The Silanna Group, headquartered in Brisbane, has grown from humble Australian roots to being a key player in power management products in the semiconductor industry globally. Their innovative products set new performance and efficiency benchmarks in a highly competitive industry. Silanna now has offices in Sydney, San Diego, North Carolina and Singapore.
To analyse their semiconductor wafers, Silanna makes use of the Microscopy Australia flagship secondary ion mass spectrometry facility at the University of Western Australia (UWA), one of only a few nanoSIMS labs in the world available to industry. It offers elemental composition analysis capable of detecting less than one part in a million. It also allows nanoscale 3D images to be built providing valuable depth profiling information to inform process engineers.
“Having Microscopy Australia at the University of Western Australia with their flagship nanoSIMS capability available to Silanna in Australia means a lot to us. We use the capability due to its specialised analysis which we would otherwise likely have to go without. We are also involved with another NCRIS-funded capability, ANFF, and it is unlikely that capabilities like this would be available in Australia without this important commonwealth co-funded support. It’s an enabler for world class process manufacturing and development that allows companies like Silanna to operate on home turf.” Andrew Brawley, VP Manufacturing, Silanna Group & Board Member, ANFF.
nanoSIMS and flagship engineer at UWA, A/Prof. Matt Kilburn
August 15, 2017
