OCEAN12: a collective initiative to advance FD-SOI technology
Soitec played an active role in the OCEAN12 project, a collaboration of 30 partners across Europe from June 2018 to September 2022, which has advanced the energy efficient FD-SOI technology and opened the path for nodes shrink.
OCEAN12, a pan European alliance gathering 30 corporate and academic partners in electronics and semiconductors including Soitec, was supported by the European funds organization for research development and innovation, the Key Digital Technologies Joint Undertaking (KDT JU), a EU-driven public-private partnership funding innovation in electronic components and systems, as well as the industry and research ministries from 8 European member states: Austria, France, Germany, Greece, Poland, Portugal, Romania and Spain.
Over four years, this alliance has been active across the full value chain in semiconductor technology, electronics devices, aerospace, and automotive technologies.
Yves Gigase, executive director of KDT JU, commented on the contribution of the alliance to advance the FD-SOI technology: “OCEAN12 successfully contributes to the portfolio of projects implemented by the KDT JU that supports the development of the FD-SOI technology in Europe. This technology is strategic for Europe because it addresses some top priorities of current European policies: the Green Deal with the developments in low power electronics assuring significant energy saving, and the European digital autonomy with an increased production capacity of semiconductors technology.
A real progress for the FD-SOI technology
OCEAN12 developed the European FD-SOI platform, fostering the roadmap of this energy efficient technology to advanced nodes beyond 22nm.
- In the field of semiconductors, a new generation of engineered SOI substrates and advanced building blocks to boost transistor mobility and electrostatic behavior were developed.
- At the design level, a whole ecosystem offers energy-efficient solutions including the first 18nm micro-processors blocks.
- At the system level, 14 demonstrators based on the FD-SOI technology were released, including a new solid state automotive radar on 22FDX, the always-on wake-up ultra-low power systems to secure automobiles, high-end video processing for aeronautic applications or power-efficient data fusion processors.
Jens Fabrowsky, Executive Vice President Automotive Electronics for Bosch, highlighted: “The cooperation in OCEAN12 has enabled Bosch to develop state of the art chips for automotive radar systems in an excellent European ecosystem. Those chips are a prerequisite for highly automated driving systems made in Europe.”
CEA-Leti, as a major European research and technology organization in the field of microelectronics, also took part in the work of the alliance. Sebastien Dauve, CEO of CEA-Leti, said: “Despite the official project ended, it gives us the necessary knowledge to consider pushing the FD-SOI technological platform towards its ultimate performances, using the frame of the future European mega fab operated in the alliance between STMicroelectronics and GlobalFoundries. The role of Soitec will be essential to develop and produce this future technology.”
Soitec, a key player in innovation for the semiconductor industry
Soitec has developed a remarkable track record over the years in developing industrial platforms for the FD-SOI industry, giving our teams the expertise and knowledge to consider pushing the FD-SOI technology platform to its ultimate performance. This is what we are going to achieve within the framework of the new European industrialization plan for microelectronics, the Chips Act.
Pierre Barnabé, CEO of Soitec, stated: “Our successful and ongoing participation in the European KDT programs helps us to demonstrate our capacity to translate semiconductor innovations into full-fledged ecosystems and gear them up to end consumer application levels. We pursue new KDT and Chips-Act initiatives to further enhance the adoption of our advanced substrates and remain committed to Europe’s objective to foster environmental sustainability and technological sovereignty.”
