News: Microelectronics
2 October 2024
Innovate UK details 16 projects receiving £11.5m of funding
Innovate UK (part of UK Research and Innovation) has issued details of the 16 projects that are to share £11.5m of funding as part of a collaborative R&D drive into ways to:
- scale up semiconductor manufacturing within the UK;
- improve supply chain resilience within the UK;
- establish innovations and new manufacturing techniques;
- expand the capability or performance of existing manufacturing techniques;
- encourage relationships between product designers and manufacturers to develop new manufacturing techniques or expanding capability;
- encourage new collaborations across industry and academia.
This is the final competition that forms part of an £18m program supporting the UK government’s national semiconductor strategy (which plans to build on the UK’s strengths in semiconductors to grow the sector, increase resilience and protect national security). The competition follows previous competition rounds, which saw investments of £1.5m in semiconductor feasibility studies and £4.3m invested in skills and training.
The 16 project titles, their grants and the participants are:
Industrial epitaxy of ULTRARAM computer memory — £680,675 to:
- Quinas Technology Ltd,
- Cardiff University,
- IQE plc,
- Lancaster University.
UpQSens: upscaling manufacture of quantum dot-based CMOS SWIR sensors in the UK — £1,189,114 to:
- Quantum Advanced Solutions Ltd,
- University of Cambridge.
Developing new UK packaging capability for highly miniaturised, compound semiconductor-based photovoltaic components to enable autonomous and sustainable IoT at scale — £564,018 to:
- Lightricity Ltd,
- Alter Technology TUV NORD UK Ltd,
Commodity High Performance InP lasers on a 6” wafer platform (CHIPIN6) — £409,942 to:
- Compound Semiconductor Centre Ltd,
- Ffotoneg Ltd,
- SPTS Technologies Ltd,
- Cardiff University.
FlexPlanner/FAR: automated solutions to dramatically improve wafer-fab efficiency, while simultaneously reducing reliance on manufacturing skilled labour — £999,943 to:
- Flexciton Ltd,
- Seagate Technology Ireland.
Scale up of avalanche photodiodes for future terabit optical networks (CAPTAIN) — £830,123 to:
- Phlux Technology Ltd,
- Sivers Photonics Ltd,
- The University of Sheffield,
- Hilight Semiconductor Ltd.
Semiconductor impact calculator ‘RESiLABLE’ to deeply decarbonise and increase supply-chain resilience of UK semiconductor manufacturing — £256,500 to:
- Minviro Ltd,
- Swansea University.
Industrial development of novel photoresists for high-NA EUV enabling UK-based semiconductor manufacturing scale-up — £1,701,542 to:
- Irresistible Materials Ltd,
- Endevour Speciality Chemicals Ltd.
Onshoring and Scale Up of 3c-SiC substrates for cubic GaN microLEDs — £303,125 to:
- Kubos Semiconductors Ltd,
- Advanced Epi Materials And Devices Ltd,
- Oxford Instrument plc,
- Wafer Technology Ltd.
UK integrated supply chain to support Vishay (UKISC-V) — £321,184 to:
- RAM Innovations Ltd,
- KuasaSemi Ltd,
- Vishay Ltd.
Enhancement of power devices with 3C-SiC — £585,921 to:
- IceMOS Technology Ltd,
- University of Warwick.
UK-GRAFT: the UK graphene research and fabrication technology foundry — £1,402,258 to:
- Paragraf Ltd,
- UK Electronic Skills Foundation,
- University of Birmingham,
- Cupio Services Ltd,
- University of Glasgow.
Establishing new manufacturing techniques for high-value semiconductor manufacturing of X-ray dosimeters for radiotherapy in the UK — £528,683 to:
- Silverray Ltd,
- University of Surrey.
GRAPHICS (Gallium nitride based advanced photonic crystal structures) — £650,132 to:
- Vector Photonics Ltd,
- University of Glasgow.
INTERPOSE-UK (Advanced integrated circuit interposers for semiconductor packaging in UK) — £438,498 to:
- BAE systems (operations) Ltd,
- Oxford Lasers Ltd,
- PRP Optoelectronics Ltd,
- University of Southampton.
APEX-G (Advanced high-power, extended-wavelength VCSEL arrays for volume infrared and green laser applications) — £608,210 to:
- Integrated Compound Semiconductors Ltd,
- NPL Management Ltd,
- Microchip Technology Caldicot Ltd,
- Compound Semiconductor Centre Ltd.
UK unveils National Semiconductor Strategy, with £1bn government funding
