You guys are so close minded it is pathetic. Yes, SOI (silicon on insulator) and SOS (silicon on sapphire) have been around for over 2 decades. While there are many technical advantages, technical barriers made it cost prohibitive for general mass production application.
I know of a company who has been doing it for almost 2 years....they have been doing it profitably (read no losses), along with efficient and cost productive (proprietary) mass-manufacturing of GaAs wafers as well. Current orders include high-output displays/LEDS (including auto tailights), space-grade solar cells, and fast communication ASICs, as well as communications substrate chips.
In recent years, semiconductor device manufacturers have increasingly
utilized substrates other than silicon to improve the performance of semiconductor devices or to enable new applications that could not be supported on the current silicon technolgies. These alternative substrates are composed of a single element such as Ge, or multiple elements which may include, among others, gallium, aluminum, indium, arsenic, phosphorus and nitrogen. Substrates that consist of more than one element are referred to as "compound substrates" and include GaAs (we all will grow tired of hearing about GaAs in the next few years IMO...it will dominate performance electronics), InP, GaP and GaN. GaAs is currently the most widely used compound substrate. Compound substrates have electrical properties which allow semiconductor devices to operate at much higher speeds than silicon-based devices or at the same speed with lower power consumption. Compound substrates also have better opto-electronic characteristics than silicon which enable them to convert energy into light and lasers, or to detect light and convert light into electrical energy.
Pull your head out of the sand
Pretty bold statement for a Mac-User/investor. ;-)
Regards.... |
