AIXTRON Celebrates 20 Years of Enabling Technology for the Compound Semiconductor Industry
Source/Type: White Papers/Technical Papers

January 27, 2004... In 2003 AIXTRON celebrated its 20th anniversary and can claim to have both seen and been at the forefront of the development of arguably the most exciting new technology market to have emerged in the last 30 years.

AIXTRON has always remained constant to the very original unique vision and mission the founders had from the very first days, that to harness the full potential of this extraordinary science, the community needed one single integrated production technology platform capable of integrating all of the diverse emerging III-V compound combinations onto one generic wafer platform.

This unique approach by AIXTRON and the technological challenges that accompanied it, set it apart from the Si chip technology approach of the time and to some degree still does, but as the two industries’ Roadmaps grow closer, the different technologies are looking increasingly complementary.

A younger sibling of the mighty and well developed Silicon industry, Compound semiconductors and materials are very rapidly becoming the next key enabling steps in the development of Silicon based technology. What was once a parallel path between the two industries is now converging through common interests and objectives.

Founded in 1983 as a spin off from the RWTH (technical university) in Aachen, Germany, the founders of AIXTRON focused their efforts on research into new emerging technologies. The highly ambitious team of just 10 scientists, including Dr. Holger Jürgensen (who was eventually to become the President of AIXTRON AG and now a prominent element in the Supervisory Board) very quickly developed advanced technology for Metal Organic Chemical Vapor Deposition selling the first AIX 200 system in the summer of 1984.

This very first MOCVD system has subsequently changed ownership, but is still to this day contributing to the success of the renowned MOCVD group at Prague University headed by Prof. T. Simecek.

In the period 1987 to 1991, AIXTRON was extremely proactive in the development of the first commercially available multiwafer production system, moving from R&D systems into full high volume production systems. Working in the same direction and in parallel, Philips’ R&D division had successfully developed and patent protected the Planetary Reactor concept, which when combined with AIXTRON technology became the key enabling technology for III-V production technology. In 1988 AIXTRON acquired the exclusive technology transfer and license package from Philips for the Planetary Reactor concept and has since then further developed the concept, registering a raft of IPR rights around the original Philips patents.

To support the rapidly developing US market for MOCVD equipment AIXTRON opened its first subsidiary in the USA in 1987 and today is located in Chicago and Los Angeles.

In 1989 the first red 670 nm AlInGaP device was produced as a result of a joint development with Philips. This technology was the foundation for the subsequent successful development of the first AlInGaP red (and subsequently: amber & yellow) LEDs by HP, the first to do so on the AIX 2000 system.

In 1990 the first ever AIX 2000 Planetary reactor system used for industrial production of compound semiconductors was delivered to Philips Eindhoven and in 1991 to Hewlett Packard in the U.S.

In 1992 AIXTRON enlarged the maximum reactor capacity to 5x4" with the delivery to Bandgap Corporation in the U.S. of the first AIX 2400 system and in the same year started the development of the world largest MOCVD reactor AIX 3000 (can be loaded with 95x2-inch wafers or the equivalent wafer area of 5x10-inch respectively) and subsequently used by the leading Solar Cell production companies for the majority of today’s III-V Space Solar Cells.

1991 saw first ever claimed UHB-LED being produced on an AIXTRON system delivered to a Japanese customer and it was in this period that AIXTRON started to develop relationships with customers in Taiwan, which today, is the largest single market for AIXTRON MOCVD systems and where some of AIXTRON ‘s longest established customer partnerships reside.

The earliest development of the AIXTRON silicon germanium, strained silicon, high-k dielectrics and OVPD for OLED system solutions can be traced back to collaboration and research work being conducted by AIXTRON and their partners as early as 1991 up to the present day and only now are emerging as the viable and truly exciting new material technologies they are perceived to be today.

As part of AIXTRON’s strategy of continuously qualifying the technology for new materials, but still based around the core AIXTRON knowledge of vapor phase deposition technology, AIXTRON worked with Philips again in 1991; investigating the potential of depositing high-k materials as part of an oxide development program, paving the way for the developments some 15 – 20 years later creating such interest in the silicon industry. AIXTRON was also involved again with RWTH during this period, working on high temperature superconductor research work funded by the German ministry of Research & Technology.

1994 saw the start of the AIX2600 system development and the eventual emergence of the first AIXTRON integrated automated wafer handling module available to the compound market.

In 1996 the 200th AIXTRON system was shipped to Hahn-Meitner Institut, Berlin, Germany and in the face of ever increasing demand, the assembly facility at AIXTRON in Aachen was doubled in size.

The period building up to 1996 was the time when the first commercial blue LED was developed by Nichia, thereby signaling a period intense development activity worldwide in pursuit of this new step change technology for the production of high brightness LEDs. The work done by Holger Jüergensen’s team directly and through collaboration with third parties enabled AIXTRON to play a key pivotal role during this period of substantial change and growth in this new market, influencing the character of the industry we see today. In 1996 the first AIXTRON GaN MOCVD systems were shipped to North Western University in Evanston, in the U.S. and the Fraunhofer Institute (IAF) in Freiburg, Germany.

1997 continued to be a very exciting period for the whole AIXTRON Team, but for a different reason as it was in this year that the company went public and by doing so were able to lay down the capital foundations necessary to continue to manage the anticipated rapid future growth and to be able to invest in further joint R&D programs.

AIXTRON (FSE: AIX ISIN DE0005066203) went public and is now listed in the Prime Standard and Tec-DAX of the German stock exchange (Deutsche Börse) and is included in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index World and the MSCI World Index.

The period covering 1998 to 2000 saw continuous expansion as the industry moved from strength to strength with AIXTRON progressively gaining a dominant market share.

The facilities at the headquarters in Aachen were again extended in 1998 for the growing R&D, customer service and sales departments.

In 1999 AIXTRON also effectively became a Technology Group when the company acquired Thomas Swan Scientific Equipment Ltd. of Cambridge in the UK and a 70% stake in Epigress AB of Lund in Sweden.

These acquisitions gave AIXTRON the opportunity to be able to offer from within the new group, a unique product portfolio, including now also vertical reactor technology with the Close Coupled Showerhead (CCS) reactors and expanding the portfolio for SiC systems, and through consolidating the Service Support functions be in a position to aim to provide best of class service support to all its customers.

In 2000, in the face of even greater demand for AIXTRON systems a brand new state of the art assembly and test facility at Herzogenrath, a location 10 minutes from Aachen, was completed thereby more than doubling again the assembly capacity for AIXTRON equipment. AIXTRON has the capacity to build and test more than 400 systems a year in some of the most modern facilities of its kind.

In this period 1999 – 2000, and following significant interest in the potential for OVPD to deliver high quality OLED structures and the emergence of SiGe / strained silicon, AIXTRON acquired licences from Princeton University and UDC to further develop production systems for the OLED industry as well as licences and collaborations investigating the potential for SiGe/strained silicon for the next generation of high speed processors

Also in 2000, AIXTRON’s Global Service Organization (GSO) was formally created as a unique fully comprehensive customer service organization serving the AIXTRON groups needs, offering 24 hour / seven days a week customer support. Customer recognition of good service is the most convincing evidence of progress and AIXTRON has consistently been acknowledged as being in ‘The Ten Best’ category in VLSI’s annual Customer Satisfaction survey.

In 2001, AIXTRON delivered the 500th MOCVD system to the market. This system, an AIX 2600G3 was a repeat order from Mitsubishi Electric Corporation, Itami, Japan and typifies the long term relationship AIXTRON has with most of their customers.

The reputation AIXTRON has developed for collaborating with customers and the commercial and academic community was a major factor in 2001 when being invited by the government authorities to be the first (and only) MOCVD equipment provider to be part of the SBIP science park community at the Hsinchu Science Park in Taiwan. This represents a key stage in the strategy AIXTRON has pursued to be an integral part of the development community in all of the major developed markets for deposition technology.

In the same year, following over ten years of business in the region, to support the rapid growth of intense business in Asia and to facilitate a fast local service world-wide, AIXTRON GSO opened offices in Japan, Korea and Taiwan and in 2002 the AIXTRON’s Global Service Network was completed with the establishment of offices in Shanghai, China, to support the rapid growth of new customers from mainland China.

In 2003 AIXTRON’s market share according to an independent market research is 67% (2001 58%). This significant growth in market share was certainly partially due to the establishment of the recently released 24x2” GaN MOCVD system as the production standard in the market as the first real mass production tool for the manufacturing of blue, green and white LEDs.

In the last 20 years AIXTRON has invested more than $ 200m in Engineering and R&D and generated revenues of more than $ 800m, a record the company is quite rightly very proud of and reflects their status as the major player in the MOCVD community and an increasingly important one in the new emerging technologies.

Paul Hyland, President and CEO said; “The preeminent knowledge, experience and reputation of Gas Phase Deposition AIXTRON has built up over the last 20 years has created opportunities for AIXTRON to take this core competency into new areas of scientific and commercial interest and over the last 10 years the group has been steadily building a highly respected credibility in several new emerging market sectors, including, Strained Silicon, Silicon Germanium, GaN on Silicon, High-K dielectrics, Ferroelectrics and OLED technologies, culminating in several high profile collaborations and orders in these new emerging markets, ST Micro and RiT Display as an example.

The convergence of the Silicon and Compound Semiconductor needs, coupled with the development of groundbreaking new display technologies, all of which are reaching for Compound solutions, presents AIXTRON with some unique challenges and opportunities most high tech companies would envy and the company’s determination to maximize those opportunities coupled with the development of a truly international and experienced team is an indication of the management’s determination to leave this difficult economic period far stronger than it went into it.”

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