CyberEpi Serves as a Digital Twin of MOCVD Systems; Shortens R&D and Product Launch Cycles of LEDs, Solar Cells, Wireless Communications Devices, and High-Power Integrated Circuits
CyberEpi, a software suite for the optimization of epitaxy manufacturing process and equipment, is an alternative to the traditional manual operation.
ITRI introduced CyberEpi, a simulation software suite that optimizes epitaxial process parameters and MOCVD equipment design parameters to reduce time, improve productivity and yield in the production of light-emitting diodes (LEDs), solar cells, wireless communications devices, and high-power integrated circuits. CyberEpi can be used by MOCVD system operators in addition to epitaxial manufacturing engineers, and reduces the control time for the epitaxial process to hours from weeks of manual trial-and-error experiments formerly required and performed only by epitaxial manufacturing experts.
CyberEpi is a powerful two-way software for epitaxial processes; it not only helps users understand the impacts of process parameters on product device characteristics, but also enables determination of feasible process parameters given the desired characteristics of new devices.
Additionally, CyberEpi shortens by about three times the development period for new structural LED epitaxial layers, resulting in faster time for implementation of a new LED into mass production, and faster time to market for LEDs. It also increases the film thickness uniformity for the epitaxial manufacturing process up to 95 percent, a major improvement over the current average of 75 percent. Based on user inputs such as deposition reactor geometry, chemical species, and growth condition parameters, CyberEpi predicts the film growth (deposition) rate and thickness uniformity based on detailed chemical kinetics and mass/heat transfer models.
CyberEpi has been beta-tested at a leading global LED company, which verified the accuracy of CyberEpi’s epitaxial process simulation. A leading vacuum equipment vendor and universities worldwide also used optimal equipment design parameters from CyberEpi to develop new MOCVD showerhead prototypes.
Using CyberEpi to optimize epitaxial manufacturing parameters overcomes the difficulties of conventional trial-and-error manual adjustments and significantly shortens new equipment development time by efficiently finding optimal equipment design parameters. CyberEpi also saves time by expanding who can participate in R&D; epitaxial production specialists who typically come from optoelectronic backgrounds and who do not usually understand the processes of chemical reactions can easily use CyberEpi, and work with expert engineers on breakthroughs in enhanced production processes and increased capacity. Moreover, CyberEpi will move from offline to online, allowing the MOCVD system to be operated and monitored online, further reducing cost in the future, ” said Dr. Ching-Chiun Wang, R&D Deputy Division Director, Mechanical & Mechatronics Systems Research Laboratories, ITRI.
CyberEpi is intended for two types of users: MOCVD users wishing to develop new growth procedures or improve their existing deposition process parameters; and MOCVD equipment developers wishing to improve current reactor designs or develop new showerheads for higher yield and throughput.
CyberEpi is currently a finalist for the R&D 100 Awards in the United States.