CONNECTING THE COMPOUND SEMICONDUCTOR COMMUNITY
January / February 2013 Volume 19 Number 1
Editor Dr Richard Stevenson
richardstevenson@angelbc.co.uk +44 (0)1291 629640
Contributing Editor Dr Rebecca Pool
News Editor
Dr.Su Westwater
editorial@rebeccapool.com suwestwater@angelbc.co.uk
Director of Semiconductor Publishing Jackie Cannon
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Senior Sales Executive Robin Halder
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Sales Manager Shehzad Munshi +44 (0)1923 690215
USA Representatives Brun Media Tom Brun
Tel: 724 539-2404 Janice Jenkins
Tel: 724-929-3550
Director of Logistics Sharon Cowley
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Design & Production Manager Mitchell Gaynor
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Circulation Director Jan Smoothy
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Subscriptions Manager Debbie Higham
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Chief Operating Officer Stephen Whitehurst
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Directors
Bill Dunlop Uprichard – CEO Stephen Whitehurst – COO Jan Smoothy – CFO Jackie Cannon, Scott Adams, Sharon Cowley, Sukhi Bhadal
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debbie.higham@angelbc.com jan.smoothy@
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Take, for example, the smartphone. Traditionally, our industry has supplied LEDs for lighting keypads and backlights, plus GaAs components for switching and power amplification. Meanwhile, the use of silicon has been restricted to signal processing and memory. But this is changing. A form of silicon technology known as silicon-on-sapphire, which has been pioneered by Peregrine Semiconductor, is displacing GaAs in the switch in mobile phones (see feature on p. 55). And the use of III-Vs in the power amplifier is now facing competition from CMOS, with Javelin Semiconductor of Austin, Texas, building an amplifier that is is appearing in the Samsung Galaxy smartphones (see p. 20).
As silicon chipmakers move into new markets, their core business will start to need support from III-V materials. The superior electron mobilities associated with InGaAs makes it a very promising candidate for producing nMOSFETs at nodes of 11 nm or less, because this transistor can then operate at low voltages, trimming power consumption. Introducing this material into silicon foundries will not be easy, but researchers are starting to tackle many of the challenges. Read my report of the International Electron Devices Meeting on p. 34 of this issue to keep track of recent progress.
Another area where silicon and the III-Vs are coming together to create better products is LED production. 2013 will mark the birth of high-volume GaN-on-silicon manufacture, and it will be interesting to see which company grabs the lion’s share of this market.
Many will expect the partnership between Bridgelux and Toshiba to lead the way, given the strong track record of impressive lab results by the US partner in this collaboration. But this team is up against some stiff competition from Plessey Semiconductors of Plymouth UK. When I visited this site late last year, Barry Dennington, the company’s chief operating officer, told me that he believed that his firm had the best technology for manufacturing flat wafers with thin buffer structures (see p.28). He expects Plessey’s LED products to make a big splash this year.
It’s hard to predict the winner of that battle. But it’s a lot easy to see that as we go through 2013 and beyond, devices combining silicon and the III-Vs are going to become more and more common.
Dr Richard Stevenson Editor
mitch.gaynor@
angelbc.com sharon.cowley@
angelbc.com
Now the boundaries are blurring, and this trend is going to continue.
shehzad.munshi@
angelbc.com E:
tbrun@brunmedia.com E:
jjenkins@brunmedia.com
NOT THAT LONG AGO, there was minimal overlap between the silicon and compound semiconductor industries. The silicon foundries churned out chips for microprocessors and power electronics, while the compounds were used to make RF amplifiers and a wide variety of optoelectronic devices.
robin.halder@angelbc.com The blurring of boundaries
jackie.cannon@
angelbc.com
editorial view
January / February 2013
www.compoundsemiconductor.net 3
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