Abstract
For more than 20 years, silicon pure players have been looking at those
"strange" semiconductor materials made of a compound of 2 or more metals,
wondering if it could be, one day, a threat for their existing business.
Material makers are seeking new business opportunities outside of silicon and
equipment suppliers are open to adapt their know-how and expand their product
portfolio.
Silicon largely dominates the semiconductor business as the reference
material. However, specific applications such as optoelectronics, RF or power
electronics require material properties that cannot be offered by silicon.
GaN, GaAs, InP, SiC and Sapphire substrates now account for only 0.6% of the
8,630 million square inches annually processed in semicon fabs. However, that
small portion of processed area is compensated by a higher merchant price
leading to a $800M market size in 2007, reaching the billion dollar threshold
by 2009 - 2010.
GaAs has been the leading material in volume thanks to the wireless technology
demand, but SiC and sapphire are now benefiting from the booming LED business.
Bulk GaN is becoming the winning choice for blue laser diode makers.
InP is still in the race expecting a strong rebound of the optical fibre
demand.
Up to now, these materials have been protected from silicon competition,
allowing device performance not reachable by THE semiconductor material
(Frequency, power, thermal conductivity, robustness, junction temperature,
voltage breakdown...). However, compound materials exhibit market prices
dramatically higher than Si. This situation pushes the device developers to do
"as well as" the compounds but using silicon. Bill Of Material is, and will
remain, the main market driver for the adoption of these CS substrates and
related technologies.
All the considered materials are now available in a 4 inch format except bulk
GaN that has just been released in 3 inch in Japan. This diameter expansion
helps to lower the manufacturing cost of CS-based devices and to mass market
affordable products.
This report offers a unique panorama of the compound semi material business in
a single package. It highlights the main metrics and the key market trends
that will help material and equipment vendors to position their R&D efforts
and anticipate the changes and forecasted evolution of their business.
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