Category Archives: LEDs

A newly finalized Department of Defense (DoD) rule reduces the risk of counterfeit semiconductor products being used by our military by implementing needed safeguards in the procurement of semiconductors and other electronic parts. The final DoD rule addresses contractor responsibilities for detection and avoidance of counterfeit electronic parts. Among other provisions, the rule implements section 818 of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year 2012, which calls for DoD to utilize trusted suppliers to mitigate the risks of counterfeits.

“Counterfeit semiconductor products can end up in critical consumer, industrial, medical, and military devices, potentially undermining our public safety and national security,” said Brian Toohey, president and CEO, Semiconductor Industry Association. “The new Department of Defense rule will help stem the tide of dangerous counterfeit semiconductor products by mandating that DoD contractors purchase from original manufacturers or authorized sources. This rule represents a long fought victory for the semiconductor industry and a significant step toward ensuring the safety and security of semiconductor products used by our military.”

While the proposed rule issued last year contained numerous issues of concern for the semiconductor industry, the final rule incorporates many improvements called for by SIA in comments filed last year. The final rule requires contractors and their subcontractors to establish a counterfeit electronic part and avoidance system, subject to audit, that includes procedures to show their use of original manufacturers, authorized distributors, or authorized aftermarket distributors prior to turning to other outlets. Additionally, the rule further strengthens flowdown requirements to subcontractors called for by SIA and subjects violators of the requirements within the rule to disapproval of their purchasing system and/or potential withholding of payments by DoD.

SIA has long advocated for measures to stop the dangerous proliferation of counterfeit semiconductor products. Counterfeiters often “harvest” semiconductor components from old circuit boards and then re-mark them to indicate they are new or that they have better performance than the original components. These counterfeit semiconductors, which may be indistinguishable from authentic semiconductors, are then sold through a network of international brokers, posing a risk to critical end products. For more information, see SIA’s anti-counterfeiting whitepaper.

“By working together to implement common sense policies like this DoD rule, we can win the fight against counterfeit semiconductor products and help ensure the safety of technologies that are vital to America’s economic and national security,” said Toohey.

Industry analyst firm NanoMarkets has published its latest forecasts of the OLED lighting market predicting a $1.4 billion market opportunity in 2019.  The report, “OLED Lighting Markets-2014” (Code Nano-721) notes that while the sector has foundered for the past few years it now appears to be worthy of some renewed optimism based on both on both improvements in OLED lighting panel performance and recent expansion of manufacturing facilities.

OLEDs aren’t just for luxury lighting any more.  The efficacy and luminance of OLED lighting panels are reaching levels where OLED lighting firms can claim that their products are truly energy efficient and have the brightness that make them a practical form of lighting for offices and homes.  For example, LG Chem said that next year it will have 135lm/W panels with 5,000 cd/m2 luminance.

Until recently, most of the output of the OLED lighting business was development kits for designers.  However, in the next few years, revenues from kits will be rapidly overtaken by revenues from OLED luminaires, with revenues from OLED luminaires for homes reaching almost $400 million in sales by 2019 and revenues from OLED office luminaires reaching almost $380 million in the same year.

OLED capacity continues to grow 

In the past three years, Osram and Philips have invested $25 million and $57 million respectively in setting up OLED production lines.  Meanwhile, Konica Minolta is currently constructing an OLED mass production facility at an approximate investment of around $100 million.

By next year, worldwide capacity for OLED lighting panels is expected to be around 30 million panels.  This number is expected to grow to almost 40 million by 2019.  NanoMarkets believes that in the next five years there will be a major influx of low-cost (and possibly government subsidized) Chinese suppliers that will force down OLED lighting prices in a manner similar to what the solar panel industry has experienced.

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of the OLED lighting market, assesses its future potential and offers detailed eight-year forecasts for the OLED lighting business including volume (units and square meters shipped) and value projections of the following market segments:  designer kits and related products, office and commercial lighting, residential lighting, non-automotive outdoor lighting, automotive lighting and customized installations.

The report also includes projections of manufacturing capacity for OLED lighting panels and an assessment of which geographic regions will prove the best customers for OLED lighting.

In addition, NanoMarkets examined the product development and marketing strategies of the leading and influential players in the OLED lighting sector, including both large and small lighting firms and the key OLED material suppliers.  Among the firms discussed in this report are Acuity Brands, Audi, BASF, Blackbody, BJB, Cheil/Novaled, Dupont Teijin, ETAP Lighting, First—O-Light, Ford, Henkel, Kaneka, Konica Minolta, Ledon, LG Chem, Lumiotec, MC Pioneer, Merck, NEC Lighting, OLEDWorks, Orbotech, Osram, Philips, Pixelligent, Samsung, Sumitomo, UDC and WAC Lighting.

By Dan Tracy, senior director, Industry Research & Statistics, SEMI

Given the slow economic growth in the U.S. during the first quarter, coupled with challenging geo-political developments around the world,uncertainty once again permeates the industry outlook for the year.  With that said, industry trends show the first quarter of this year being generally stronger than the first quarter of one year ago. This week, the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) announced that semiconductor sales reached $78.6 billion in the first quarter, the highest-ever first quarter sales.

Industry data collected by SEMI and its data partners also demonstrate a positive first quarter compared to one year ago. Combined equipment billings reported by SEMI and the Semiconductor Equipment Association of Japan (SEAJ), as reported in our respective book-to-bill programs, have first quarter 2014 billings at about $7.9 billion, over 30 percent higher than one year ago.  Leadframe unit shipment growth, reported to SEMI, is up 14 percent compared to the same period one year ago.

Segment

1Q 2013

1Q 2014

Year/Year Growth
Equipment Billings* ($B)

$5.9

~$7.9

~33%
Leadframe Shipments

77.2

88.4

14.5%

*- Combined billings reported by the SEMI and SEAJ book to bill, respectively

Following two years of decline in investments, equipment spending is expected to improve this year — off of the lower base, while steady semiconductor unit growth will drive spending growth on semiconductor materials.  Combined spending on equipment and materials will approach $85 billion globally for the year.

Over the previous ten years, approximately $110 billion has been spent on equipment and materials in North America for semiconductor manufacturing, and another $12 billion (or more) in spending for 2014 will enable manufacturers here to maintain their prominent rankings in the industry.  With this investment, North American wafer fabs continue to represent over 14 percent of the total installed base globally.

The encouraging start to the year, coming off of two years of declining investments, will result in growth for semiconductor equipment and materials in 2014. Clarity in the overall economy and in demand growth for electronics will determine just how strong investment and spending growth will unfold for the year.

The SEMI/Gartner Market Symposium at SEMICON West on Monday, July 7 will provide an update on the semiconductor market outlook. In addition to presentations by SEMI and Gartner analysts, Sunit Rikhi, VP of Technology and Manufacturing Group and General Manager, Intel Custom Foundry, will present on “Intel Custom Foundry – Competing in Today’s Fabless Ecosystem.”

Other upcoming SEMICON exhibitions and conferences include SEMICON Russia (May 14-15), SEMICON Taiwan (September 3-5),SEMICON Europa (October 7-9), and SEMICON Japan (December 3-5).

As high data rate applications put more strain on LTE wireless networks, innovative solutions such as small cell base stations (BTS) and carrier aggregation will be needed to bridge the bandwidth gap in high traffic areas. In response to broader bandwidth demand, Cree, Inc. introduces a family of GaN HEMT RF transistors that delivers industry-leading bandwidth and high efficiency performance to support today’s busy LTE networks. Built on plastic dual-flat no-leads (DFN) surface mount packages, the new Cree GaN HEMT RF transistors also provide the affordability needed to replace less efficient Si or GaAs transistors in these applications.

“The trend of ever-increasing amounts of data-rich applications will drive the need for small cell deployment to improve wireless network performance,” said Tom Dekker, director of sales and marketing, RF Business Unit, Cree, Inc. “Our industry-leading GaN technology will provide the desired bandwidth, flexibility, efficiency and affordability our small cell customers demand.”

The new GaN HEMT DFN product family includes 28V and 50V, 15W and 30W unmatched transistors. The frequency-agile transistors are capable of operating at a range between 700 MHz to 3.8 GHz instantaneous, and may be optimized for band splits. Multi-band capability creates design flexibility that helps small cell OEMs speed their time to market and allows operators to reconfigure the same small cell unit for different market requirements.

In high efficiency applications, Cree GaN HEMT RF transistors help reduce the size and weight of LTE cellular network transmitters and simplify thermal management. These efficiency gains generate significant energy savings in operational costs. Cree developed Doherty reference design CDPA27045 utilizing 15W and 30W HEMT DFN transistors to demonstrate the technology’s superior efficiency. The design delivers approximately 50 percent drain efficiency at 10W average power under a LTE 7.5dB peak-to-average ratio signal, and covers 2.5-2.7 GHz instantaneous RF bandwidth while offering 16dB of linear gain.

The new family of GaN HEMT DFN RF transistors is based on Cree’s qualified 50V, 0.4µm gate length process.

Veeco Instruments Inc. (Nasdaq:VECO) has appointed Shubham Maheshwari, 42, as its new Executive Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer (CFO). Mr. Maheshwari replaces David D. Glass, who announced his retirement from Veeco last December.

Mr. Maheshwari brings more than 20 years of experience in engineering and finance to Veeco. He most recently served as Chief Financial Officer of OnCore, a global manufacturer of electronic products in the medical, aerospace, defense and industrial markets. Prior to this role, he held various finance roles including Senior Vice President Finance, Treasury, Tax and Investor Relations at Spansion, a global leader in Flash memory based embedded system solutions. Mr. Maheshwari helped lead Spansion’s emergence from bankruptcy to become a successful public company. Prior to Spansion, he spent over ten years at KLA-Tencor, a global semiconductor capital equipment manufacturing company, in various senior level corporate development and finance roles, including Vice President of Corporate Development and Corporate Controller. During his tenure at KLA-Tencor, he worked on over $1 billion in acquisition transactions.

He holds a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology in Delhi, India, an M.S. in Chemical Engineering from Kansas State University, and an MBA from the Wharton Business School, University of Pennsylvania.

John Peeler, Veeco’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, commented, “Shubham brings an ideal mix of highly relevant financial leadership experience to Veeco. I am confident he will hit the ground running to help take Veeco to the next level of performance. I’m extremely pleased that Shubham has joined our leadership team.”

“Veeco is a great match for me and I’m excited to come on board,” commented Mr. Maheshwari. “Veeco has done an impressive job managing through an extended downturn, but I think the best is still in front of the Company. I look forward to helping to strengthen the business and capitalizing on the significant growth opportunities ahead.”

Quantum Global Technologies LLC today announced it joined SEMATECH in Albany NY, to advance process tool chamber parts cleanliness and analytical methods to meet sub-20nm wafer fabrication process requirements.

Under the terms of the agreement, SEMATECH and QuantumClean will collaborate in the development of new methodologies involving process tool chamber parts cleaning and analytical methods for detecting particles beyond today’s capabilities.

“We are extremely pleased to enter into this agreement with SEMATECH”, stated Dr. Ardeshir Sidhwa, QuantumClean’s Sr. Director of Innovation & Technology. “We constantly strive to advance technologies and provide innovative solutions to our leading-edge wafer fab and OEM customers.  As our industry advances towards sub-10nm nodes, QuantumClean will be prepared for the challenges of surface preparation and cleanliness, removing and measuring particles and contamination well-beyond today’s capabilities,” concluded Dr. Sidhwa.

“QuantumClean is the first and only outsourced semiconductor process tool parts cleaner that has the vision to join SEMATECH,” stated David Zuck, COO of Quantum Global Technologies.  “QuantumClean has always invested a significant portion of its profits into parts cleaning and analytical technology development to meet the ever-increasing requirements of the industry’s leading-edge wafer fabs and OEMs.  However, in sub-20nm design node manufacturing, traditional part clean methods and related metrology prove ineffective.  Through collaboration with SEMATECH, which is already working on 11nm and 7nm design node solutions, these challenges will be overcome and QuantumClean will incorporate this knowhow into our business to the benefit of our customers,” concluded Mr. Zuck.

“SEMATECH’s goal is to build the infrastructure needed to successfully implement future device nodes. Our work to investigate the generation, propagation, removal, and impact of defects generated by equipment, equipment components, and materials used in advanced semiconductor processes helps enable these supply chain elements to meet the difficult contamination requirements of the upcoming device nodes,” said Michael Lercel, SEMATECH’s senior director of Technology. “Our partnership with QuantumClean brings additional expertise in precision parts cleaning to SEMATECH, and in turn will raise the level of our research efforts and further strengthen SEMATECH’s commitment in identifying the challenges of future technology nodes.”

Recognizing the changing dynamics of the microelectronics industry in Southeast Asia, SEMI today announced the expanded scope of its industry-leading SEMICON regional exposition which will now rotate between Singapore and other locations within Southeast Asia. Building on the twenty-year history of SEMICON Singapore, the expanded event — branded SEMICON Southeast Asia — will have its inaugural event in in Penang, Malaysia in 2015.  The announcement was made during SEMICON Singapore 2014 (www.semiconsingapore.org), which is currently being held from 23-25 April at the Marina Bay Sands.

“While Singapore continues to serve as the hub of the microelectronics industry in Southeast Asia, SEMI recognizes the growth and importance of the industry across the region requires a new vision for serving our members and other customers where they do business,” said Kai Fai Ng, president of SEMI Southeast Asia. “Through the rotation of SEMICON Southeast Asia between Singapore, Malaysia, and the region, we will open new business opportunities for our customers and foster stronger pan-regional engagement in our programs and other events serving the industry. On alternating years, we will continue to support the host regions through high-level executive conferences in Singapore and Malaysia.”

According to Gartner, the Southeast Asia microelectronics manufacturing market accounts for more than 27 percent of the world’s assembly, packaging, and test production and Malaysia alone represents over 10 percent of the global square footage, followed closely by the Philippines, Thailand and Singapore.  According to the SEMI (www.semi.org) World Fab Forecast, Southeast Asia is among the top four regions in terms of growth rate for capacity.  In 2014, approximately $800 million of front end fab spending will occur in Southeast Asia.

The new SEMICON Southeast Asia will continue to focus on the key trends and technologies in semiconductor design and manufacturing, adding emphasis in serving the needs of expanding applications markets in areas including mobile devices and other connected “Internet of Things” (IoT) technologies, many of which require development of specialized materials, packaging, and test technologies, as well as new architectures and processes — technologies addressed by a growing number of companies located across Southeast Asia.  SEMI will continue to maintain its regional headquarters in Singapore.

For more information on SEMICON Singapore 2014, visit: www.semiconsingapore.org.   To learn about SEMICON Southeast Asia 2015 exhibition opportunities, visit www.semiconsea.org.

GaN-on-Si is entering in production. Under this context, what is the patent situation? KnowMade and Yole Développement decided to collaborate and combine their expertise to perform a patent analysis dedicated to the GaN-on-Si substrate market: GaN on Silicon Substrate Patent Investigation.
Under this report, the companies detail the technological challenges and known solutions. They provide an overview of the main players and up to 2020 market volume & revenue forecasts. Analysts give a deep understanding of the IP landscape and identify key patents per technology issues or patent assignee.

“GaN-on-Si technology appeared naturally as an alternative to GaN- on-Sapphire, the main stream technology for LED applications. Today, despite potential cost benefits, the mass adoption of GaN-on-Si technology for LED applications remains unclear,” explains Dr Hong Lin, Technology & Market Analyst, Compound Semiconductors & Power Electronics at Yole Développement.

Most major LED makers have a patenting activity related to GaN-on-Si technology, but so far, few have made it the core of their strategy and technology roadmap. Contrary to the LED industry, Yole Développement and KnowMade expect GaN-on-Si to be widely adopted by power electronics and RF applications because of its lower cost and CMOS compatibility.

Screen Shot 2014-04-24 at 8.00.00 PM

The growth of GaN-on-silicon substrate was first reported in the early-1970s (T. L. Chu et al., J. Electrochemical Society, Vol. 118, page 1200), since the early 1990s more and more academics and industrials have been involved in developing this technology. GaN-on-Si technology is now poised for a list of technical challenges. The high lattice mismatch between GaN and Si results in a high defect density in epitaxial layers (dislocations). The high thermal expansion coefficient (TCE) mismatch between GaN and Si leads to a large tensile stress during cooling from the growth temperature to room temperature. The tensile stress causes film cracking and a concave bending of the wafer (warpage). These factors combine to make both dislocation density and crack/warpage reduction a challenging task.

Under GaN-On Si Substrate Patent Investigation report, Yole Développement and KnowMade cover patents published worldwide up to December, 2013.

“The patents addressing the above mentioned challenges have been selected, and an in-depth analysis of patent holders and corresponding patented technologies is provided. This report does not include patents related to active layers or GaN-based devices,” explains Dr Nicolas Baron, CEO & Co-founder, KnowMade.

Fundamental patents describing a gallium-nitride-based compound semiconductor grown on a silicon substrate were filed before the 1990s with the most significant assigned to TDK and Fujitsu. In the early 1990s, Toyoda Gosei and the University of Nagoya filed the first concepts of a buffer layer for improving the crystallinity of GaN. Those fundamental patents have been followed by an ever increasing number of applications since 1995 as more companies competed in GaN-on-Si technology to meet the technological challenges, the market demand and to lower manufacturing costs. Currently, the patented technologies reflect the significant improvements that have been made on key material issues such as dislocation density reduction and stress management for preventing cracks and warpage of the wafer.

According to Yole Développement & KnowMade analysis, GaN-on-Si IP is mature enough to initiate mass production.

Intermolecular, Inc. today announced that Epistar Corp. and Intermolecular have signed a multi-year extension of their existing collaborative development program (CDP) and royalty-bearing IP licensing agreement to increase the efficiency and reduce the cost of Epistar’s light emitting diode (LED) devices.

Under the terms of the agreement, which was initially established in April 2013, Epistar and Intermolecular engineers will continue to work together to leverage Intermolecular’s High Productivity Combinatorial (HPC) technology platform to dramatically accelerate development and manufacturing qualification of novel materials and processes for advanced LED products.

“Epistar is leveraging Intermolecular’s HPC methodology and technology in order to accelerate R&D experimentation as we bring more advanced, higher-performing LED devices to market for our customers,” stated Carson Hsieh, vice president of R&D at Epistar. “Our CDP with Intermolecular helped to significantly increase the performance of one of our LED products during development, and we are now in the process of implementing that technology in production. In the coming years we expect our continuing relationship with Intermolecular to support further advancements in our technology roadmap.”

“Increasing LED efficiency is the key to reducing LED system cost and enabling widespread adoption of more innovative lighting products. We are pleased to enter into this multi-year agreement extension with Epistar—a leader in LED manufacturing—to support their product innovation strategy through accelerated materials development and LED device integration,” stated Sandeep Nijhawan, senior vice president and general manager, Clean Energy Group at Intermolecular.

Intermolecular’s mission is to improve R&D efficiency in the semiconductor and clean energy industries through collaborations that use its HPC platform, which allows R&D experimentation to be performed at speeds up to 100 times faster than traditional methods.

SEMI has announced the new Semiconductor Technology Symposium (STS), to be held July 8-10 as part of the SEMICON West 2014 (www.semiconwest.org) technical and business program agenda. The new program addressing the most important and critical issues facing the future of semiconductor manufacturing in a new and more technical conference format.

The three-day STS conference is a comprehensive technology and business conference addressing the key issues driving the future of semiconductor manufacturing and markets. Aligned with the latest inputs from technology roadmaps, sessions at the STS will focus on the significant trends shaping near-term semiconductor technology and market developments in areas including advanced processes and materials, lithography, metrology, yield, design, packaging, test, and 450mm.

The STS will also incorporate two IEEE sessions — the IEEE/SEMI Test Vision 2020 workshop, a popular technical conference focused on key trends in automated test equipment (ATE) held concurrently with SEMICON West since 2011, and the IEEE CPMT session (Mobility and More: The M&Ms of Cost Beneficial Advanced Packaging).

“The Semiconductor Technology Symposium addresses today’s critical business and technology issues that companies need to understand in order to plan their investments for the next business cycle,” said Karen Savala, president of SEMI Americas, organizer of SEMICON West. “While technical sessions at past SEMICON West events have addressed these topics and areas, we are focused this year on elevating both the content and presentation in a format more conducive to information exchange and peer-to-peer engagement.”

Since 2006, the majority of technical program content at SEMICON West has been presented on the popular TechXPOT stages on the show floor, with select sessions attracting “standing room only” audiences, exceeding the capacity and capabilities of the stage areas. “We have responded to attendee feedback and developed the STS to take these ‘sold-out’ sessions off the show floor into a more traditional and professional conference setting, with paid guaranteed classroom-style seating, lunch, and networking breaks,” Savala added.

The STS agenda is arranged in parallel sessions (both in the morning and the afternoon), with joint networking luncheons held each day. Registration is available for day passes (one morning and one afternoon session on the same day) or as a package for multiple days. Separate registration for the Test Vision 2020 Workshop is also available. For SEMI members, day passes start at $169 and packages start at $380. For non-members, day passes start at $199 and packages start at $449. Test Vision 2020-only registration starts at $240 for members, $300 for non-members.  Early-bird pricing for the STS and Test Vision 2020 ends June 6.

Tuesday, July 8

  • Challenges, Innovations and Drivers in Metrology
  • Mobility and More: M&Ms of Cost Beneficial Advanced Packaging
  • STS Networking Lunch
  • Yield Session: Defectivity and Process Variability-Inspection, Defect Reduction Challenges and Process Controls at the Sub 20nm Nodes
  • Packaging Architectures with TSV

Wednesday, July 9                 

  • Design for Test
  • Getting to 5nm Devices: Evolutionary Scaling to Disruptive Scaling and Beyond
  • STS Networking Lunch
  • Test Vision 2020, Day 1 of 2, afternoon session/panel
  • Readiness of Advanced Lithography Technologies for HVM

Thursday, July 10

  • Test Vision 2020, Day 2, morning session
  • 450mm Technology Development Update
  • STS Networking Lunch
  • Test Vision 2020, Day 2, afternoon session
    • Breakthrough High-Volume Manufacturing Innovations: New Paradigms for the Road Ahead

In addition to the Semiconductor Technology Symposium (www.semiconwest.org/sts), SEMICON West continues to feature complimentary “no charge” keynote addresses and TechXPOT conference sessions on the exhibition floor as part of the free “expo pass.” Sessions at the TechXPOTs are aimed at engineers and technologists looking for solutions to key technology challenges and looking to better understand cutting-edge and future technology developments. Developed in conjunction with SEMI technical committees, partner organizations, and technologists, the TechXPOT agenda will provide a deeper view of key technology developments in areas including MEMS, Variability Control, Supply Chain, Productivity, 3D Printing, Test, 3D, Silicon Photonics, Automotive Applications, and Compound Semiconductors.  SEMICON West will features over 50 hours of free technical, applications and business programs with the critical, need-to-know information presented by industry leaders.

Free registration for SEMICON West 2014 (www.semiconwest.org) ends May 9.  Early-bird pricing for the Semiconductor Technology Symposium (STS) and Test Vision 2020 ends June 6.  Register for SEMICON West here: www.semiconwest.org/register.