SEMICONDUCTOR INDUSTRY
UPDATE
December 2020
McIlvaine Company
Beneq Completes New Clean Room Facility
Minnesota Chipmaker Skywater Finishes Addition Construction
CSconnected Project Receives £25.44M Funding
Beneq Completes New Clean Room Facility
The new ISO Class 7 cleanroom will be dedicated to manufacturing ALD equipment
for semiconductor and other markets with similar cleanroom requirements
Beneq, a supplier of atomic layer deposition (ALD) equipment for semiconductor
and other industrial markets, has completed construction of a brand-new
cleanroom and application laboratory at its corporate headquarters in Espoo,
Finland.
Built with the latest cleanroom design and construction technology, the new
facility adds approximately 3,766 sq. ft. (350 square meters) of ISO 7 cleanroom
floor space at Beneq's headquarters. It will be used for product and process
development, equipment assembly, prototyping, and testing services.
"Since the launch of the Beneq Transform™
last year we have seen great demand for our ALD equipment products from
semiconductor customers,” stated Dr. Tommi Vainio, Vice President of ALD at
Beneq. “Together with the semiconductor application laboratory the new cleanroom
will be the engine for Beneq's rapid growth in More-than-Moore markets,
including power semiconductors, RF, image sensors, MEMS, compound
semiconductors, LED & Micro-LED, OLED, and more.”
The new cleanroom is part of Beneq's ISO 9001 certified processes. It also
houses a modern 1,614 sq. ft. (150 square-meter) semiconductor application
laboratory, solely designed for developing and prototyping ALD solutions for
More-than-Moore applications. Beneq has also expanded its existing cleanroom
facility to ensure the highest availability and new safety features.
The new cleanroom officially entered into production in December 2020. Prior to
this facility the company had 20,444 sq. ft. (1900 square meters) of existing
cleanroom capacity, which it will continue to operate for other customer
markets.
Minnesota Chipmaker Skywater Finishes Addition Construction
SkyWater's announcement tells customers that engineering, design work can begin
sooner.
SkyWater began to roll in manufacturing equipment to its new cleanroom at its
Bloomington plant. The equipment will be installed after ventilation is turned
on to make the football field-sized room cleaner than an operating room.
SkyWater Technology Inc., the biggest maker of computer chips in Minnesota, said
the addition of a third cleanroom to its factory in Bloomington was ahead of
schedule, with manufacturing equipment already being moved in.
The company announced the addition in October and said it was being paid for in
part by the Pentagon, which for decades has been one of the largest end
customers of chips made at the facility.
SkyWater is a contract manufacturer, building chips that are designed by other
companies. Its new cleanroom, which is about the size of a football field and is
four stories tall with two stories underground, will allow SkyWater to make
chips that meet a military specification called "rad-hard," or hardened against
the effects of radiation.
Such chips can be used for computers and other devices that operate in more
difficult environments, including military settings, medical devices and in
space.
Tom Sonderman, chief executive of SkyWater, said in an interview that the
earlier-than-expected completion of the construction of the clean room gives the
company more breathing room for the installation, testing and ramping up of
manufacturing equipment.
"By getting the facility done quicker, we're giving ourselves a bigger window to
qualify the back-end portion of the process," he said.
SkyWater aims to begin producing chips from the new cleanroom by the end of
2021. By announcing that construction has ended, the company signals to
customers that engineering and design work they put in for chips that will be
built at SkyWater can begin sooner than anticipated.
Sheaumann Laser Opens New Semiconductor Laser Facility
The new facility triples the size of Sheumann's original location and adds
15,000 sq. ft. of cleanroom space for manufacturing and R&D activities
Sheaumann Laser has opened a new 57,800 sq. ft. facility in Billerica, Mass. This
move is a signal of growth for the manufacturer of semiconductor lasers.
The expansion and relocation have been supported by a $2.34 million grant from
the Massachusetts Manufacturing Innovation Initiative (M2I2) and matching funds
from the company, Sheaumann will increase both its workforce and production
capabilities to meet demand for laser-based technologies in multiple industries.
Sheaumann specifically plans to broaden its wafer growth capabilities, expanding
its existing near-infrared gallium arsenide (GaAs) wavelength range offerings
(780-1080 nm) to include indium phosphide (InP) wavelengths (1120-1875 nm).
"The M2I2 capital grant helps immensely in supporting Sheaumann's passion for
innovative technology by helping broaden our capabilities in laser growth to
include InP wavelengths," Sheaumann President Gary Sousa said. "Sheaumann will
rely on its new technologies and personnel to nearly double its current product
line and continue competing with overseas foundries with production based
exclusively in the state of Mass. The company anticipates growing its workforce
by 40%."
The new facility triples the size of Sheumann's original location and adds
15,000 sq. ft. of cleanroom space for manufacturing and R&D activities. The
company also plans to construct an incubator space for photonics-based startups
with complementary process needs.
CSconnected Project Receives £25.44M Funding
UK government funding provided through UK Research and Innovation’s flagship
Strength in Places Fund
The UK Government has announced the first wave of funding through UK Research
and Innovation's flagship Strength in Places Fund in which a major £43.74M
project with South Wales' compound semiconductor cluster has been approved and
will be supported by £25.44M funding from Strength in Places.
The project CSconnected is based around integrating research excellence with the
unique regional supply chains in advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing.
Compound semiconductors are critical components across a wide range of new
technologies and the primary aim of the CSconnected project is to develop a
competitive advantage in key enabling technologies which will allow the UK to
increase trade globally in critical sectors such as communications, 5G,
autonomous and electric vehicles, medical devices - all opportunities the UK
must act on to secure our long-term future prosperity.
The project partners include: Cardiff University (lead partner); Cardiff Capital
Region City Deal; Compound Semiconductor Applications Catapult; Compound
Semiconductor Centre (CSC); IQE; MicroLink Devices UK; Newport Wafer Fab (NWF);
Rockley Photonics; Swansea University; SPTS Technologies; and Welsh Government.
Activities Will be coordinated by CSconnected Limited.
Wyn Meredith, CSC and lead author of the SIPF application commented: “Today's
announcement is excellent news for Wales and the UK, providing a unique
opportunity to harness the excellent research and innovation capabilities in a
way that translates into world-class UK based manufacturing for new and emerging
global technology markets“.
UK Research and Innovation works in partnership with universities, research
organizations, businesses, charities, and government to create the best possible
environment for research and innovation to flourish. We aim to maximize the
contribution of each of our component parts, working individually and
collectively. We work with our many partners to benefit everyone through
knowledge, talent and ideas.
Operating across the whole of the UK with a combined budget of more than £7
billion, UK Research and Innovation brings together the seven research councils,
Innovate UK and Research England. www.ukri.orgLed by UK Research and Innovation,
Strength in Places Fund (SIPF) is a competitive funding scheme that takes a
place-based approach to research and innovation funding, to support significant
local economic growth.
McIlvaine Company
Northfield, IL 60093-2743
Tel: 847-784-0012; Fax:
847-784-0061
E-mail:
editor@mcilvainecompany.com
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www.mcilvainecompany.com