Strategy Analytics Says III-V Concentrated Photovoltaics Will Represent 10% of Global Market in 2012
CompoundSemi News StaffDecember 10, 2008...Market research firm, Strategy Analytics of Boston, Massachusetts USA estimates that the global terrestrial photovoltaic market will be worth $20.2 billion in 2008, and will grow to $35.2 billion by 2012. SA predicts that the total terrestrial solar cell market will have a CAAGR (compound annual average growth rate) of 23 percent during the period. SA contends that the rapid growth will be mainly due to increasing worldwide demand for renewable energy.
The company presented its latest analysis on the terrestrial photovoltaic market and the expanding use of compound semiconductors in the emerging sector at the Green Power for Korea 2009 Conference on December 9.
"Crystalline silicon-based solar technology still has a dominating market share of around 89% in 2008. However, moving forward, its share will be eroded as a result of competing technologies based on thin film and compound semiconductors," reports Asif Anwar, Director of the GaAs service at Strategy Analytics, "Thin film solar cells cost less and do not consume large amounts of crystalline silicon. Traditional crystalline silicon solar cell manufacturers, such as Q-Cells and Sharp, are involving in this new area."
Mr. Anwar concluded, "III-V based concentrated photovoltaic technology offers advantages of high cell conversion and lower material usage. Strategy Analytics believes that these advantages will translate to CAAGR of 133% through 2012, accounting for 10% of the total market share."
Company News Release Kopin Receives NASA Award for Development Indium Gallium Phosphide Solar Cells
CompoundSemi News StaffDecember 10, 2008...NASA has awarded Kopin of Taunton, Massachusetts USA, a $600,000 Phase II small business innovative research (SBIR) grant to produce nanostructured solar cells comprised of indium gallium phosphide (InGaP) materials. NASA previously awarded the company a Phase I SBIR for development of indium nitride-based solar cells in May. The goal of the new two-year project is reportedly to develop a solar cell design that is more efficient and less expensive than conventional multi-junction technology. Currently the most efficient solar cells use gallium arsenide technology.
"The material structures used in conventional solar cell designs significantly limit their power conversion efficiency and performance, requiring a trade-off between current and voltage," said Dr. Roger E. Welser, Kopin's Director of New Product Development. "For this SBIR program, we are employing a proprietary, patent-pending structure incorporating InGaP barriers, the same material used in our HBT (heterojunction bipolar transistor) wafers for billions of cell phones. In the Phase I program, Kopin produced several InGaP-based test structures that demonstrated a significant increase in the open-circuit voltage without any degradation in current."
Dr. John C.C. Fan, Kopin's President and Chief Executive Officer commented, "For unconcentrated sunlight, we believe our innovative approach in this SBIR program has the potential to achieve conversion efficiencies exceeding 40% with a single p-n junction device, approximately 20% higher than the current efficiencies of today's best multi-junction solar cells." Kopin News Release Molecular Imprint Deploys Next Phase of its Nanopatterning System
CompoundSemi News StaffDecember 10, 2008...Molecular Imprints, Inc., a leader in nanopatterning systems and solutions, announced the next phase of its ongoing S-FIL (Step and Flash Imprint Lithography) adoption and education campaign. The company's Step and Flash Imprint Lithography technology uses a mold (template) made of fused silica with a circuit pattern etched into it. Circuits are produced after the template is pressed onto a moldable material that is cured with UV light. The company says its S-FIL campaign paves the way for both the semiconductor and hard disk drive (HDD) industries to transition to its nanoimprint lithography system. Molecular Imprints will also expand its efforts in the light-emitting diode (LED) market.
The company boasts that it has received 10 orders in 2008 from the HDD industry for its S-FIL systems. So far, six of the orders have shipped. MII notes that Sematech accepted delivery of a new Imprio 300 system and completed installation and formal acceptance in a record 68 days.
“In 2008, Molecular Imprints’ S-FIL solution further solidified its position as the lithography technology of choice for patterned media production in the hard disk drive industry, while in the semiconductor industry S-FIL became a favored candidate for use in 32nm and below volume nonvolatile memory production,” said Mark Melliar-Smith, CEO of Molecular Imprints.
Melliar-Smith indicated that industry surveys from organizations such as Wright, Williams & Kelly found that the number of industry participants expecting to see imprint lithography in production between 2010 and 2012 has jumped over 50 percent. He revealed that more survey respondents reported that they expected to see imprint lithography in production between 2010 and 2012 than expected to see EUV lithography in production. Company News Release December 9, 2008...Reseachers at Ruhr-Unversity in Bochum, have found that hydrogen accounts for the difficulties associated with p-doping of zinc oxide. Previously it was postulated that oxygen impurities caused defects in the zinc oxide crystal lattice structure. However,
A team of chemical scientists at the Ruhr-University in Bochum, working under the auspices of Prof. Christof Wöll, is a step closer to unveiling the reason why doping with zinc oxide is so difficult. They specifically found that controlling the concentration of hydrogen atoms during the production of intrinsic zinc oxide is the the key to the routine use of ZnO as semiconductor. The scientists have documented their results in the journal Physical Review Letters. Ruhr-University in Bochum News Release, Content continues for LIGHTimes SecondPage members... SDK to Take Over SiC Epitaxial Wafers Business from ESICAT
CompoundSemi News StaffDecember 8, 2008...Showa Denko K. K. (SDK) has agreed to take over ESICAT Japan's silicon carbide (SIC) epitaxial wafer business by the end of this year. According to SDK, the main focus of its SIC wafers will be for power device applications. SDK notes that ESICAT produces SIC wafers by forming a thin layer of single-crystal SiC on the surface of SiC bulk wafers. Showa Denko insists that development of SiC devices has been delayed because of lack of stable supply of high-quality SiC epitaxial wafers in Japan. SDK hopes to eliminate the problem with the acquisition.
ESICAT reportedly uses proprietary technologies and research results owned by the National Institute for Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), the Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry (CRIEPI), and SDK. Japan's AIST supported ESICAT as one of its “technology transfer ventures.” SDK says that this allowed the use of its intellectual property and facilities. ESICAT has been selling SiC epitaxial wafers since November 2006, and has continued to increase uniformity and decrease defect density. SDK and ESICAT have agreed on the business transfer to expand the business and encouraging the growth of the SiC epitaxial wafers market for power device applications. At ESICAT, SDK will reportedly continue in its research strategy to develop SIC wafers and technology for power electronic applications. SDK News Release HRL Laboratories Demonstrates Graphene RF Field-Effect Transistors
CompoundSemi News StaffDecember 8, 2008...HRL Laboratories of Los Angeles, California USA, reported demonstrating what it says is the first graphene RF field effect transistors (FETs). Graphene is a single layer of carbon atoms densely packed in a honeycomb crystalline lattice configuration. Some have described graphene as chicken wire on an atomic scale. HRL says the development was part of the Carbon Electronics for RF Applications, or CERA program, a 51-month, three-phase program to develop a new generation of carbon-based radio-frequency (RF) integrated circuits for ultra-high-speed, ultra-low-power applications.
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and the the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center (SPAWAR) sponsored the effort that will attempt to exploit the unique qualities of graphene carbon to create components to enable unprecedented capabilities in high-bandwidth communications, imaging, and radar systems. HRL is reportedly collaborating with a group of universities, commercial companies, and the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) on the program. According to HRL, most previous demonstrations of graphene FETs have most used exfoliated graphene films, "HRL, working with the NRL, demonstrated graphene FETs using epitaxial film operating in the RF frequency range,” said Jeong-sun Moon, Senior Research Scientist with the Microelectronics Laboratory at HRL. “This is a key step toward wafer-scale high-speed graphene RF FETs that operate in the RF domain." HRL News Release Alfalight Offers 940 nm, 6 W Pump for CaTV and FTTx Amplifiers
CompoundSemi News StaffDecember 8, 2008...Alfalight of Madison, Wisconsin USA, has released a 940 nm, 6 W, uncooled multimode laser diode for cladding-pumped telecom fiber amplifiers. The company boasts that the new laser provides higher output at pricing comparable to previous 4 W devices. Alfalight says that the new laser actuall improved the dollar-per-watt performance by about 50%. The AM6-940B-20-608 device includes a thermistor for temperature tracking, supporting complete system diagnostic and performance monitoring. It is available now in a compact, hermetic 6-pin package and is offered with a 105 um, 0.22 NA fiber. Target telecom applications are erbium-ytterbium fiber amplifiers for CaTV and FTTx networks.
Ron Bechtold, vice president, sales and marketing said, "With this latest 940 nm device we continue to advance dollar-per-watt performance for high-reliability laser diode pump solutions for telecommunications applications." Company News Release NCKU Professor Elected as IEEE Fellow
LIGHTimes StaffDecember 4, 2008...Professor Ching-Ting Lee, Dean of College of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and Distinguished Professor of National Cheng Kung University (NCKU) in Tainan, Taiwan, has been elected as a 2009 Fellow of Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), The IEEE has been viewed as one of the world's leading professional associations for the advancement of technology. The IEEE says that Professor Lee's notable contribution and scientific achievement mainly relates to gallium nitride (GaN) based optoelectronic and microelectronic devices such as LEDs. NCKU News Release, Content continues for LIGHTimes SecondPage members... Our news features are reported
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