【Member News】New breakthrough! The 6-inch casting method for Gallium Oxide single crystal has been successfully developed

      In February 2024, Hangzhou GAREN SEMI Co., LTD., in collaboration with the Advanced Semiconductor Research Institute of Hangzhou International Science and Technology Innovation Center of Zhejiang University and the National Key Laboratory of Silicon and Advanced Semiconductor Materials, successfully prepared high-quality 6-inch unintentionally doped and conductive Gallium Oxide (β-Ga₂O₃) single crystal by self-created casting method. The 6-inch Gallium Oxide substrate was processed and obtained, becoming the first industrialized company to master the 6-inch Gallium Oxide single crystal substrate preparation technology in China.

Figure 1 6-inch unintentionally doped (top) and conductive (bottom) Gallium Oxide single crystal

Figure 2. 6-inch conductive Gallium Oxide substrate

      Gallium Oxide (β-Ga₂O₃) has become one of the most concerned ultra-wide band gap semiconductor materials due to its excellent performance and low-cost manufacturing. It is mainly used for the preparation of power devices, radio frequency devices and detector parts, and has broad application prospects in rail transit, smart grid, new energy vehicles, photovoltaic power generation, 5G mobile communication, national defense and other fields.

      The casting method is a new melt method for the growth of Gallium Oxide single crystal, which is independently developed by Academician Yang Deren's team. In May 2022, the team successfully grew a 2-inch Gallium Oxide single crystal by casting method. Subsequently, Hangzhou GAREN SEMI continued to iterate and innovate, and successfully grew a 4-inch Gallium Oxide single crystal in May 2023. In February 2024, the growth of 6-inch Gallium Oxide single crystal was broken through, and small batch production was achieved.

      Casting method has the following significant advantages:First, casting method has low cost, because the amount of precious metal Ir and loss are greatly reduced compared with other methods, the cost is significantly reduced.Second, the casting method is simple and controllable, with short process flow, high efficiency and easy size enlargement.Third, the casting method has complete independent intellectual property rights, and Chinese and American patents have been authorized, which lays a solid foundation for breaking through foreign technology monopoly and realizing domestic substitution.In the future, the team will continue to carry out independent innovation work and gradually break through lower cost and higher quality Gallium Oxide substrates to promote the high-quality development of the Gallium Oxide industry.

      This project has been supported by Zhejiang Province 2023 "Lingyan" Research and development Program and Hangzhou Xiaoshan District "5213" Excellence program support.