SHANGHAI, CHINA: Soitec, the world's leading supplier of silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafers and other engineered substrates, said during Semicon China that the growing industry-wide momentum in SOI-based design and manufacturing presents China's explosive growth chip industry with ideal conditions to add SOI technology to its roadmap.

SOI is used today in a growing number of advanced electronic devices for a wide variety of applications, ranging from automobiles to portable consumer products. SOI-based chips are cost-efficient to manufacture, and designed to be power-efficient and performance-enhancing. The timely convergence of China's technological readiness and increased industry-wide support for SOI design and manufacturing can facilitate the move to SOI by China's foundries and fabless companies.

"This is a fortuitous time for China's semiconductor industry, which has tremendous potential to take advantage of SOI's unique features. But, in order for China to align with industry leaders, foundries and fabless players need to begin laying the groundwork now," said André-Jacques Auberton-Hervé, president and CEO of the Soitec Group.

"As a founding member of the SOI Industry Consortium, Soitec is working with 21 leading companies to support the acceleration of SOI innovation across a broad range of markets and reducing barriers of adoption. We expect that chip designers and manufacturers in China will be early beneficiaries of this endeavor, and we will move forward together," Auberton-Hervé said.

As part of its commitment to meeting both existing and expected demand for SOI throughout Asia, Soitec is currently qualifying customers at its new 300mm fab, known as Pasir Ris 1, built in Singapore to support the rapidly growing Asian market.

What is SOI?
Most chips are fabricated on wafers made of silicon. SOI (Silicon-On-Insulator) refers to a special kind of silicon wafer, in which a layer of insulation is added just below the top surface. Leading chip companies are using these SOI wafers to manufacture chips for PCs, game consoles, telecommunications devices, automotive and industrial applications and more.
The main reason they choose to manufacture their chips on SOI wafers instead of "bulk" silicon wafers is that the embedded layer of insulation helps keep the electrical current from leaking out of the chip. The result is that these SOI-based chips run up to 30 percent faster or cut power usage by as much as 50 percent.

Soitec owns a patented process called Smart Cut, which is used to manufacture most of the SOI wafers in the world.