Micromax Global Expansion

Mobile handset maker Micromax will soon produce mobile accessories, including chargers and batteries.

Micromax announced it is planning to invest ₹2,000 crore over the next five years to expand its production services as part of the company's aggressive play to topple India's leading smartphone company, Samsung.

Micromax co-founder Rajesh Agarwal told local reporters: "Company will expand its operations to two to three countries this year."

The 7-year-old mobile phone manufacturer already has presence in South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries as well as in Russia, but Tech Story reported that the company is also looking at Africa and Iran markets as its next target.

Micromax accounts for about 14 per cent of the total domestic market share, selling around 2.5 million units every month, according to the company's data. "We expect our share to go up to 20 per cent in 2016-2017," Agarwal said, according to the news outlet.

The mobile handset company inaugurated its ₹100 crore Hyderabad unit, which Micromax said is equipped to manufacture not only 1 million mobile units per month, but also LED TVs, LED lights and other electrical gadgets.

Agarwal was quoted by The Hindu saying Micromax will shift its "existing operations from Beijing, China" to its new Hyderabad facility.

Agarwal told reporters the company is targeting to increase its sales from ₹12,000 crore last year to ₹15,000 crore this fiscal year.

Last year, industry watchers said Micromax is already "within striking distance" of Sony—one of the world's largest consumer electronics brand—in India, compared to two years ago, when "Micromax was not even half of Sony in turnover."

A previous report said Micromax's sales grew by 47 per cent in 2014-2015, whereas Sony's Indian unit was only able to increase its business by 10 per cent.

Analysts believe the Indian smartphone manufacturer has the potential to even edge out Sony, which is in the midst of exiting the ₹10,000 smartphone segment that will impact its business growth.

A company executive said: "Despite smartphone being a bigger market in India as compared to television, its growth rate is high too. Micromax will continue to grow at high double digit pace which might be a challenge for Sony this year."

The recently opened unit is Micromax's second facility in Hyederabad, with Rudrapur in Uttakhand hosting the first. For its new unit, the company is planning to increase its headcount to 1,000.

Construction is already underway for Micromax's next plant in Rajasthan, which entails a ₹500 crore investment.

The Georgia Tech Institute for Electronics and Nanotechnology

The Institute for Electronics and Nanotechnology (IEN) is one of the founding NSF interdisciplinary academic research centers dedicated to nanotechnology discovery and development. The IEN evolved from its original focus as a NSF Microelectronics Research Center (founded in 1981) at Georgia Tech’s Atlanta campus. In 2009, the name was changed to the Nanotechnology Research Center (NRC) to reflect its physical expansion into the Marcus Nanotechnology Building (MNB) and research expansion into the growing realm of nanotechnologies applications.

More recently, as part of Georgia Tech’s (GT) push to consolidate capital-intensive research, the NRC was combined with similarly-themed research centers (including NSF-funded graphene research, the Packaging Research Center, and the Georgia Electronic Design Center) to form an interdisciplinary research hub on campus, the IEN.

Over the years, Georgia Tech has used these centers and their associated facilities to become the one of the world leaders in nanoscale science and engineering, with research programs spanning biomedicine, materials, electronics, photonics/optics, and energy. The IEN is comprised of multiple academic electronics and nanotechnology research centers, each offering a unique intellectual focus ranging from basic discovery and innovation to systems integration. The IEN has approximately 115 GT faculty users and more than 500 GT student users as well as nearly 200 users from other academic institutions and industries. Through the NSF’s National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network (NNIN), IEN facilities are accessible to all U.S. academic users at the same price afforded by campus-based faculty.

The IEN runs one of the largest university cleanroom complexes in North America. The IEN’s core mission is to provide exceptionally high value, fee-based open user access to research cleanrooms and laboratories at its core facilities.

The IEN cleanroom has two on-campus locations: the Pettit Microelectronics Building (PMB), opened in 1988; and the Marcus Nanotechnology Building (MNB), opened in 2009. Together, these two facilities provide fully integrated electronics/materials cleanrooms; separate biological cleanroom space; a state-of-the-art characterization and microscopy suite housed in a vibrationally and acoustically shielded space; and supporting labs, equipment, and technical expertise. The expanded space enables Georgia Tech faculty, students, and non-GT users from academia, state and federal labs, and industry to carry out pioneering nanoscale research. Both the Pettit and Marcus facilities include significant laboratory space that house faculty research labs immediately proximate to the cleanroom and microscopy facilities.

Pettit houses an 8,500 sq. ft. cleanroom (Class 10-100), while the Marcus building includes 10,000 sq. ft. of inorganic fabrication cleanroom space (Class 100) as well as 5,000 sq. ft. of biological cleanroom space (Class 1000), including Biosafety Level 1 and 2 labs. The inorganic and organic cleanrooms are adjacent so that researchers can transfer their samples without exposing them to a non-cleanroom environment. This novel design enables a seamless fusion of traditional, top-down microfabrication approaches (e.g. optical and electronbeam lithography) and various types of bottom-up self assembly approaches (typical biologically-derived) to nanotechnology research at Georgia Tech. The Marcus building also houses a newly-completed 3,300 sq. ft. imaging and characterization suite that offers comprehensive microscopy and imaging services, as well as X-ray and ion-based characterization, for a wide variety of materials and devices.

The IEN cleanrooms and labs accommodate over two hundred individual pieces of equipment, which enable users to run an extensive variety of materials growth and fabrication processes in a single facility. These processes include traditional microfabrication processes such as photolithography and mask generation; thin film deposition; plasma etching and wet chemistry; and packaging. Electron beam lithography and nano-imprinting services offer the ability to quickly prototype nanoscale devices on different substrates. Traditional chemical vapor deposition (CVD) materials growth, including atomic layer deposition as well as non-traditional process such as soft lithography, are also available. IEN cleanroom users come from numerous different academic departments within Georgia Tech’s Colleges of Engineering and Science, as well as the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI).

The mission of the IEN is to maintain these current resources while also growing our capabilities through the acquisition of new high-tech tools; train users on safe and proper operation of the equipment; and provide the highest caliber technical expertise to enable users to achieve their desired results. These facilities, along with a skilled and experienced staff, has enabled Georgia Tech to be the hub of nanotechnology research in the southeast and competitive with the best U.S. national university facilities.

Fundamentally, having a fully controlled environment is crucial in nanotechnology research and development. Particle levels, temperature, humidity, pressure, light, ultrapure water, and process gases all play important roles in achieving the conditions needed to conduct successful

research.

One of the challenges of user-centered facilities is that most new users do not have experience working in a cleanroom and lack familiarity with the unique operational conditions that come with this environment. To assist with acclimation, the IEN provides mandatory orientation programs to educate new users about cleanroom operation, safety, regulations, training, and protocols. Before being granted unsupervised access to any specific piece of equipment, users are required to attend training and pass a hands-on check-off test by facility staff. The IEN also offers seminars, workshops, forums, and staff office hours to assist users with process or engineering.

Particle contamination is the biggest concern for maintaining a controlled cleanroom environment. Cleanroom suits must be worn at all times to avoid cleanroom users’ skin and hair generating particulate contamination. Every item that users bring into the cleanroom must be cleanroom compatible (especially with regard to particle contamination) and fully decontaminated before entering to maintain the required cleanroom conditions. Non-cleanroom designed paper, notebooks, and cardboard containers are not allowed inside, and any chemical bottles, plastic boxes, or other instruments need to be wiped completely prior to taking inside the cleanroom. Before a new piece of equipment can be installed in the facility, it must be decontaminated multiple times in a dedicated cleaning area. Any particle producing process must be conducted in a well-ventilated area. The cleanroom staff checks particle levels on a regular basis to monitor any changes in airborne contamination.

In the Pettit cleanroom, process equipment is located in bays separated by chases which contain supporting items such as pumps, chilled water, gas cabinets, exhaust scrubbers, power supplies, and other support equipment. These supporting systems do not need to be in the highly controlled environment, so isolating them in the chases reduces the amount of expensive cleanroom space one has to construct. In addition, allowable particle levels are controlled separately from bay to bay. For example, the photolithography bay has a Class 10 environment while the metallization bay is Class 1,000. In contrast, the Marcus inorganic cleanroom is a flow-through, ballroom design where all equipment is located within the same 10,000 sq. ft. open area. The challenge of maintaining low particle counts throughout the facility is addressed by maintaining a higher flow rate on the clean air return to those cleanroom sections that require it. With this approach, we have been successful in keeping these low particle count sections of the cleanroom at Class 100 level.

Many of the fabrication processes are sensitive not only to particle levels, but also to other environmental parameters such as temperature, humidity, and vibration. The IEN cleanroom has a network of sensors monitoring the variation in these parameters, and the data can be directly read in real time via a web interface, along with historical data covering longer periods of times to identify trends. Many of the warnings and alarms from the sensor network are sent immediately to cleanroom staff on their mobile devices so they can rapidly identify problems and fix them.

Ultimately, maintaining the appropriate controlled environment relies upon collaboration between staff and users. Users report to staff any problems or concerns about the cleanroom environment, and they also help staff to identify potential problems, warn other users of improper behavior, and do some routine housekeeping work. Everyone who uses and benefits from the cleanroom has the responsibility of keeping the facility safe.

The product of a well-controlled environment is high quality research. Supported by the IEN cleanroom, Georgia Tech faculty, students, and research staff, as well as our research affiliates from other universities and companies, have published journal articles, presented at conferences, and filed patents based on discoveries realized within the IEN facilities. In addition, this research has led to a number of successful startup companies founded by GT faculty and students.

The Sydney Nanoscience Hub

The Sydney Nanoscience Hub, headquarters of the Australian Institute for Nanoscale Science and Technology (AINST), will officially launch on April 20.

The new $150 million facility is among the most sophisticated laboratories for advanced measurement and experimental device demonstration globally built for this purpose and joins just a handful of facilities at some of the most prominent universities around the world.

Available for public use is a one-stop-shop prototyping facility and cleanroom (including core facilities in nanofabrication, nanometrology, and nanoscale imaging). These facilities will be complemented by an advanced electron microscope in one of the most electromagnetically and mechanically stable laboratory environments in the world.

The facility, measuring approximately 124,816 sq. ft. (11,600 square meters) in size, is a world-first, offering combinations of laboratories with unprecedented technical performance for nanoscale research, meshed with teaching facilities that bring students into the heart of the action.

The research laboratories span a variety of specifications, but these “precision metrology” laboratories have combinations of technical performance that are unmatched in comparable facilities globally. These include extremely tight electromagnetic interference specifications (<10nT pp fluctuations); vibration (better than VCG criterion — the tightest spec developed — a particular metric for floor vibration over a frequency band); air temperature stability (temp stable to within +/- 0.1 C); air pressure (fluctuations <~5-7 Pa); and humidity (stable +/-5 percent).

The Institute is also about to commence the procurement process for a new aberration corrected transmission electron microscope. This microscope will allow researchers to “see” and measure atoms and the forces that bind them together.

McIlvaine Company

Northfield, IL 60093-2743

Tel: 847-784-0012; Fax: 847-784-0061

E-mail: editor@mcilvainecompany.com

Web site: www.mcilvainecompany.com