, CA, USA (spun off from Micron Technology in 2015) as Shin-Etsu moves ahead with its development of GaN-related products.
Together with its silicon wafer manufacturing subsidiary Shin-Etsu Handotai Co Ltd, Shin-Etsu Chemical has been developing and selling substrates such as silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafers and GaN-on-silicon wafers besides its usual line of silicon wafers for power and high-frequency semiconductors.
Qromis’ substrate technology (QST) is said to be fully diameter-scalable (6”, 8”, 12” and beyond) and engineered to alleviate stress from epitaxial layers, allowing the deposition of tens of microns of high-quality and low-dislocation-density bulk-like GaN on 6” or larger diameters.
Shin-Etsu aims to further expand its product portfolio by utilizing Qromis’ patented substrate technology in addition to advancing the line-up of its existing products, and will address a wide range of customer needs by offering multiple materials and substrates solutions.
Shin-Etsu notes that the GaN market is expected to grow rapidly because the devices can help to resolve the conflicting issues of the need for energy conservation and the high-performance requirements essential for mobility evolution in areas such as autonomous driving, 5G communication and deeper digitalization.
Shin-Etsu Group (which includes Shin-Etsu Chemical and Shin-Etsu Handotai) says that, by supplying large-diameter GaN-related products, it aims to contribute to the realization of an energy-efficient, sustainable society.
Imec and Qromis present p-GaN HEMTs on 200mm CTE-matched substrates
Kyma demos 200mm GaN HVPE on QROMIS’ MOCVD GaN-on-QST wafers
