RF-SOI – A Secured Substrate Supply

Kerui Wang, Simgui Technology

September 27, 2017 - Shanghai

SOI In RF Supply Chain

Bulk Silicon SOI Device Application

2

RFSOI – Mainstream from 3G to LTE Advanced and

Beyond

SOI Substrate Value Proposition

Enhanced RF performance

Integration including switch, LNA,

PA, passive

Lowest cost vs. GaAs and MEMS

technologies

Available 200mm and 300mm

Source : Yole Development, 2017

2,014 M$

CAGR

12%

2016 2022

1,026 M$

3

So How To Satisfy the Increasing Demand ?

4

Simgui Entered Into RF-SOI Supply Chain

5

• Spec

• Performance

• Metrology

• Control

• Facilities

• Toolset

• Technology

• Process

Simgui Partnership with Soitec

Simgui and Soitec strategic partnership since 2014

Technology transfer of Smart-Cut from Soitec to Simgui

6

Simgui + Soitec – 200mm SOI Capacity

Total capacity Simgui + Soitec – 1 million of 200mm wafers/year by 2018

850K

100K

Soitec Simgui

200mm SOI Capacity in K wafers/year

Soitec Bernin, France

850 kw/y

Simgui Shanghai, China

100 kw/y 2017

150 kw/y 2018

7

Simgui Technology

- Company founded in 2001, specialized in SOI

manufacturing and in Epi

- 4 Technologies available for SOI development and

manufacturing: Simox, BESOI, Simbond and Smart-Cut

- Wafer sizes : 150mm & 200mm

- Top silicon thickness range: 100nm - 100µm

- Applications : digital, analog power, RF, photonics and

MEMS

8

Smart-Cut Technology

• Wafer Size

• 200mm

• Thickness Range

• Up to 1.5µm

• Applications

• Digital

• Analog Power

• RF

• Photonics

9

Simgui Achievements 2016-2017

• P1 in High Volume Mode

• P2 starts to ramp-up

• Customer qualifications ongoing on P2, P3 and P4

2016.06 2017.09

VDA

Certification

P1 1st Customer

Qualification

P2 1st Customer

Audit

2017.01

P1 2nd Customer

Audit P1 HVM

P2 Ramp-Up

10

Si Thickness Mean Si Thickness Range

RF-SOI Product – Thickness Performance

• Top Silicon Thickness

• Ellipsometer

• Stable thickness

performance

• Above Cpk target 1.33

• Continuous improvement

Si Thickness Cpk Trend

1.677 1.544

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

Jul Aug

Si Thickness Range Cpk Trend

polarizer analyzer

detectorlight source

iB

wafer

polarizer analyzer

detectorlight source

iB

wafer

11

Sum of Defect Area Count

RF-SOI Product – Surface Particle Performance

• Surface Particle

• Surfscan SP1

• Meet specification

• Acceptable capability

• Continuous improvement

SOD Cpk Trend AC Cpk Trend

12

Harmonic Quality Factor

RF-SOI Product – RF Performance

• RF performance

• SRP + CPW

• Harmonic Quality Factor meet LTE requirement

• Performance mainly determined by substrate which is aligned with Soitec

13

RF-SOI – RF Validation

• RF performance

• In-house SRP

measurement that

allows HQF validation

within 2 days

• Close partnership with

local institutes

• CPW pattern +

measurement within ~1

week

0 2 4 6 8 1012141618202224Resis

tivity(o

hm

-cm

)

Depth(um)

14

TrapRich SOI – Product Yield Achieved High Volume

Manufacturing Target

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug

TrapRich Yield Trend 2017

Yield Target Volume

15

RFSOI Product Roadmap

Product Application 2017.09 2018.06

RF-SOI T1 RF 0.18 Si Thickness Uniformity

+/- 12.5 nm

Si Thickness Uniformity

+/- 10nm

RF-SOI T2 RF 0.13 Si Thickness Uniformity

+/- 10 nm

Si Thickness Uniformity

+/- 8nm

RF-SOI H1 RF Si Thickness Uniformity

+/- 12.5 nm

Si Thickness Uniformity

+/- 10nm

16

8 10

15

20

30

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

2017.09 2018.01 2018.07 2018.12 2019.12

200mm Smart-Cut Capacity Roadmap (kw/month)

SOI Capacity Roadmap

(Project in preparation)

17

RF-SOI Players in China

Substrate

Provider Foundries Design Companies Phone Makers

18

Simgui Values for RFSOI

• Technology – Smart-Cut technology transferred from Soitec

• Maturity – Product performance equivalent to Soitec’s, product yield met

high volume manufacturing target

• Capacity – 15K/month by mid-2018, totally 1 Mw/year of 200mm together

with Soitec. 30K/month by 2019.

• 4 SOI technologies available to meet requirement of various applications

• Active SOI promoter in China, close partnership with most of the Chinese

foundries and design companies.

19

Thank you