【Member News】NCT Accelerates Mass Production of Gallium Oxide System, from Substrate Manufacturing to Epitaxial

NCT embarked the manufacture and development of new material Ga₂O₃ substrate.

NCT Headquarters

  Low cost is crucial for the wide application of gallium oxide with excellent physical properties in power devices. In addition to the advantages of growth speed and easy processing, it is also accelerating the independent research and development of the device and improving the mass production system.

  In the general factory in Sayama, Saitama, crystal crystallization, substrate manufacturing and epitaxial growth are carried out, and the manufacturing of devices is entrusted to the OEM factory (OEM enterprise).

  There are about 20 employees in the headquarters, responsible for crystallization, substrate and epitaxial engineering. At the same time, personnel on the same research and development are strengthening the manufacturing and development system.

Clean room with epitaxial growth in progress. It is expected to add epitaxial film forming equipment

  NCT's β Gallium oxide crystal can be grown using the same melting growth method as silicon. Its advantage lies in its  crystal  growing speed. SiC (silicon carbide) and GaN (gallium nitride) use the vapor phase growth method, and the growth rate can only reach several hundred microns in one hour. In the case of melt growth method, β Gallium oxide crystal can also grow tens of millimeters. High-speed is conducive to low-cost production.

  Compared with Sic, which needs special machines to deal with the particular hardness, gallium oxide is more flexible and easy to process. Therefore, equipment for processing silicon wafers can also be widely used to process gallium oxide substrates requiring slicing and grinding, which is very important in reducing costs.

  NCT undergoes epitaxial growth internally to achieve high purity film formation. HVPE method (hydride vapor phase epitaxy) is used to promote the practicability of epitaxial film forming device. The film-forming method using metal chlorides is expected to reduce the cost of raw materials.

  Now we are developing equipment that can form several films at a time, and jointly develop a 6-inch mass production device with TAIYO NIPPON SANSO. It is expected to introduce 4-inch devices in 2023 and 6-inch devices in 2025.