Interview
from different countries, primarily the Far East. So what we are looking at is how can we fill the gaps because at present, even though we have companies around that are working in all of these areas, it’s not joined up.”
In 2015, Cardiff University announced that it was investing around £75m in the Institute for Compound Semiconductors as part of its new £300m Innovation Campus. Meadows explains: “The Institute for Compound Semiconductors is purely for research of TRLs 1, 2 and 3 to develop new and novel materials, so the idea is that those new novel materials could be prototyped by the Compound Semiconductor Centre. “Working closely with the Welsh
government, they were very supportive on the joint venture between Cardiff University and IQE, specifically for developing new epitaxial materials, wafer materials at TRLs 4, 5 and 6 so it is prototyping and allowing access to others to do that but to attract originally European funding but also innovate UK funding to help the development of new, next-generation products,” says Meadows. The UK government has also invested
more than £50m in the first Catapult Centre in Wales, dedicated to the development of compound semiconductor applications. Meadows comments: “What we are looking at doing is offering a complete service and, if you look at its history, it’s almost developing the same way that Silicon Valley evolved. It actually took Silicon Valley 20 to 30 years to become established because when you get to a critical mass you start attracting
people into the region for jobs because they’re not stuck with the one employer; they can move around and gain experience. The compound semiconductor cluster currently employs approximately 1,300 people and expects to boost the number employed across the sector to around 5,000 over the next five years. But also it starts to attract inward investors who want to tap into the whole research and development chain as well. And that’s exactly how Silicon Valley developed in the early days but it was an organic development. Within the cluster, we are working very closely together as one and we’re trying to brand the entire cluster as CSconnected so we can go out and effectively say: ‘this is happening in Wales now. We have the capabilities, why not come here to develop your next products’. And it’s really gaining traction.” As Meadows has explained, compound semiconductors are everywhere, and emerging technologies rely on them for higher performance and higher power so it’s great that the UK can play such a big part in the industry. “It is a pretty significant industry,” concludes Meadows, “and it’s one that the UK does have a lead in and we want to make sure we maintain that lead. We’ve sadly seen it so many times; if you look at any handset or phone it will not be made in Britain. So what we’re looking at in a small way is bringing some back, a bit like reshoring. Not so much bringing it back but keeping what we have because we do have this expertise. Like I say, there are other clusters around but we work with them and they’re organic clusters
but by far the biggest concentration and the biggest investment, currently around about £300m worth of investment in compound semiconductors, is right along the M4 corridor here, mainly in South East Wales. We are also working with Swansea University as well as connecting with other organisations across the UK. There are also a lot of photonic based businesses that use our materials, in areas such as North Wales where there is a very strong photonics cluster. Ironically, many photonics companies have been sourcing laser modules from Asia to use in their
their products, probably not knowing that IQE in turn are supplying the materials that the modules are made from. So what we are looking at is expand what we do here in Wales and the UK. So that’s really where the cluster is coming from and the history of it and why we believe it’s an important industry sector.”
www.csfusion.org www.iqep.com
www.compoundsemiconductor
centre.com
www.cieonline.co.uk
Components in Electronics
November 2018 13
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