The new facility, which will be equipped with Aledia’s own machines, will be dedicated to R&D as Aledia prepares to launch production within the next two years.
Compared to the OLEDs and liquid crystals in today’s displays, Aledia’s silicon nanowire LEDs offer higher brightness and energy efficiency and generate the three basic colors from a single chip. These advantages position Aledia to penetrate some huge markets, including smartphones. The market is so big that if just 20% of smartphone displays switched to LED technology, the manufacturing capabilities required would surpass those of TSMC, the world’s leading semiconductor manufacturer.
Speeding up R&D
To gear up for volume manufacturing, Aledia, which currently has 90 employees, is moving to Echirolles, near Grenoble. The company’s primary objective is to speed up R&D to rapidly align its products with customer specifications. At the same time, Aledia is starting to work with a foundry with a view to launching production within two years. For the past seven years, Aledia has been housed at MINATEC Entreprises, where it was able to grow without making substantial investments in equipment, most notably by using the CEA’s facilities. The company is leaving MINATEC Entreprises, but will stay in the Grenoble area. Aledia also plans to build 1,400 sq. m of cleanrooms at its new site. The Grenoble microtechnology startup scene has not seen a project of this scale in years.