Semiconductor today

Flexible integrated circuit (FlexIC) designer and manufacturer Pragmatic Semiconductor Ltd of Cambridge, UK has launched its latest radio frequency identification (RFID) near-field communication (NFC) product line. NFC Connect is claimed to unlock seamless, item-level intelligence for mass-market products that are traditionally constrained by cost, supply chain and sustainability challenges...

During a visit to Newport Wafer Fab in South Wales — the UK’s largest semiconductor facility — a day after giving her Spring Statement (promising a “new era of security and national renewal” to kickstart economic growth, protect working people and keep Britain safe), the UK Government’s Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves has welcomed the intention of discrete semiconductor and passive electronic component maker Vishay Intertechnology Inc of Malvern, PA, USA to invest £250m in boosting production at its subsidiary Vishay Newport Ltd as part of plans to develop large-scale compound semiconductor manufacturing in the UK, specifically of silicon carbide devices...

After an internal and external search by its board of directors, Wolfspeed Inc of Durham, NC, USA — which makes silicon carbide (SiC) materials and power semiconductor devices — has appointed Robert Feurle as CEO, effective 1 May. He succeeds Thomas Werner, who is serving as interim executive chairman and will return as chairman of the board following the transition...

Compound Semiconductor Applications (CSA) Catapult is part of a consortium that is one of the winners of the Quantum Missions pilot competition, securing a share of £12m of funding from government agency Innovate UK. The collaboration brings together Vector Photonics Ltd (spun off from Scotland’s University of Glasgow in 2020), Sheffield University spin-off Phlux Technology —which designs and manufactures 1550nm avalanche photodiode (APD) infrared sensors — and the University of Bristol, alongside the Catapult’s expertise...

Spectrik of Eindhoven, The Netherlands is taking further steps in developing photonic gas sensors for agricultural applications by partnering with Eindhoven-based VTEC Lasers and Sensors B.V...

As part of its ongoing initiatives to optimize its manufacturing footprint, materials, networking and laser technology firm Coherent Corp of Saxonburg, PA, USA is to sell its epitaxial fabrication facility in Champaign, Illinois...

Materials, networking and laser technology firm Coherent Corp of Saxonburg, PA, USA has launched its 2x400G-FR4 Lite optical transceiver, a silicon photonics-based module optimized for AI-driven data centers and high-speed Ethernet networks. Designed for high volume deployments, the transceiver delivers 500m reach while significantly reducing power consumption. It complements the firm’s existing 800G-DR8 transceiver (also built with silicon photonics technology) with a wavelength-multiplexed variant that is more fiber-efficient than the DR8...

Materials, networking and laser technology firm Coherent Corp of Saxonburg, PA, USA has launched its 793nm pump laser diode, setting what is said to be a new industry standard with 28W of power and 97% polarization purity. The product offers what is claimed to be unmatched performance and cost efficiency, unlocking new possibilities for applications in the rapidly growing thulium fiber laser market...

Bridgelux Inc of Fremont, CA, USA (a vertically integrated developer and manufacturer of solid-state light sources for lighting applications) has expanded its chip-on-board (COB) product line by launching two inaugural DriveLux series of light engine products. By seamlessly integrating COB technology with an advanced driver, DriveLux is compact, with a replaceable design, what is claimed to be exceptional CRI90 efficacy, and versatile mounting options for large, selectable optical lenses in various sizes and beam angles...

Multi-national industrial and energy company METLEN Energy & Metals S.A. of Athens, Greece — which operates the only vertically integrated bauxite, alumina and primary aluminium production unit in the European Union (EU) with privately owned port facilities — says that its flagship investment in gallium production at the historic Aluminium of Greece industrial unit has been officially recognized as a Strategic Project by the European Commission under the Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA)...

Skorpios Technologies Inc of Albuquerque, NM, USA (which provides integrated silicon photonics products and silicon nanostructures based on its proprietary Tru-SiPh wafer-scale heterogeneous integration platform) has appointed Gunter Reiss as chief revenue officer to accelerate global expansion across AI infrastructure, hyperscalers, optical networking, quantum computing, LiDAR, aerospace, and advanced foundry services...

Analog/mixed-signal and specialty foundry X-FAB Silicon Foundries SE of Tessenderlo, Belgium, independent pure-play indium phosphide (InP) integrated photonics foundry SMART Photonics of Eindhoven, The Netherlands, and Epiphany Design of Enschede, The Netherlands (a fabless photonic design house specialized in hybrid and heterogeneous photonics) are collaborating to develop a new heterogeneous photonics integration platform that combines the strengths of InP and silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technologies, enabling multi-terabit data rates for datacom and telecom applications...

Acacia Communications Inc of Maynard, MA, USA (now part of Cisco) — which develops and manufactures high-speed coherent optical interconnect products — has expanded its client optics components portfolio with new products that leverage its proven digital signal processing (DSP) and silicon photonics expertise in coherent optics. Specifically, the firm is introducing a 3nm Kibo 1.6T PAM4 DSP and a family of 200G-per-lane optical engine products that can deliver a solution with the power efficiency required for the most demanding AI workloads...

Deposition equipment maker Aixtron SE in Herzogenrath, near Aachen, Germany is a partner in the research project GraFunkL (Graphene as a functional layer in UVC LEDs) for the use of novel UVC LEDs, which are to be used, among other things, against multi-resistant hospital pathogens...

Photonic application-specific integrated circuit (PASIC) chip design and manufacturing company OpenLight of Santa Barbara, CA, USA (which launched as an independent company in June 2022, introducing the first open silicon photonics platform with heterogeneously integrated III-V lasers) has completed Telcordia GR-468 qualification for all active components in its photonic design kit (PDK) based on Tower Semiconductor’s PH18DA process...

Power semiconductor product supplier Diodes Inc of Plano, TX, USA has introduced its first series of indium antimonide (InSb) Hall-element sensors for rotation speed detection and current measurement in consumer applications such as laptops, mobile phones, joysticks, and in motors found in various home appliances. In industrial applications, they are designed for use in position encoders and commutation of brushless motors and fans. The development of these devices addresses the market demand for greater availability of high-sensitivity InSb Hall sensors in industry-standard 4-pin SOT23-4 and SIP-4 packages...

In booth 6357 at the Optical Fiber Communications Conference & Exposition (OFC 2025) in San Francisco, CA, USA (1–3 April), Scintil Photonics of Grenoble, France (a fabless firm developing and commercializing silicon photonic integrated circuits with integrated lasers for AI data centers) is demonstrating LEAF Light, which is claimed to be the world’s first single-chip, multi-wavelength laser source that delivers the speed, reach, power efficiency and lower latency required for scale-up networks. Scintil’s compact dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) remote light source (with what is claimed to be the world’s most precise wavelength spacing) is said to be a vital component within the emerging co-packaged DWDM architecture that addresses the challenges for scalable AI data centers...

In booth 5315 at the Optical Fiber Communications Conference & Exposition (OFC 2025) in San Francisco, CA, USA (1-3 April), POET Technologies Inc of Toronto, Ontario, Canada — designer and developer of the POET Optical Interposer, photonic integrated circuits (PICs) and light sources for the hyperscale data-center, telecom and artificial intelligence (AI) markets — is demonstrating its latest technology innovations and products, detailed as follows...

To enhance production of its proprietary high-power distributed feedback (DFB) laser and laser array technology, Sivers Semiconductors AB of Kista, Sweden is partnering with WIN Semiconductors Corp of Taoyuan City, Taiwan — which provides pure-play gallium arsenide (GaAs) and gallium nitride (GaN) wafer foundry services for the wireless, infrastructure and networking markets. The strategic collaboration paves the way for high-volume manufacturing of critical components for coarse wavelength division multiplexing (CWDM) and dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) applications...

Since lighting is no longer confined to a simple on-and-off function, ams OSRAM GmbH of Premstätten, Austria and Munich, Germany says that, with advances like pixelated lighting, its new EVIYOS Shape (available now) gives it the power to create innovative tailored scenarios...