June 29, 2006 – sp3 Diamond Technologies Inc., Santa Clara, CA, a developer of diamond substrate technology for enhancing thermal management, has received a $750,000 Phase II contract from the Missile Defense Agency to develop gallium nitride (GaN) on silicon-on-diamond (SOD) devices, for use with radar trasmit/receive modules.
The company already completed Phase I of the project, which involved delivery of 100mm SOD wafers with a GaN top surface, and data showing performance advantages obtainable in a HEMT device with a thermal layer of diamond, including junction temperature drops of 80?K and a 37% power increase.
Dwain Aidala, president and COO, stated that the company also has demonstrated that its diamond-on-silicon technology is usable with other active circuit devices, as well as MEMS applications. sp3 is currently working with Nitronex Corp. on fabrication of GaN material on SOD substrate for high-power devices, as well as with TriQuint Semiconductor for their high-frequency MMIC development.