Semiconductor today

For coverage of all the key business and technology developments in compound semiconductors and advanced silicon materials and devices over the last month, subscribe to Semiconductor Today magazine...

MICLEDI Microdisplays B.V. of Leuven, Belgium — a fabless developer of micro-LED display modules for augmented reality (AR) glasses that was spun off from nanoelectronics research center IMEC in 2019 —showcased its range of red, green and blue (R, G and B) µLEDs at the SPIE AR-VR-MR 2024 exhibition in San Francisco, CA, USA (30–31 January), colocated with Photonics West 2024...

Teledyne e2v HiRel Electronics of Milpitas, CA, USA (part of the Teledyne Defense Electronics Group that provides solutions, sub-systems and components to the space, transportation, defense and industrial markets) has announced the availability of the model TDLNA0430SEP radiation-tolerant UHF to S-band low-noise amplifier (LNA), suitable for demanding high-reliability space applications where low noise figure, minimal power consumption and small package footprint are critical to mission success...

The JEDEC Solid State Technology Association (which develops standards for the microelectronics industry) has published ‘JEP198: Guideline for Reverse Bias Reliability Evaluation Procedures for Gallium Nitride Power Conversion Devices’. Developed by the JC-70.1 Gallium Nitride Subcommittee of JEDEC’s JC-70 Wide Bandgap Power Conversion Semiconductor Committee (which was formed in October 2017 with 23 member companies, rising to over 80 now), JEP198 is available for free download from the JEDEC website...

Luminus Devices Inc of Sunnyvale, CA, USA – which designs and makes LEDs and solid-state technology (SST) light sources for illumination markets – has expanded its product portfolio with the introduction of green and blue lasers catering to a wide range of applications including entertainment lighting, laser projection display, leveling and measurement, and biometric monitoring...

Independent power electronics company Quantum Power Transformation (QPT) of Cambridge, UK (which was founded in 2019) says that a second co-founder of GaN Systems Inc of Ottawa, Ontario, Canada (a fabless developer of gallium nitride-based power switching semiconductors for power conversion and control applications), Girvan Patterson, has joined his fellow co-founder Geoff Haynes, former VP of business development at GaN Systems, as an advisor to QPT. Patterson was CEO at GaN Systems (now part of Infineon) for over eight years and has been the founder of three major start-ups and led seven IPOs and M&A transactions...

The compound semiconductor substrate market is growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 17% to $3.3bn in 2029, according to the report ‘Status of Compound Semiconductors Industry 2024’ by market analyst firm Yole Group...

Silvaco Group Inc of Santa Clara, CA, USA (which provides electronic design automation software and semiconductor design IP for process and device development) has joined GaN Valley to help advance the state of the art in designing efficient gallium nitride (GaN) power devices and enable its customers to innovate with its Victory TCAD (technology computer-aided design) platform...

Infineon Technologies AG of Munich, Germany has announced its joint Innovation Application Center in Shenzhen with mobile charging and consumer electronics products firm Anker Innovations of Changsha, Hunan, China. With the center already fully operating, it is paving the way for more energy-efficient and CO2-saving charging solutions that support decarbonization...

Guerrilla RF Inc (GRF) of Greensboro, NC, USA — which develops and manufactures radio-frequency integrated circuits (RFICs) and monolithic microwave integrated circuits (MMICs) for wireless applications — has announced the formal release of two ¼W linear power amplifiers PAs and two low-noise amplifiers LNAs earmarked specifically for the automotive market. All four devices were qualified to meet rigorous AEC-Q100 quality standards — a critical benchmark for semiconductor devices used in automotive applications. These new PAs and LNAs are used primarily in cellular compensators (essentially cellular ‘signal boosters’ serving to amplify and enhance cellular signals within the cabin of vehicles)...

In booth 1667 (Hall C) at SPIE Photonics West 2024 (30 January–1 February), KYOCERA SLD Laser Inc (KSLD) of Goleta, near Santa Barbara, CA, USA — which is commercializing gallium nitride (GaN)-based laser light sources for automotive, mobility, specialty lighting and consumer applications — is demonstrating new LaserLight technologies including a high-speed, bidirectional link for underwater wireless optical communication (UWOC) and custom-chip GaN laser capabilities...

Gallium nitride (GaN) power IC and silicon carbide (SiC) technology firm Navitas Semiconductor Corp of Torrance, CA, USA and SHINRY of Shenzhen, China (a tier-1 supplier of on-board power supplies to auto-makers such as Honda, Hyundai, BYD, Geely, XPENG, and BAIC) have opened a joint R&D power laboratory to accelerate the development of new-energy vehicle (NEV) power systems enabled by Navitas’ GaNFast technology...

Infineon Technologies AG of Munich, Germany has announced a partnership in which it will provide its 1200V CoolSiC MOSFET power semiconductor devices — in combination with EiceDRIVER compact 1200V single-channel isolated gate drive ICs — to Sinexcel Electric Co Ltd of Shenzhen, China (a provider of core power equipment and solutions for the energy Internet) to further improve the efficiency of energy storage systems...

Avalanche photodiode (APD) infrared sensor designer and manufacturer Phlux Technology (which was spun out of the UK’s Sheffield University, with a seed funding round of £4m led by Octopus Ventures in December 2022) has announced its first products, the Aura family of 1550nm infrared (IR) devices based on the firm’s Noiseless InGaAs APD technology. The sensors are claimed to be 12x more sensitive than traditional best-in-class indium gallium arsenide (InGaAs) APDs. As a result, the operating range of LiDAR, laser range-finders, and optical fiber test equipment can be extended by up to 50% with Phlux sensors, which are drop-in replacements for existing surface-mount or TO-packaged components...

Nichia Corp of Tokushima, Japan — the world’s largest gallium nitride (GaN)-based light-emitting diode/laser diode (LED/LD) manufacturer and inventor of high-brightness blue and white LEDs — has commercialized a chip-scale LED (part number NFSWL11A-D6) that achieves a horizontal light distribution...

At the SPIE Photonics West 2024 exhibition in San Francisco, CA, USA (30 January–1 February), UV-C LED maker Silanna UV of Brisbane, Australia is sharing booth #237 with Marktech Optoelectronics Inc of Latham, NY, USA (a designer and manufacturer of optoelectronics components and assemblies), denoting the start of Marktech commencing distribution of Silanna’s new 235nm and 255nm UVC LEDs, which are said to enable safer, more eco-friendly, lower-power germicidal UV solutions, and chemical or material sensing...

UK-based Oxford Instruments says that its atomic layer deposition (ALD) equipment has been installed at an “award-winning UK micro-LED provider” to support the latest consumer-immersive reality products and display devices. The system is used to deposit high-K dielectric ultra-thin films for high-density, very high-brightness, low-power and high-frame-rate RGB pixel arrays for consumer augmented-, virtual- and mixed-reality devices and smart watches...

Riber S.A. of Bezons, France — which makes molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) systems as well as evaporation sources — has received an order from a “major compound semiconductor industrial customer in Asia” for three production systems: two MBE 412 systems and one MBE 6000 system (for delivery in 2024)...

Tokyo-based Mitsubishi Electric Corp is to release six new J3-Series power semiconductor modules for various electric vehicles (xEVs), featuring either a silicon carbide metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor (SiC-MOSFET) or a silicon-based RC-IGBT (insulated-gate bipolar transistor), with compact designs and scalability for use in the inverters of electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs). All six J3-Series products will be available for sample shipments from 25 March...

In booth #2245 at the Applied Power Electronics Conference (APEC 2024) in Long Beach, CA (25–29 February), SemiQ Inc of Lake Forest, CA, USA — which designs, develops and manufactures silicon carbide (SiC) power semiconductors and 150mm SiC epitaxial wafers for high-frequency, high-temperature and high-efficiency power semiconductor devices — is debuting new portfolio of QSiC 1200V MOSFET modules, which are designed to operate reliably in challenging conditions and enable high-performance, high-density implementation while minimizing both dynamic and static losses...