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Editorial: BinOptics Brings a New Facet to 1300nm Lasers
... There's a new company name on datacom industry radar screens, BinOptics Corporation of Ithaca, New York USA. Although founded back in November of 2000, the company is only now making its debut on the compound semi industry scene because of its very promising work on 1300nm solid state lasers....
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Blue 2004 Concluded and Deemed Huge SuccessMay 13, 2004...Our Blue 2004 event has concluded, and
the initial reports in from those who attended is that this truly unprecedented
event was a huge success. Our thanks again to our Diamond sponsors, Veeco
and Accent Opto, our Platinum sponsors
(Aixtron, Rohm Haas, Monocrystal, Rubicon and BOC Edwards) and all our Gold
sponsors and exhibitors for your faith in CompoundSemi Online's ability
to deliver the outstanding international audience. And our special thanks to
our keynote speaker, Chuck Swoboda of Cree
for his eye-opening address on Tuesday afternoon (see our Tuesday
editorial recapping his talk), and to our two featured speakers, Bob
Steele of Strategies Unlimited and
John Fan of Kopin. We thank each and every
one of you who attended for doing so and we're sure you've left the meet much
richer in knowledge, insight, and certainly... in connections. We want to again
point out the hard work our organizing committee did under the guidance of Alan
Thompson, our Senior Technology Editor, and the superb job our co-chairs, Bob
Walker and Yung-Sheng
Liu did in making this a first class event. Everyone seems to agree, Blue
2004 in Taiwan should become a very strong annual event in Asia. So...
stay tuned for dates for 2005 and beyond and for the rollout of even more
exciting CompoundSemi Events and projects highlighting the incredible
contributions advanced solid state LEDs and laser diodes are making to our world.
Now... back to our usual news coverage. May 13, 2004...Lumileds Lighting of San Jose, California USA is opening a new plant in Malaysia
targeted at meeting the growing demand for their popular Luxeon LED lines. Along
with the full compliment of Luxeon's the lines at the new plant will include
the first warm white LEDs available in volume. The new facility will replace
Lumileds' current factory in Penang this summer, and will triple the current
capacity capability. The plant will be located in a 200,000-square-foot building
that Lumileds purchased a short distance from its current rented space and Lumileds
says it will more than double its manufacturing workforce when all production
lines are fully deployed. The new facility will also allow Lumileds to expand
laboratory services such as calibration, reliability testing and failure analysis,
and will include a state-of-the-art Luxeon Experience Center to assist in hosting
customer visits. “Market demand for our Luxeon product line is accelerating
as manufacturers and lighting designers become increasingly aware of the benefits
of solid-state lighting in general and Luxeon in particular,” said Greg
Crema, Lumileds VP of Worldwide Manufacturing. “This move will allow us
to stay ahead of the demand curve and enable us to handle our growth projections
for the foreseeable future.” Manufacturing at the new plant is scheduled
to begin by the end of April, with simultaneous production at the old and new
facilities to avoid disruption in supply while the new factory is brought online.
New production lines are currently being installed and qualified to provide
redundant manufacturing during this transition. The move will be completed by
the beginning of July. Company
news release HB-LED Sales Boost Rohm's Profitability by 20%May 13, 2004...According to a May 13 Nikkei Net report,
Rohm Company of Japan turned in an impressive +20% profit over last year, "
thanks to solid demand for products such as light emitting diodes, liquid crystal
display modules, and semiconductor lasers for use in mobile phones and DVD recorders,"
despite a sag in sales from the company's other chip ventures due to price competition
and more players in those other fields. For Rohm's fiscal year which ended in
March 2004, the company booked a group net profit of Y63.72 billion, up 20.2%
from Y53.00 billion a year earlier. Once again, solid state advanced LEDs have
proved to be one of the few sectors that continues to be thriving, despite a
continued worldwide economic downturn. IQE's Strained Silicon Getting Even More RelaxedMay 13, 2004...IQE Silicon Compounds Limited of Cardiff, UK has released its latest proprietary,
which is a strained silicon product that touts an impressive 20% germanium (Ge)
strain. According to IQE, the material exhibits best in class characteristics
in terms of surface micro roughness (at less than 1Å on 1µm x/µm
field size), low threading and low pile up dislocation densities, germanium
and thickness uniformity, as independently assessed by several wafer manufacturers
and IDMs. In contrast to most other Strained Silicon products in the marketplace,
IQE’s Strained Silicon product family exhibits virtually 100% strain relaxation
at 10%, 17%,19% and now 20% Ge content wafers. Full lattice relaxation is critical
in ensuring maximum levels of strain in the surface silicon film, hence maximizing
mobility enhancement and additionally, ensuring thermal stability during subsequent
wafer processing. Company
news release Skyworks Scores Cellular System Contract from ArimaMay 13, 2004...Skyworks Solutions, Inc. of Woburn, Massachusetts USA has announced that their
integrated GSM/GPRS cellular system solution has been selected as Arima Communication's
platform for a number of new wireless handsets that will be launched later this
month in China. Commenting from Arima headquarters in Taiwan, Owen Chen, Executive
VP said, "Working with Skyworks, rather than multiple RF and baseband
vendors, has enabled us to deliver a desirable new line of handsets in record
time. We expect to see these new phones quickly gain share within the rapidly
growing and competitive Chinese market." Arima utilized Skyworks' compact,
power-efficient GSM/GPRS cellular system solution to provide all of the necessary
hardware and software functionality for handset operation with advanced data
and multimedia features. The new handsets will feature GPRS data support, color
LCD displays, a built-in digital camera, 40-level polyphonic ring tone melodies,
predictive text input, Enhanced and Multimedia Messaging Services (EMS/MMS)
software, a WAP browser and advanced gaming. Company
news release
Oki Electric, Symetrix and Aixtron Together Readying Low Power FeRAMs for ProductionMay 13, 2004...Aixtron of Aachen, German has announced the signing of a three-company agreement
between Aixtron, Symetrix Corporation of Colorado Springs, Colorado USA and
Oki Electric of Tokyo, Japan focused on the sale of an Aixtron Tricent MOCVD
tool which is being acquired by Oki for the commercial manufacturing of high-density
FeRAM non-volatile memories. The tool will be used by Oki for commercial production
of FeRAM devices, starting with a full line of devices from 64k to 16Mbit. Symetrix'
role is in regard to a joint development by Oki and Symetrix who have together
developed a totally new kind of FeRAM at Oki’s Hachioji, Japan R &
D center. This new technology exhibits significantly faster speeds and uses
substantially less power than existing FeRAMs in production. Simultaneously,
Aixtron and Symetrix have together developed the MOCVD process at Aixtron's
facilities in Aachen and at Symetrix' research facilities in Colorado Springs.
With the delivery of this production tool, the three companies have achieved
a major milestone in the ongoing commercialization of FeRAMs. According to Aixtron,
an MOCVD tool capable of meeting commercial production specifications has long
been sought by the FeRAM industry. “The delivery of this tool to Oki
marks the successful culmination of a lot of hard development work by Aixtron
and Symetrix,” says Tim McEntee, Aixtron's Executive VP and COO Semiconductor
Equipment. "The installation of our MOCVD tool in a production setting
for FeRAMs is a major milestone. It has become increasingly clear that FeRAMs
are a non-volatile memory solution that will enjoy widespread market penetration
for many years ahead and we expect our tool to play a key role.” Engineering
samples of the new FeRAM are scheduled to be released by the forth quarter of
2004. Company
news release Kopin Keeps Getting More ColorfulMay 13, 2004...Coming off a huge success speaking at our Blue
2004 event in Taiwan Wednesday, May 12th, John Fan and his always innovative
company, Kopin Corporation of Taunton, Massachusetts
USA have announced that Tekom has selected Kopin's CyberDisplay 180K for its
newest digital still camera. Tekom Technologies, Inc., is a digital still camera
maker in Taiwan and their AX408 is already selling in Europe and Asia. With
its operating headquarters based in Taiwan, Tekom has its R&D core in Taipei,
and bases manufacturing in Gao Bu and Chang An in China. With many years of
effort, its capital has accumulated to US $250 million; its turnover in 2003
increased to US $160 million. The AX480 contains an electronic viewfinder system
produced by Asia Optical Co. Inc. of Taiwan. For 20 years, Asia
Optical Co. Inc. has developed core technologies for the optical industry,
accumulating unsurpassed experience in multi-layer coating and glass molding.
Asia Optical is capable of producing a wide range of products on an OEM and
ODM basis, including optical components (lenses, lens head units, prisms, mirrors,
filters, etc.), laser rangefinders, microscopes and cameras. Asia Optical trades
on the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
The system includes Kopin's ultra small CyberDisplay 180K, a 0.24-inch diagonal
color filter active matrix liquid crystal display with an active resolution
of 800 x 225, or 180,000 sub-pixels, and an Asia Optical lens. The system allows
Tekom to offer advanced features in the AX480 while keeping it compact, lightweight
and power efficient for convenience and portability. The AX480 is a 4.23-megapixel
camera that features audio video capabilities, an 8X optical zoom, a 4X digital
zoom and SD/MMC memory card compatibility. The AX480's CyberDisplay-equipped
viewfinder also includes a focusable diopter lens. "This design win
represents continued success on two important fronts in our strategy to grow
our display product line," commented John Fan who is always terrific
at sharing his underlying strategy with others in the hopes that they too may
become as successful as Kopin in the entrepreneurial arena. "First,
Tekom is a leading Taiwanese manufacturer of digital still cameras, and becoming
established with leading Taiwan OEMs is an important step in our strategy. Second,
we continue to transition from our monochrome product to our recently introduced
color filter displays, which include our CyberDisplay 113K, 180K and 922K. We
hope to continue executing on our strategy and expanding our placement of the
CyberDisplay product line across additional camera brands as the market grows." Company
news release
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The
McDonald Report
Commentary & Perspective...
BinOptics Brings a New Facet to 1300nm LasersMay 13, 2004...There's a new company name on datacom industry radar screens, BinOptics Corporation
of Ithaca, New York USA. Although founded back in November of 2000, the company
is only now making its debut on the compound semi industry scene because of
its very promising work on 1300nm solid state lasers. BinOptics is approaching
this traditionally hard-to-conquer wavelength with a totally new approach that
could indeed create a new class of surface-emitting lasers. Whereas so many
companies in our field have attacked 1300nm lasers from the vertical viewpoint
(VCSELs), BinOptics' approach is taking the whole business lying down. They're
doing at it from the horizontal aspect and calling their proprietary etched
facet technology (EFT) platform-based device a "Horizontal Cavity Surface
Emitting Laser" or HCSEL
for short (hic-cell?) The approach may indeed cause more than a hiccup
in our industry. BinOptics, led by seasoned
pros who know the in's and out's, and the up's and down's of the biz, wisely
makes a diverse line of products that address a variety of datacom applications,
such as 10G Ethernet, parallel optical interconnects, PON and CWDM, as well
as advanced non-telecom applications, but it's their new HCSEL technology that
is of special interest to our community, given our strong background pioneering
850 and 1300nm VCSELs.
According to BinOptic's recent April launch of the initial HCSEL rollout, their
device combines the power and high reliability of an edge-emitting laser with
the low cost and ease of packaging of a VCSEL by integrating a horizontal laser
cavity with a 45 degree etched reflecting mirror to direct the output beam vertically.
The first product is a 1310nm Fabry-Perot (FP) laser designed for uncooled operation
at data rates of 2.5 Gbps with an optical output power of 20 mW and a slope
efficiency of up to 0.3 W/A and is available with, or without, an integrated
monitoring photodetector (MPD). (Company
news release) Note on the company's website,
that they've helpfully included a great deal of background on their approach,
and they've also done a great job of putting up a website that is quite complete
and gives site-seers a good, open look at the company.
While we'll certainly be talking directly to the company principals
as time goes on, (especially CEO/Chairman and co-founder Alex Behfar who
designed the original 980nm epi structure and physical layout at IBM a technology
that was first developed by Alex at IBM, which then was sold first to JDSU and
is now a part of Bookham) as those in our community well know, 1300nm are
hard to accomplish in VCSELs technology. So... we thought a candid, independent
assessment was the best way to start our coverage on this especially promising
startup. So... we sent our intrepid technical sleuth and Advanced Technology
Editor, Paul Martin (who has literally and figuratively 'characterized' many
a VCSEL), to dig into the BinOptics site and sort out what they're probably
doing and how they're doing it, and comment on their prospects.
According to Paul... "It looks like they are using the traditional mix
of materials (probably InGaAs, AlGaAsP) on InP in order to reach the 1.3-1.5um
emission region. In that material system, VCSEL development has not been very
successful because the materials don't offer enough of an index contrast to
construct the vertical mirror structures necessary for VCSEL operation. Traditionally,
all of the InP based lasers have been edge emitters. Mirrors are formed by cleaving
the wafer along crystallographic planes, and the semiconductor - air interface
offers enough of a contrast in refractive index to serve as a mirror. Because
of this, you don't have a laser until the wafer is cleaved, and only then can
you test the die. Testing involves placing and aligning each laser die one at
a time on the test apparatus. Compare this with on-wafer testing of VCSELs,
where a single optical alignment will suffice to test an entire wafer (literally
thousands or tens of thousands of lasers) and you can understand why VCSELs
are so much cheaper to manufacture than edge emitters. The testing process adds
a significant cost to the manufacturing of edge emitters.
"BinOptics has has developed a etching process which etches preferentially
along a particular crystallographic axis. The lasers still lie horizontally
in the wafer, but the light can be reflected out of the surface of the wafer
by the etched facet. Not only does this allow for automated on-wafer testing,
but BinOptics claims the process is more reproducible than mechanical cleaving.
The process also adds additional possibilities not available to edge emitters,
such as fabrication of laser arrays. If these claims are valid and transferable
to production volume, the technique should have a significant impact on cost."
And there you have it, friends. Maybe you better but HCSELs, and BinOptics,
on your radar screen.
If you have questions about the
solid state lighting and compound semiconductor industries or have news
or views to share, I'm Jo Ann McDonald, Editor of LIGHTimes and CompoundSemi News.
Feel free to contact me directly, anytime. 
My direct tel at the ranch is
+1-325-463-5345
From time to time Jo Ann may comment on companies in which she holds a
modest investment - be sure to read
her disclosure at some point in time... |
