Arrowhead Subsidiary Collaborates With Kyma Technologies To Reduce The Cost Of Blue Lasers And Blue LEDs

Pasadena, CA — Arrowhead Research Corporation announced recently that its majority-owned subsidiary, Aonex Technologies, Inc., has entered into a collaborative agreement with Kyma Technologies, Inc., a producer and marketer of semiconductor products, to develop materials to reduce the cost of gallium nitride (GaN)-based devices such as blue laser diodes and blue light emitting diodes (LEDs).

Blue laser diodes are an enabling technology for HD-DVD™ and Blu-Ray™ DVD players. Manufacturing these devices in high volume has proven challenging and has led to delays in such highly anticipated products as the Sony PlayStation 3™. Blue LEDs are used as light sources for a wide variety of applications, including back lights for cell phones, and are expected to one day replace conventional incandescent and fluorescent light sources because of their higher efficiencies and longer lifetimes.

"We are very excited that Aonex will work with Kyma to reduce the costs of this promising class of materials," said R. Bruce Stewart, Arrowhead's Chairman. "Blue LEDs, for instance, are a key enabling technology for solid state lighting, which has the potential to substantially reduce electricity consumption and lower carbon emissions."

Dr. Keith Evans, Kyma's president and CEO, added, "We are delighted to work with the Aonex team. The combined attributes of Aonex's A-SapphTM substrate technology and Kyma's proprietary high growth rate, low defect density GaN crystal growth technology have great potential to reduce the costs of a broad range of high performance nitride semiconductor devices."

Under the terms of the agreement, Aonex will provide Kyma with access to its proprietary wafer technology, A-Sapph™. Kyma will work to leverage the superior properties of A-SapphTM to produce large-area wafers suitable for the manufacture of GaN devices. Such large-area wafers could dramatically reduce the cost of GaN devices by enabling an increase in the number of chips per wafer while also substantially improving yields.

This agreement is part of Aonex's program to sample its substrates to select device and wafer manufacturers.

SOURCE: Arrowhead Research Corporation