News

4 June 2009

 

Cree strikes GaN supply & market development agreement with Korea’s RFHIC

Cree Inc of Durham, NC, USA has signed a definitive agreement to supply gallium nitride on silicon carbide (GaN-on-SiC) high-electron-mobility transistors (HEMTs) to RFHIC Corp of Suwon, Korea for their GaN HEMT amplifier product families.

In addition, Cree and RFHIC have entered into a market development agreement to facilitate deeper market penetration of GaN HEMT solutions by leveraging Cree’s expertise in GaN transistor production on SiC substrates and its monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) foundry capability with what is claimed to be RFHIC’s leadership position in innovative packaging, amplifier integration and volume assembly capabilities.

“This important relationship is designed to allow both Cree and RFHIC to expand their market presence and accelerate the insertion of GaN HEMT technology into a number of key, volume applications,” says Dr Cengiz Balkas, VP & general manager of Cree’s Power and RF business unit.

“The combination of Cree’s and RFHIC’s core strengths can accelerate GaN HEMT market penetration in cellular infrastructure, two-way communication, CATV amplifier, and a variety of other emerging market segments,” says Jim Milligan, Cree’s director of RF and microwave products. “It provides a wide range of options in hardware integration levels to best address customer needs,” he adds.

“Cree’s GaN-on-SiC HEMT process is the most mature GaN HEMT process in the market,” comments RFHIC’s chief technology officer Dr Samuel Cho. “We initially pursued a GaN-on-Si HEMT approach but converted our product line and future direction to Cree’s GaN-on-SiC HEMT technology, based on its superior thermal and electrical characteristics as well as its outstanding robustness and reliability,” he adds. “RFHIC aims to offer cost-effective, GaN HEMT amplifier solutions to the market.”

See related items:

Cree samples GaN HEMT microwave transistors for telecom applications

Cree samples high-efficiency 120W GaN HEMT microwave transistor

Search: Cree GaN HEMT SiC substrates

Visit: www.cree.com

Visit: www.rfhic.com