You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles
YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.
© 2012<br />
Patent analysis of SiC<br />
single crystal, wafer and<br />
epiwafer manufacturing<br />
July 2012 edition<br />
II-VI<br />
II-VI Denso Sumitomo Metal<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
Dow corning<br />
75, cours Emile ZOLA, F-69100 Villeurbanne, France<br />
Tel: +33 472 83 01 80 - Fax: +33 472 83 01 83<br />
Web: http://www.yole.fr
Bulk SiC growth<br />
Sublimaton<br />
HT-CVD<br />
LPE; VLS<br />
Back-grinding<br />
Dicing,<br />
Flip-chip<br />
Die shaping<br />
Back-End<br />
level 0<br />
Bare-die<br />
Sources: Yole Développement<br />
© 2012 • 2<br />
Context and frame of the survey<br />
SiC boule / crystal<br />
Patent analysis playground<br />
dies-on-wafer<br />
Back-End<br />
level 1<br />
Binning, pick-and-place<br />
Packaging, Housing<br />
Front-End<br />
Wafer<br />
Polishing<br />
Litho, deposition,<br />
etching, metallization…<br />
SiC epi-wafer<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
SiC wafer<br />
Epitaxy<br />
Packaged devices Power module
Physics<br />
Pro<br />
Cons<br />
© 2012 • 3<br />
SiC Growth Technologies<br />
Main concepts<br />
Sublimation<br />
(PVT)<br />
Most used technology<br />
Widely implemented<br />
Powder purity is key<br />
Growth rate, Crystal<br />
length<br />
No turn-key equipment<br />
HT CVD<br />
Continuous material feeding<br />
Highly tunable parameters<br />
Turn-key equipment<br />
Trade-off growth-rate vs.<br />
defect density<br />
SiC Substrate Market<br />
Hetero-epitaxy<br />
3C-SiC<br />
SiC deposited<br />
by LPCVD<br />
“undulant” Si wafer,<br />
removed after growth<br />
(Hoya patent)<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
Supposedly low-cost<br />
Fully scalable in Ø<br />
Wafer bowing<br />
Defect density<br />
LPE<br />
Similar to Cz method<br />
Metal contamination<br />
Carbon solubility in Si<br />
melt
© 2012 • 4<br />
SiC Wafers for Power Electronics<br />
Market volume projection split by diameter 2010-2020<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
Does not include 2” wafers for R&D purposes<br />
Executive Summary
Evolution of SiC patent publication timeline<br />
Documents count<br />
250<br />
200<br />
150<br />
100<br />
50<br />
0<br />
1 1 2 2 2 2 1 1 2 2 3 2 1 1 2 1 6 35<br />
27 30<br />
14 16<br />
20 18<br />
5 4 6 9<br />
3 5<br />
24<br />
44<br />
37 35 37<br />
32 35<br />
1928<br />
1939<br />
1957<br />
1958<br />
1960<br />
1961<br />
1964<br />
1966<br />
1967<br />
1968<br />
Distribution by date of publication<br />
© 2012 • 5 SiC Patent Survey - 2012-04<br />
75<br />
55 48<br />
63 68 75 72<br />
97<br />
86<br />
115<br />
161<br />
155<br />
1969<br />
1970<br />
1971<br />
1975<br />
1976<br />
1977<br />
1978<br />
1979<br />
1980<br />
1981<br />
1982<br />
1983<br />
1984<br />
1985<br />
1986<br />
1987<br />
1988<br />
1989<br />
1990<br />
1991<br />
1992<br />
1993<br />
1994<br />
1995<br />
1996<br />
1997<br />
1998<br />
1999<br />
2000<br />
2001<br />
2002<br />
2003<br />
2004<br />
2005<br />
2006<br />
2007<br />
2008<br />
2009<br />
2010<br />
2011<br />
2012<br />
Publication Year<br />
• This bar graph shows patent family distribution by year (using the earlier publication date of each family).<br />
• 1772 patents were selected from 1928 to 2012.<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
• 64% of patents were published during the last 10 years. In comparison, SiC device sales started in 2001 with<br />
Infineon first SiC Schottky diode commercial product.<br />
SiC Patent Landscape<br />
193<br />
41
Regional distribution of patents based on<br />
priority & publication country<br />
© 2012 • 6<br />
Geographical distribution of patents<br />
based on<br />
priority country<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
Geographical distribution of patents<br />
based on<br />
publication country<br />
• 72% of patents about SiC crystal/epiwafer are filed by firms or universities located in Japan and 12% in the US.<br />
However, more than 90% of SiC substrate market is handled by US and EU companies and only 5% by Japan (at<br />
least before the acquisition of SiCrystal (D) by Rohm (J) in 2010)<br />
Generating patents doesn’t mean generating business !<br />
• These patents are mainly granted in Japan, US, China, Germany and Korea (map on the right).<br />
SiC Patent Landscape
© 2012 • 7<br />
TOP-15 leading patent applicants over the time<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
• Sumitomo (J) has recently deposited a large number of patents dealing with Liquid Phase Epitaxy (LPE) SiC growth technique.<br />
• We can observe Bridgestone (J) ramp-up, in line with their first product commercialization late 2009.<br />
• Nippon Steel (J) seems gaining momentum these last 6 years, probably preparing the 6” wafer commercialization, as well as the<br />
epitaxy process thanks to the acquisition of several LPE-EPI repi-reactors.<br />
• Denso is incredibly active despite no commercial offer. Most of the R&D is also done with Toyota, focusing on the RAF (Repeated aface)<br />
growth technology<br />
SiC Patent Landscape
© 2012 • 8<br />
Company assignee vs. technology matrix<br />
High patent activity<br />
Medium patent activity<br />
Low patent activity<br />
Not significant activity<br />
Number<br />
Patent<br />
Families<br />
Company 167<br />
Company 124<br />
Company 116<br />
Company 111<br />
Company 99<br />
Company 68<br />
Company 68<br />
Company 57<br />
Company 49<br />
Company 48<br />
Company 44<br />
Company 44<br />
Company 32<br />
Company 31<br />
Company 28<br />
Company 28<br />
Company 27<br />
Company 25<br />
Company 24<br />
Company 23<br />
Company 22<br />
Company 22<br />
Company 22<br />
Company 19<br />
Company 14<br />
Company 13<br />
Company 12<br />
Company 10<br />
Company 10<br />
Company 5<br />
SiC crystal/epiwafer<br />
Technological segmentation<br />
SiC single crystal SiC finishing SiC epiwafer<br />
PVT LPE<br />
nH-SiC 3C-SiC<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
SiC Patent Landscape<br />
Defect<br />
reduction<br />
S.I.<br />
p-type
Top 20 assignees<br />
© 2012 • 9<br />
SiC single-crystal growth patent<br />
companies involvement<br />
The bar graph displays main assignees based on the number of patent<br />
families. About 160 actors are involved in SiC single crystal. The top-10<br />
assignees represents 70% of patents.<br />
The 3 main assignees are Japanese: XXX, XXX and XXX. The first US<br />
firm (XXX) is at the 6 th position.<br />
Okmetic / Linkoping Univ. (HTCVD) is not in the TOP-10<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
SiC single-crystal<br />
Assignee collaboration network<br />
Number in black on each link between assignees is the number of co-filings.<br />
Number up right to each box is the number of patent families for this<br />
assignee.<br />
5 major clusters have been drawn: CREE, XXX, SiCrystal, Nisshin and XXX.<br />
Only CREE and SiCrystal have commercial activities<br />
After Sixon going bankrupt, all IP came back to XXX, however the commercial<br />
activity stopped.<br />
XXX-XXX endemic links are well exhibited here with 43 co-filed patents<br />
SiCrystal was partially owned by Siemens and co-filled 7 patents together
Siemens (DE): Sublimation reactor design<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
© 2012 • 10 Key SiC growth patents
CREE (US): Vanadium-free S.I. SiC<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT<br />
© 2012 • 11 Key SiC growth patents
Publication Number<br />
(representative patent<br />
of the family)<br />
© 2012 • 12<br />
Extract of the Excel spreadsheet<br />
Publication Date<br />
(AAAAMMJJ)<br />
Priority Date<br />
(AAAAMMJJ)<br />
LINKS Title (EN) Abstract (EN) Assignee(s) Inventor(s) Legal Status<br />
JP2010228937 20101014 20090326 RAW MATERIAL FOR<br />
PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To MITSUI ENGINEERING & SUZUKI TATSUYA LEGAL DETAILS FOR JP2010228937<br />
WO2010114008 20101007 20090403 MANUFACTURING DEVICE FOR PRODUCING SINGLE SINGLE provide A device a (1) method for producing for a SHIPBUILDING<br />
BRIDGESTONE (JP) SEKI WATARU; KONDO DAISUKE EED=2012-02-01; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=DEAD;<br />
WO2010114008<br />
DE102009016132 20101007 20090403 CRYSTAL Producing OF silicon SILICON carbide CARBIDE single The process crystal comprises of silicon carbide SICRYSTAL (DE) STRAUBINGER THOMAS (DE); EED=2030-03-31; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
DE102009016132<br />
DE102009016131 20101007 20090403 volume Producing single a silicon crystal, carbide by disposing The process a seed for producing crystal in a<br />
SICRYSTAL (DE) KOELBL STRAUBINGER MARTIN THOMAS (DE) (DE); EED=2029-04-03; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
DE102009016131<br />
WO2010111473 20100930 20090326 volume SIC SINGLE single CRYSTAL crystal,<br />
silicon A physical carbide vapor volume transport single II VI (US) KOELBL GUPTA AVINASH MARTIN (DE) K (US); EED=2029-04-03; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
WO2010111473<br />
WO2010101200 20100910 20090306 SUBLIMATION CRUCIBLE, APPARATUS, GROWTH AND growth Provided system is a crucible includes for a NIPPON STEEL (JP) ZWIEBACK KATSUNO MASAKAZU ILYA (US); SEMENAS (JP); EED=2030-03-25; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
WO2010101200<br />
WO2010103387 20100916 20090312 METHOD FOR OF PRODUCING SIC producing In a method silicon of producing carbide an SiC TOYOTA MOTOR (JP) FUJIMOTO SAKAMOTO TATSUO HIDEMITSU (JP); TSUGE (JP); EED=2030-02-25; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
WO2010103387<br />
JP2010194633 20100909 20090223 SINGLE GRINDING CRYSTAL METHOD OF SILICON single PROBLEM crystal, TO BE the SOLVED: SiC single To BRIDGESTONE DAIKOKU KADOHARA HIRONORI TAKUYA; (JP); NAKAMURA EED=2030-03-11; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010194633<br />
JP2010189246 20100902 20090220 CARBIDE METHOD MONOCRYSTAL<br />
FOR ADHERING SiC provide PROBLEM a grinding TO BE SOLVED: method To of TOYOTA MOTOR MASAO; OGURO MARUYAMA HIRONORI; SAKAMOTO TAKAYUKI EED=2029-02-23; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010189246<br />
JP2010189216 20100902 20090217 SINGLE METHOD CRYSTAL FOR MANUFACTURING<br />
AND SOLUTION solve PROBLEM such TO problems BE SOLVED: that To in OSAKA UNIVERSITY HIDEMITSU; YOSHIKAWA FUJIWARA TAKESHI; TANAKA EED=2029-02-20; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010189216<br />
JP2010184849 20100826 20090213 SILICON METHOD CARBIDE FOR COMPOSITE SINGLE provide PROBLEM a method TO BE SOLVED: for To TOYOTA MOTOR TOSHIHIRO; FUJIWARA YASUYUKI KAWANISHI SAKIKO EED=2029-02-17; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010184849<br />
CN101805927 20100818 20100420 BONDING Grower of OF high-purity SEED CRYSTAL semiFOR<br />
provide The invention a method relates for composite to a SHANGHAI INSTITUTE OF BOYUAN CHEN; ZHIZHAN CHEN; EED=2029-02-13; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
CN101805927<br />
CN101812723B 20120411 20100420 insulating NA silicon carbide grower The invention of a high-purity belongs to semi- the CERAMICS SHANGHAI CHINESE INSTITUTE ACADEMY OF ERWEI NA SHI; BING XIAO; EED=2030-04-20; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
CN101812723<br />
KR20100090387 20100816 20090206 TREATMENT METHOD FOR SEED technical PURPOSE: field A method of crystal for growth CERAMICS, DONG EUI UNIVERSITY CHINESE ACADEMY INDUSTRY CHOI JONG MUN (KR); LEE WON EED=2030-04-20; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
KR20100090387<br />
WO201095021 20100826 20090219 AND PRODUCTION GROWING METHOD MEHTOD OF FOR N- processing A method for seed producing and a method n-type ACADEMIC TOYOTA MOTOR (JP) JAE SEKI (KR); AKINORI SHIN BYOUNG (JP); FUJIWARA CHUL EED=2029-02-06; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
WO2010095021<br />
JP2010180117 20100819 20090209 TYPE APPARATUS SIC SINGLE FOR CRYSTAL, N-TYPE SiC PROBLEM single TO crystal, BE SOLVED: including: To BRIDGESTONE YASUYUKI KADOHARA (JP) TAKUYA; OKUNO EED=2030-02-18; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010180117<br />
JP2010168257 20100805 20090126 MANUFACTURING METHOD FOR PRODUCING SILICON provide PROBLEM an TO apparatus BE SOLVED: for To DENSO KENICHIRO; MAKINO HIDEMI MARUYAMA EED=2029-02-09; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010168257<br />
JP2010163335 20100729 20090119 SILICON MANUFACTURING CARBIDE SINGLE APPARATUS improve PROBLEM the TO yield BE SOLVED: of a source To BRIDGESTONE MIYAMOTO TARO; MOTOYAMA EED=2029-01-26; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010163335<br />
US7767022 20100803 20060419 OF Method SILICON of annealing CARBIDE SINGLE a provide A crystal a is manufacturing<br />
sublimation grown II VI (US) TAKESHI GUPTA AVINASH K (US); EED=2029-01-19; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
US7767022<br />
CN101724893 20100609 20091118 sublimation Method for preparing grown crystal high- in The a invention crucible by discloses way of a a BEIJING TIANKEHEDA BLUE RAY; ZWIEBACK HUIQIANG ILYA BAO; (US); XIAOLONG CHEN EED=2028-11-20; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
CN101724893<br />
JP2010150110 20100708 20081226 purity NITRIDE semi-insulating SINGLE CRYSTAL silicon AND method PROBLEM for TO preparing BE SOLVED: a high- To INSTITUTE FUJIKURA; NATIONAL OF PHYSICS INSTITUTE CHINESE CHEN; KAMATA LONGYUAN HIROYUKI; LI; KATO CHUNJUN EED=2029-11-18; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010150110<br />
JP2010150109 20100708 20081226 METHOD NITRIDE SINGLE FOR PRODUCING CRYSTAL AND THE provide PROBLEM a method TO BE SOLVED: for producing To OF FUJIKURA; ADVANCED NATIONAL INDUSTRIAL INSTITUTE TOMOHISA; KAMATA HIROYUKI; NAGAI ICHIRO; KATO EED=2028-12-26; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010150109<br />
KR20100067883 20100622 20081212 METHOD APPARATUS FOR FOR PRODUCING GROWING THE A provide PURPOSE: a method An apparatus for producing for OF CRYSBAND ADVANCED (KR) INDUSTRIAL TOMOHISA; LEE WON JAE NAGAI (KR); KU ICHIRO; KAP EED=2028-12-26; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
KR20100067883<br />
JP2010138006 20100624 20081209 SINGLE PRODUCTION CRYSTAL METHOD OF growing PROBLEM a TO single BE SOLVED: crystal is To BRIDGESTONE RYEOL MOTOYAMA (KR); CHOI TAKESHI JUNG WOO EED=2028-12-12; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010138006<br />
DE102008063124 20100701 20081224 SILICON Producing CARBIDE a silicon SINGLE carbide provide The method a production for producing method a of SICRYSTAL (DE) STRAUBINGER THOMAS (DE); EED=2028-12-09; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
DE102008063124<br />
CN101724906B 20120222 20091118 volume NA single crystal,<br />
silicon The invention carbide discloses volume single a BEIJING TIANKEHEDA BLUE-RAY WOHLFART NA ANDREAS (DE); EED=2028-12-24; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
CN101724906<br />
KR20100066072 20100617 20081209 GROWTH APPARATUS FOR method PURPOSE: for A high-efficient<br />
device for growing SEMICONDUCTOR KOREA ELECTROTECHNOLOGY CO., LTD.; BAHNG WOOK (KR); JOO SEONG EED=2029-11-18; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
KR20100066072<br />
JP2010132517 20100617 20081208 MULTIPLE APPARATUS SILICON FOR CARBIDE a PROBLEM plurality TO of BE silicon SOLVED: carbide To RESEARCH BRIDGESTONE INSTITUTE (KR) JAE ISHIHARA (KR); KANG HIDETOSHI; IN HO (KR); KIM EED=2028-12-09; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010132517<br />
JP2010132510 20100617 20081205 MANUFACTURING METHOD FOR PRODUCING SILICON provide PROBLEM an TO apparatus BE SOLVED: for To BRIDGESTONE MOTOYAMA TAKESHI EED=2028-12-08; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010132510<br />
US20100159182 20100624 20081224 SILICON Production CARBIDE Method SINGLE for a provide A method a is method used for producing<br />
SICRYSTAL (DE) STRAUBINGER THOMAS (DE); EED=2028-12-05; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
US2010159182<br />
JP2010126380 20100610 20081126 Codoped PRODUCTION Bulk SiC METHOD Crystal OF and a PROBLEM bulk SiC TO crystal BE SOLVED: having To a BRIDGESTONE WOHLFART MARUYAMA ANDREAS TAKAYUKI; (DE); EED=2029-12-24; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010126380<br />
JP2010126375 20100610 20081125 SILICON METHOD CARBIDE FOR MANUFACTURING<br />
SINGLE provide PROBLEM a production TO BE SOLVED: method To of SUMITOMO ELECTRIC<br />
KOBAYASHI NISHIGUCHI YOSHINORI; TARO EED=2028-11-26; LEGAL DETAILS FOR STATE=ALIVE;<br />
JP2010126375<br />
CRYSTAL<br />
provide a method for<br />
INDUSTRIES<br />
EED=2028-11-25; STATE=ALIVE;<br />
YOLE DEVELOPPEMENT
Change language