Advanced substrates for power electronics

Abstract

The power semiconductor industry in general and the wide band gap semiconductors in particular, are experiencing an accelerated growth driven by the mega trend of electrification. Silicon carbide metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors have reached a maturity that makes the automotive industry confident in having silicon carbide in inverters and on board chargers in electric cars. After more than 25 years of research and development, the bulk silicon carbide substrates have reached the 8 inches diameter size with an improved quality leading to a pretty good manufacturing yield of the devices. This is reinforced by the innovative engineered Smart SiC™ substrates coming to the market with improved performances. Gallium nitride (GaN) on silicon high electron mobility transistors are also upgrading the energy efficiency of converters ranging from watts to kilowatts thanks to their ultra low conduction and switching losses. The mega-hertz switching frequencies enable to shrink the size of the converters with improved efficiency compared to silicon with great success in the consumer market and others. Given a specialized and high quality GaN engineered substrate, vertical GaN field effect transistors are promising solution for high power electronics.