European consortium receives $3.6 million SiC research contract
The prime contractor for the project is Alstom Research and Technology Centre in Stafford, UK. Other participants are the French companies Alstom Transport, INSA de Lyon and Ion Beam Services, Sweden’s Linkoping University and CNM Barcelona of Spain. UK partners include the University of Wales at Swansea, Dynex Semiconductor and Semelab.
“I am very excited to be involved with such a technically strong team,” said Roger Bassett, Alstom’s program manager for ESCAPEE. “I believe this group has the capability over the next three years to take a world lead by developing reliable MOSFET and Schottky diode manufacturing technology for SiC.”
“Power MOSFET and Schottky barrier diodes offer high performance with fast switching and high power conversion efficiencies in a wide range of electric equipment such as power supplies and induction motor drives,” said Paul Taylor, Dynex’s CTO. “Today we use silicon as the base material, and these products are limited to a few hundred volts. In future, SiC technology developed within ESCAPEE will provide the potential of achieving 3,300 V with the same products. The resulting devices will be suitable for use in high-temperature electronics and applications involving harsh operating environments. They will therefore be of interest in rail and marine transportation, power generation and distribution as well are more general purpose industrial power conditioning and motors drives.”
