Cree and STMicroelectronics boost existing silicon carbide wafer supply agreement

Cree and STMicroelectronics announced expansion and extension of an existing multi-year, long-term silicon carbide wafer supply agreement to more than US$500 million. The extended agreement is a doubling in value of the original agreement for the supply of Cree’s advanced 150mm silicon carbide bare and epitaxial wafers to STMicroelectronics over the next several years, the companies announced Tuesday. 

The increased wafer supply enables the semiconductor leaders to address the rapidly growing demand for silicon carbide power devices globally, particularly in automotive and industrial applications.

The adoption of silicon carbide-based power solutions is rapidly growing across the automotive market as the industry seeks to accelerate its move from internal combustion engines to electric vehicles, enabling greater system efficiencies that result in electric cars with longer range and faster charging, while reducing cost, lowering weight and conserving space. In the industrial market, silicon carbide modules enable smaller, lighter and more cost-effective inverters, converting energy more efficiently to unlock new clean energy applications.

“Expanding our long-term wafer supply agreement with Cree will increase the flexibility of our global silicon carbide substrate supply,” said Jean-Marc Chery, president and CEO of STMicroelectronics. “It will further contribute to securing the required volume of substrate we need to manufacture our silicon carbide-based products as we ramp up production over the next years for the increasing number of programs won at automotive and industrial customers.”

“Silicon carbide delivers performance enhancements that are critical to electric vehicles and a host of next-generation industrial solutions for solar, energy storage and UPS systems,” said Gregg Lowe, CEO of Cree. “Cree remains committed to leading the semiconductor industry’s transition from silicon to silicon carbide, and the extension of the agreement with ST ensures we are able to meet the accelerating, global demand for this solution across a diverse range of applications while accelerating the market.”

Keysight, FormFactor and CompoundTek come together to accelerate integrated photonics technologies

Keysight Technologies, a technology company that helps enterprises, service providers and governments accelerate innovation to connect and secure the world, FormFactor, a provider of essential test and measurement technologies along the full IC life cycle, and CompoundTek, a global foundry services leader in emerging silicon photonic solutions (SiPh), have joined forces to accelerate integrated photonics innovations.

Keysight, FormFactor and CompoundTek, have jointly developed an advanced photonics on-wafer testing solution that delivers industry-first capabilities including automated alignment, simultaneous optical-optical and optical-electrical device tests.

The joint solution, to be offered by CompoundTek, includes the FormFactor CM300xi-SiPh, with automated wafer level photonics positioning combined with Keysight’s industry standard IL/PDL engines and N7700A Photonics Application Suite (PAS), to support wavelength repeatability of ±1.5 pm at two-way sweeps up to 200 nm/s within 1240nm to 1650nm to ensure accuracy and repeatability from O-band to L-band.

Keysight’s N4373E 67 GHz Lightwave Component Analyzer which delivers unprecedented bandwidth for both optical receiver testing and optical transmitter testing with guaranteed specifications for electro-optical S-parameter measurements for device traceability.

Keysight’s PathWave software platform which provides a consistent user experience, common data formats and control interfaces. FormFactor’s SiPh software that enables automated calibrations and alignments and simplifies integration with Keysight’s PathWave software platform, as well as optical instrumentation, to ensure ease of use.