Automated inspection tool to unveil defects in raw Gallium Nitride (GaN) and Silicon Carbide (SiC) crystals.

Gallium Nitride (GaN) and Silicon Carbide (SiC), in particular the 4H hexagonal polytype of SiC (4H-SiC), are wide bandgap semiconductors with significantly superior electrical and thermal characteristics compared to Silicon. Both materials are key enablers for ongoing changes in electric utility and transportation infrastructures.

Commercial products that significantly benefit from GaN and SiC semiconductors include solid-state energy converters, power management electronics, power amplifiers, light-emitting diodes, displays, solar cells, lasers, and environmental sensors.

Recently, the development of GaN and SiC-based devices has highly accelerated because of their potential for 5G technology. The high defectiveness of produced crystals is one of the principal obstacles to expanding GaN and 4H-SiC use.

Therefore, tools for more efficient GaN and 4H-SiC production are highly requested.The Swiss company Scientific Visual has already developed quality inspection tools for raw Sapphire industrial crystals and is expanding its technology to GaN and 4H-SiC.

This project aims to develop an automated non-destructive inspection tool to help semiconductor manufacturers to get insight into raw GaN and 4H-SiC crystal quality.

Such a scanner will help improving the growth process and assessing the defectiveness of GaN and 4H-SiC crystals before processing.

It will save resources on slicing and polishing initially defective crystals, and thereby time and costs to fabricate epi-ready wafers.