SET seeks deep-UV LED market penetration
Sensor Electronic Technology (SET), a US company developing short-wavelength LED chips, has begun shipment of deep-UV products.
The latest AlInGaN-based LEDs emit at 265-365 nm, and suppliers of testing and sensor equipment have placed the first orders with SET.
However, SET president Remis Gaska is keen to expand the Columbia, SC, company's customer base: "We plan to penetrate very-high-volume markets for water and air purification and disinfection products."
As well as being smaller than traditional deep-UV light sources such as mercury or deuterium lamps, the LEDs contain fewer toxic chemicals. SET hopes that more applications, such as food safety inspection, can also be penetrated in the future.
SET uses a novel growth technique known as migration-enhanced MOCVD (ME-MOCVD) to fabricate its AlInGaN structures. The technique, which can be thought of as a combination of MBE and MOCVD growth, is said to be well-suited to the production of devices with high aluminum content.
SET already sells 340 nm LEDs and is also working on high-power RF electronic devices.
