Bluglass Delivers Process Transfer For Seren Photonics

Successful transfer of GaN template process to BluGlass MOCVD platform 

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Australian technology innovator BluGlass has successfully facilitated for its customer, Seren Photonics (a UK developer of semi-polar GaN products) the transfer of its GaN template process to the BluGlass MOCVD platform.

BluGlass has been working with Seren since November 2016 with the objective of transferring the process from laboratory scale equipment onto a production relevant MOCVD platform.

Semi-polar GaN is an alternative GaN template for the manufacture of LEDs, that overcomes many of the problems associated with the green gap (inability to make efficient green LEDs using MOCVD) and has the potential to also address LED efficiency droop, where the LEDs become gradually less efficient at high power.

Previously, semi-polar GaN was only available in small pieces, cut from a bulk GaN crystal. The Seren technology creates high quality semipolar GaN on industry standard 2inch, 4inch and 6inch sapphire wafers.

BluGlass and Seren are working together to demonstrate commercially viable semi-polar devices including reviewing the potential to use BluGlass’ proprietary RPCVD technology to further improve the performance of green LEDs. BluGlass will continue to work with its customer Seren, with future development now focusing on refining the manufacturing process with an emphasis on improving uniformity and yield, whilst parallel development will continue to focus on further reduction in defect density.

BluGlass MD, Giles Bourne said: “It’s pleasing to see another BluGlass custom epitaxy customer achieve a successful technology demonstration. We look forward to continuing to assist Seren deliver the successful completion of the next stage of development”.

He added “BluGlass selects its customers based on the potential benefits to the nitrides industry, as we seek to  work with the next generation of technology developers.”

Seren chief development officer, Bedwyr Humphreys, said: “It’s great to see a process that was developed in a university lab successfully scale up on to a production relevant platform. The focus now is on moving the product development to the next stage where we can start to look at refining the process. We had always designed the process with production in mind so it’s really exciting to see this basic process demonstrated on a 19 x 2inch MOCVD reactor, which now means we can sample in much larger quantities than before.”

The lack of an efficient green LED has limited the market size for many applications requiring red-green-blue (RGB) LEDs, such as colour controlled lamps in general lighting. As well as reducing barriers for existing applications, an increasingly efficient green LED technology is also an enabler for new technologies such as the rapidly emerging RGB microLED space, expected to be used in next generation display technology due of its low power consumption and vivid colour.