IQE Silicon Compounds short-listed for Materials Award

08 June 2005

IQE Silicon Compounds, a wholly owned subsidiary of IQE plc (IQE), has been short-listed for a semiconductor industry award. The winner of the award, which is sponsored and organised by European Semiconductor Magazine, will be announced at the industry's premier tradeshow event, Semiconductor West, to be held in San Francisco from 12th to 14th July.

IQE's nomination relates to the company's development of its UltraSmooth strained silicon product. Other companies shortlisted for the Materials, Enabling Award are DuPont Dow Elastomers, Honeywell International Inc., and SOITEC.

The winning entry will be decided based upon votes received at the European Semiconductor's official website for the award (click here to visit European Semiconductor Site).
 

OVERVIEW OF IQE SILICON COMPOUNDS NOMINATION

IQE Silicon Compounds Ltd., employs around 30 people at its manufacturing site in Cardiff, Wales. The company has developed and filed patents for a highly cost effective, single-stage epitaxial process to produce an "UltraSmooth" strained silicon surface finish with very low dislocation levels.

Extensive testing and measurement has demonstrated that IQE's proprietary strained silicon exhibited improvements in mobility of up to 100% for nMOS and up to 15% for pMOS, which was a much greater mobility enhancement for pMOS than had previously been achieved for this level of strain, and significantly better than other strained material measured at the same time.
The mobility enhancement of nMOS and pMOS performance is of particular significance, since it facilitates more rapid commercialisation of the strained silicon technology and the scope of IQE's patent applications covers all key processes for carrier enhancement by the reduction of surface roughness on any form of strained silicon including strained silicon on insulator (sSOI).

Furthermore, global strain processes such as those developed by IQE, are considered the only viable method for producing sSOI, a technology that has been highlighted on the industry's own roadmap (ITRS) as being essential for next generation devices. Consequently, high quality bulk strained silicon layers such as IQE's Ultrasmooth product are absolutely key to producing quality sSOI devices. The surface characteristics of IQE's Ultrasmooth product facilitates the layer transfer process and results in a fully-bonded strained sSOI product. IQE's proprietary UltraSmooth Strained Silicon is therefore the ideal candidate for this new development in materials technology.
 

IQE Silicon Compounds is also exhibiting at the Semicon West trade show - Booth 3103, Gateway Hall, Moscone Center. 12-14 July 2005.

Contacts:


IQE plc:
Ali Hoy +44 (0)2920 837500
Chris Meadows +44 (0)2920 839400