Technology engineering & licensing firm ALLOS Semiconductors GmbH of Dresden, Germany have concluded its joint project to establish its mature 150 and 200mm gallium nitride on silicon (GaN-on-Si) technology at Epistar Corp of Hsinchu Science Park, Taiwan (the world's largest manufacturer of LED epiwafers and chips).
The project was executed with better-than-expected results and ahead of schedule in less than six months. For example, reproducible crystal quality was achieved with a total dislocation density of 2×108cm2. It is reckoned that, with this performance, Epistar has caught up with the world-leading results of forerunners that have been developing GaN-on-Si LED technology for some time.
During the project ALLOS established its GaN-on-Si epiwafer process on Epistar's epitaxial reactors. Epistar engineers were trained and worked in the integrated project team with ALLOS to gain full understanding and control over the GaN-on-Si technology. Currently, Epistar's own LED technology is being transferred to GaN-on-Si structures.
"To conduct the technology transfer with ALLOS has proven to be the right decision for Epistar as it allowed us to quickly gain command over their leading GaN-on-Si technology in a very cost-efficient and reliable way," comments Epistar's president Dr M. J. Jou. "In a second phase we will now be focussing on realising the cost advantages of GaN-on-Si LEDs and to unlock the application benefits," he adds.
"To accomplish a project of this size and complexity with such results is a complete success," comments ALLOS' CEO & co-founder Burkhard Slischka. "This result underlines ALLOS' project execution skills as well as our technical capabilities to grow crack-free wafers with market-leading crystal quality," he claims. "This is an example that our fast, cost-effective and successful implementation of GaN-on-Si helps our customers to reduce development risk and to save time and money."
