Evaluating Both Gallium Oxide Wafer Growth Method Economics and Cost Comparision to other Wide Bandgap Materials

Gallium oxide (Ga₂O₃) is an emerging ultra-wide bandgap semiconductor which shows promise for use in high-power, high-temperature, optoelectronic, and sensing applications. Ga₂O₃’s wider bandgap enables increased breakdown voltages and lower on-state resistances making it potentially superior to current commercially available materials such as silicon carbide and gallium nitride. Economically Ga₂O₃is cost-competitive with the ability to be grown from melt. To best understand cost drivers and opportunities for research to enable cost reductions we present a techno-economic analysis that projects the cost of 6″ β-Ga₂O₃ wafers fabricated from crystals grown via edge-defined film-fed growth (EFG). We compare it to previously reported epi-wafers grown via the Czochralski (CZ) method. We further explore what are currently key drivers of cost, such as the historically high iridium prices and present cost-sensitivity analysis of other various drivers’ impact on the final cost. The key result presented is that EFG has a 2× cost advantage compared to epi-wafers grown via the CZ method.