AIXTRON AG today announced an order for one Close Coupled Showerhead (CCS) 6x2 inch MOCVD system from HRL Laboratories LLC, based in Malibu, USA. The order was received in the third quarter 2009 and the system will be delivered in the first quarter 2010.
The new system will be used to support HRL's work on advanced GaN technologies. This includes growth of GaN HEMTs for millimeter-wave power applications and high voltage gallium nitride (GaN) transistors for high efficiency power switching applications.
A research staff member working on GaN at HRL comments: “We consider the high standard of performance and engineering of AIXTRON’s CCS MOCVD tools a perfect match for our needs. Among the practical aspects which suit our applications are not only the low carrier gas consumption and overall efficient materials utilization but also the ease of maintenance. The CCS system has a proven track record thanks to the large number of systems installed worldwide and we will appreciate the good scale-up potential that enables an easy recipe transfer to a large system.
The AIXTRON system will provide a major augmentation to our GaN material growth capabilities. For example, it will enable fabrication of more sophisticated GaN HEMT structures as well as addressing our need for higher process throughput.”
HRL has become the leader in millimeter-wave GaN-based MMICs; amongst its reported success is 500 mW of output power at 95 GHz for a GaN MMIC as presented at the 2008 CSIC conference.
HRL Laboratories is a corporate research-and-development laboratory specializing in research into sensors and materials, information and systems sciences, applied electromagnetics, and microelectronics. HRL provides custom research and development and performs additional R&D contract services for its LLC member companies, the U.S. government, and other commercial companies.