Korea is the new compound semiconductor boom region
Much of the early compound semiconductor work in Korea was performed at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST). "In the early 1980s, the only person in Korea who had an MOCVD system for GaAs growth was Y S Kwon, a professor at KAIST," says Y H Lee, also of KAIST. "Several companies attempted to do some R&D on compound semiconductors, but in terms of making money the industrial effort was not particularly successful." However, adds Lee, the last few years have seen many success stories, with companies such as LG, Knowledge*on and Samsung starting to make a profit from devices such as LEDs, and lasers for CD and DVD players.
Korea is now in the process of breaking out of its traditional mould, which has seen the business landscape dominated by slow-moving industrial conglomerates or chaebol. "Historically, three of the largest chaebol - Samsung, LG and Hyundai - worked on compound semiconductors, but Hyundai closed down all their activities in this area in 1998 due to the Asian financial crisis," explains Holger Juergensen of Aixtron. "Today, there are several businesses related to LG and Samsung that work on compound semiconductors, as well as a number of new start-up companies."
Korea has one of the world s highest usage of cellphones and the Internet, and these domestic markets are fertile testing grounds for new technologies. Not surprisingly, many start-ups have been established to produce components for the communications industry. With several world-class university and other research labs specializing in optoelectronics, there is a good supply of both ideas and engineers. Capital is harder to come by in the present uncertain climate, but is available as venture capital and also in the form of investment from, or joint ventures with, the established chaebol. "In this sense Korea is a hybrid between Japan and the US," says Emcore s Tom Miehe. "As in Japan, many people work for large corporations, but there is also the scope to spin-off small companies or invest in start-ups."
"There were at least 10 start-up companies founded in Korea in 2000-2001," says Euijoon Yoon, CEO of one such company, Nanotron Technologies. "Many were set up by researchers from Samsung and LG, or by university professors. The compound semiconductor industry is blooming in Korea."
However, Korea has not escaped the industry downturn; equipment manufacturers report successful years in 1999 and 2000, but fewer sales last year. "From my point of view the market for compound semiconductor equipment was not so good in 2001," says James Park, president of Hanvac, a Korean company that manufactures MOCVD systems for the domestic and foreign markets. "But I think that the equipment market will improve towards the end of this year, and the market for devices should become much better."
In contrast to Taiwan, where the focus on low-cost manufacturing has lead to a pre-eminent position in several segments of the LED market, Korean companies have somewhat different agendas. "Korean companies tend to look at leading-edge technologies rather than addressing very low cost markets," says Tom Miehe. As described on the following pages, Korean companies are looking at VCSELs, nitride-based LEDs and a range of other compound semiconductor devices. Epiwafer foundries Epiplus An epiwafer manufacturer located in Gyoungi-Do, Epiplus was set up in May 2000 using capital supplied by institutional investors. A second round of funding came at the end of the same year. At the same time, Epiplus was selected as a lead manager in an epiwafer technology development program sponsored by the Korean Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy. The company moved to its new building in early 2001 and started commercial production of epiwafers in the second half of the year. Epiplus now manufactures a product range including 4 and 6 inch InGaP/GaAs and AlGaAs/GaAs HBT epiwafers, and blue and green GaN-based LED epiwafers.
EpiValley Located in Kyung-gi-Do, a suburb of Seoul, EpiValley was founded in December 1999 and currently has 26 employees. According to Joongseo Park, general director, the company manufactures a wide range of epiwafers. "We have five MOCVD systems and a monthly capacity of around 1000 wafers," says Park. "Our products include epiwafers for AlGaAs/GaAs VCSELs, InGaP/GaAs HBTs, AlInGaN-based LEDs and HEMTs, as well as 650, 780 and 808 nm laser diodes." EpiValley also sells custom-designed epiwafers based on GaAs, InP and AlInGaN materials.
