News Article
Kyma cashes in with $400k grant
The firm is one of 16 selected by North Carolina Green Business Fund to improve its plant efficiency by a very significant amount.
Kyma Technologies, a supplier of ultra-high purity crystalline GaN and AlN materials and related products and services, has won an NC Green Business Fund grant to develop a more energy efficient manufacturing facility.
The NC Green Business Fund which is managed by the North Carolina Department of Commerce. Triangle-based companies and organisations have been awarded more than $2.8 million in grants from the North Carolina Green Business Fund, state Commerce Secretary Keith Crisco announced.
Statewide, a total of 16 organisations received grants which totalled to $4.6 million; the grants are being funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
Under this award, Kyma will receive over $400,000 to install several elements of an ultra-high energy efficiency manufacturing infrastructure. This includes installation of a geothermal heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC system); installing better insulation; implementation of high efficiency LED based solid state lighting; implementation of smart utility control sensors; and creation of an energy usage monitoring and optimisation centre.
“While we have always prided ourselves with our relatively low carbon footprint, especially compared to that of many of our competitors, NC Green’s support is going to enable us to improve our plant efficiency by a very significant amount,” said Heather Splawn, Kyma vice president of operations.
Keith Evans, Kyma’s president and CEO, added, “We are pleased to receive the support of the NC Department of Commerce’s NC Green fund. This helps us become even greener in the manufacturing of our products, which is almost poetic, because our products in turn are used by our customers used to make their products greener too."
Kyma’s GaN and AlN materials are designed to enable their customers to make energy efficient nitride semiconductor devices such as LEDs and power switching electronics.
The market for nitride semiconductor devices is expected to surpass $65B over the long term, including over $32B in visible lighting applications and over $33B in power electronics applications.
