From: compoundsemiconductor.net

Technology from the Chinese Academy of Sciences pushes rates of conversion from bulk crystals to substrates past 70 percent, lowering costs.

Chinese startup Tankeblue is boasting that it can produce SiC substrates 60 percent cheaper than its competitors, thanks to its crystal growing expertise.
“Very high yield and very low cost of production has been achieved,” a company spokesperson told compoundsemiconductor.net.
The Beijing company credits this development to a breakthrough in physical vapor transport (PVT) SiC growth from the work of its CEO, Xiaolong Chen. That technology allows it to slice its bulk crystals into useable substrates with over 70 percent yield, reducing costs.
Tankeblue is selling conductive 2-inch diameter 4H and 6H crystal orientation substrates that it says have less than 10 micropipe defects and 5 x 104 dislocations per square centimeter. It also sells 2-inch semi-insulating 6H SiC wafers and 3-inch conductive 4H wafers with somewhat lower crystal quality.
“The micropipe density and dislocation density have now both reached advanced international levels,” the spokesperson said.
Chen and two fellow professors from the Nanoscale Physics and Devices Laboratory of Chinese Academy of Sciences form the core around which Tankeblue was established in 2006. The company says that it is the first SiC substrate vendor in China and has already attracted customers from as far afield as the US, Germany, Australia and Japan.



With over 10 years experience in crystal growth, much of Chen's work has been focused on the study of SiC defect formation.
Earlier in 2009, Chen and his colleagues published an analysis of the impact of temperature gradients on the formation of “misoriented domains” that he describes as killer defects.
He showed that by controlling temperature gradients in the PVT furnace used to produce the bulk SiC crystal and limiting growth rates, useful wafer yields could be much increased.

Richad: 第一次听说Tankeblue就是上周与一位法国朋友聊天的时候，他说道他们在用这家公司的SiC衬底。我当时还以为是外资，没想到他说这个是中国本土企业，来自于中国科学院。后来蛋蛋在网站上了解到这确实一家有不少SiC衬底产品的本土公司。对SiC材料不熟悉，但是大概知道其用途和价格。号称第四代半导体的SiC，据说前途无量。特别欣慰能看到中国搞材料的公司壮大起来，想起来去年听吴毅锋博士的报告，他有个非常明确的观点：做半导体，尤其是这种非常规的半导体，材料的性能至关重要。

GaN on SiC or GaN on Si?

***

深深陷入Σ-Δ的泥沼之中。人太笨，没办法。

***

北京的天气暖和起来了，中午游泳也感到非常爽快。