The Death of Silicon

Dear Reader,

In 1965, Gordon Moore, the co-founder of Intel, made a prediction that would shape the future of technology…

He observed that the number of transistors on an integrated circuit was doubling approximately every two years.

This prediction, which came to be known as Moore's law, held true for decades, driving the rapid miniaturization and advancement of silicon-based computer chips.

However, silicon's reign as the king of semiconductors is coming to an end…

Silicon-based computing technology is reaching its physical limits in terms of design complexity, processing power, memory, energy consumption, density, and heat dissipation.

As transistors on silicon chips continue to shrink in size and increase in density, several challenges arise that our favored material, silicon, just can’t handle anymore:

• Speed and Density Limitations: Increasing processing speed requires reducing the distance between components on the chip and shrinking the size of transistors. This miniaturization has reached a point where further reductions are becoming increasingly difficult and expensive.
  
  
• Design Complexity: As chips become smaller and denser, their design becomes more complex, making it challenging for designers to develop new chips. By 2015, the chip size was expected to reach 10 nanometers, with an estimated 2018 transistors packed onto such a minute chip, posing a significant design challenge.
  
  
• High Cost: The increasing complexity of chip design leads to higher non-recurring engineering costs, making each new chip design more expensive than its predecessor.
  
  
• Power Consumption and Heat Dissipation: The increasing density of transistors on silicon chips results in higher power consumption and heat generation. This poses a challenge to maintaining stable operation, as transistors may interfere with each other due to heat. For instance, a 3.2 GHz Pentium IV processor consumes 135 watts, while a dual-core 2.8 GHz Pentium D with 167 million transistors consumes 244 watts.

The limitations of silicon necessitate a new material that can drive technological advancement.

And gallium nitride (GaN) has emerged as an extremely promising candidate. GaN is a wide-bandgap semiconductor material with superior properties compared with silicon.

GaN semiconductors offer several advantages over silicon:

• High Electron Mobility and Saturation Velocity: GaN has superior electron transport properties compared to silicon, enabling higher-speed operations. This allows for faster switching speeds and the development of high-frequency devices.
  
  
• Wide Bandgap: GaN's bandgap is about three times wider than silicon, enabling it to handle higher voltages and temperatures efficiently. This makes GaN devices more reliable and robust in high-power applications.
  
  
• Excellent Thermal Conductivity: GaN efficiently dissipates heat, making it suitable for high-power applications where effective thermal management is crucial. Its compatibility with higher operating temperatures compared with silicon further enhances performance and reliability.
  
  
• High Power Density and Miniaturization: GaN's high power density enables the creation of smaller and lighter devices that can deliver high power outputs. This advantage is particularly valuable in portable electronics and automotive systems.
  
  
• Improved Energy Efficiency: GaN devices exhibit lower power losses during operation, leading to higher energy conversion efficiency. This translates to lower power consumption, reduced system costs, and improved overall energy utilization.

While gallium nitride (GaN) offers significant advantages over silicon in semiconductor technology, several challenges are hindering its widespread adoption:

• Manufacturing Complexity and Cost: Fabricating GaN semiconductors requires specialized techniques and equipment, making the process more complex and expensive than silicon-based manufacturing. This complexity stems from the unique properties of GaN, such as its lattice mismatch with commonly used substrates, requiring the development of novel manufacturing methods to ensure high-quality device production.
  
  
• Material Defects and Reliability Concerns: GaN crystals can exhibit defects like dislocations and point defects, which can negatively impact device performance and reliability. Researchers and manufacturers are actively working to improve crystal growth techniques to minimize these defects and enhance the overall quality of GaN materials.
  
  
• Integration into Existing Semiconductor Processes: Integrating GaN technology into existing silicon-based semiconductor processes poses a challenge due to the different material properties of GaN compared to silicon. Adapting fabrication processes and designs to accommodate GaN's unique characteristics is an ongoing area of research and development.
  
  
• Limited Availability of GaN Substrates: Silicon is the dominant substrate material for semiconductor fabrication, but high-quality GaN substrates are less readily available. This limited availability can lead to higher costs and challenges in meeting the growing demand for GaN-based devices. Researchers are exploring alternative substrate options and improving GaN-on-silicon technology to address this issue.

But we’ve uncovered a small, private company dedicated to developing these advanced materials…

Its aim is to overcome these challenges and accelerate the world's transition to GaN.

This company recognizes the importance of GaN in driving innovations across various sectors, including clean technologies.

And its focus on platform materials and groundbreaking technology positions it to address the limitations of GaN semiconductor production and enable its scalability.

To learn more about this company’s innovative solutions, its mission to bring GaN technology to the forefront, and your opportunity to become an early investor before anyone else…

Check out this brief presentation and get our detailed report today.