Technology Partner

Over the last few years SoS has also been growing into the role of a technology partner, working closely with various universities on the development of future products in MEMS and Solar applications.

One may ask, why is a commercial company like SoS putting effort and funds into future developments?
The answer is very simple, SoS management strongly believes that in Europe we can make a difference within society by working together.

SoS strives here too to become the first partner of choice when it comes to working on these kinds of technology applications. With our team of expert equipment and process engineers we want to make that difference!

• Project on Ultrasound MEMS technology: The Innovation to Industrialisation for Advanced Micro- and Nanosystems (I2I) project has been granted subsidies from EFRO. Part of the I2I project comprises the project Ultrasound MEMS technology, with SolMateS BV, Solutions-on-Silicon BV, University Twente and NovioMEMS BV. Based on the thin film piezo-electric technology of SolMateS an industrial process flow will be developed. Twente University offers expertise and Solutions-on-Silicon BV is the consultant for the design of cleanroom equipment.
  

• Project on Thin-Film Lift-Off process for re-use of substrates. Within the project Radboud University together with TF2 Devices BV, CCM BV, Solutions on Silicon BV and ALSI BV aims to reduce the manufacturing costs of high-efficiency solar cells made with III-V compound semiconductors. This cost reduction is obtained by the application of an Epitaxial Lift-Off (ELO) technique to separate the 2 µm thick solar cell structure as deposited by a gas phase deposition technique, from its expensive substrate, which has a thickness of about 300 µm. A further reduction of expensive semiconductor material will be obtained by the application of mirrors or lenses to concentrate the light that falls on an area many times (up to 1000 times) larger than that of the actual solar cells.

• Parallel with the research into material reduction, the efficiency will be increased to a level of more than 30% by the development of a tandem cell consisting of two different III-V cells e.g. a Gallium-Arsenide (GaAs) cell and an Indium-Gallium-Phosphide (InGaP) cell deposited on top of each other. In this respect one of the most important goals of the project is to develop thermally stable tunnel junctions as optically transparent, low resistivity, inter-device ohmic contacts between the two cells in the tandem structure.