EPC CEO & Co-Founder, Alex Lidow on Bloomberg Radio discusses the flurry of M&A in the semiconductor space and how GaN is displacing silicon across the enterprise.

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“The semiconductor industry will become one where there are a lot of large corporations and smaller companies will, in effect, be outsourced R&D, much like the pharmaceutical sector,” says Alex Lidow, CEO of Efficient Power Conversion. He says in this scenario Qorvo Corporation and Intersil Corp. could become attractive targets.

Lidow, however, believes consolidation may bring a dark ages to innovation in the semiconductor industry.

Forbes
November 23, 2015
By: Antoine Gara
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According to a new research publication by Transparency Market Research, the global GaN semiconductor devices market that was valued at US$379.82 million in 2012, is estimated to reach US$2,203.73 million by the end of 2019, registering growth at a remarkable CAGR of 24.6% during the forecast period of 2013 to 2019.

Industry Today
October 14, 2015
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In recent years, the acceleration predicted by Moore’s law has slipped. However, silicon could give way to new materials for making faster and smaller transistors.

New York Times
By: John Markoff
September 26, 2015
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Alex Lidow, scion of an engineering dynasty, thinks the essential material at the heart of the tech industry needs to change. Lidow, 60, is currently head of a company called Efficient Power Conversion, and is one of the tech world’s loudest advocates for making transistors and semiconductors from gallium nitride. Silicon is traditionally used for the transistors and semiconductors on which the technology industry relies. This is an amazingly lucrative business: according to the Semiconductor Industry Association, which represents U.S.-based firms, the worldwide semiconductor industry was responsible for approximately $335.8 billion of sales last year alone.

Fast Company
September, 2015
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The company Alex founded in 2007, called Efficient Power Conversion, or EPC, is wholly dedicated to the task of putting GaN in the forefront for use in a variety of things. Wireless power transmission, Class D audio amplifiers, (using a small circuit board, this would produce less heat, and extend battery life on portable systems); and pulsed lasers, or LiDAR (Light Distancing and Ranging), designed to quickly create 3D images useful in mapping and meteorology.

By: Bruce Rogers
Forbes
September 3, 2015
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The cost of electrical power is a key driver of socioeconomic vitality, as it enables us to improve our quality of life and advance new applications and industries. GaN (gallium nitride) has emerged as a displacement technology to the venerable, but aged, silicon solutions that will allow us to stay ahead of our demand for more and more efficient power.

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If expanding industries typically indicate vibrancy, a race to acquire and consolidate is generally reflective of the opposite – a period of slowed growth in mature, often once high-flying categories. And while many industries experience a period of stardom, followed by a sharp and steady decline, we should be extremely worried when they occur in industries that are fundamentally central to our socio-economic vitality.

Forbes
June 26, 2015
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The effort to take advantage of gallium nitride is partly a response to technical and economic factors that have slowed improvement in silicon-based chips.  While companies are still finding ways to fabricate smaller transistors in silicon, reductions in cost and power consumption have been more difficult to achieve. But gallium-nitride circuits can switch on and off much more quickly than silicon and handle higher voltages, said Alex Lidow, EPC’s chief executive. That makes the material particularly good for chores that involve power conversion.

Wall Street Journal
June 22, 2015
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Power conversion involves creating tiny devices that convert electricity from one form to another, enabling all manner of electrical gadgets to function. Till now, silicon had been the preferred medium for power conversion processors, but as that element reaches the limits of its efficiency, attention has focused on new materials.

Los Angeles Business Journal
June 21, 2015
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Integrated Device Technology, Inc. (IDT^®) (NASDAQ: IDTI) today announced its collaboration with Efficient Power Conversion (EPC) to develop technology based on Gallium nitride (GaN), a semiconductor material widely recognized for its speed and efficiency. Under their collaboration, the companies will explore integrating EPC’s eGaN^® technology with leading IDT solutions.

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Alex Lidow, CEO and co-founder of EPC, talks with Alix Palutre of Power Systems Design on a new family of eGaN FETs that has superior performance, smaller size, high reliability, and a low price point. With this announcement, the last barrier to the widespread adoption of GaN transistors as silicon MOSFET replacements has fallen.

Power Systems Design
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Moore’s predictions became a self-fulfilling prophecy. The computing power of chips not only did double every 24 months, they had to double every 24 months or the tech industry — and the economy at large — would suffer dire consequences, stifling innovation and economic advancement.

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re/code
Alex Lidow
April 17, 2015

Chip advances have powered one technology revolution after another: PCs, the Internet, smartphones, smartwatches and, soon, self-driving cars. One company betting its future on III-V materials is Efficient Power Conversion, a 34-person startup led by Chief Executive Alex Lidow. EPC already is seeing steady revenue growth from devices that incorporate a III-V layer made of gallium nitride (GaN). In 2016 or 2017 he expects to adapt the gallium nitride manufacturing process to work for the logic circuits that do the thinking in computer processors. Because of gallium nitride's electrical properties, "you immediately get a thousand times potential in improvement" over conventional silicon, he said.

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CNET.com
April 17, 2015

Dean Takahashi at VentureBeat profiles Alex Lidow. Silicon chips have had a decades-long run as the foundation for modern electronics. But a new kind of chip, based on the compound material gallium nitride (GaN), promises to unseat silicon because it has higher performance, less power consumption, and lower cost.

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VentureBeat
April 2, 2015

Enhancement-mode gallium nitride (GaN) transistors have been commercially available for over five years. Commercially available GaN FETs are designed to be both higher performance and lower cost than state-of-the-art silicon-based power MOSFETs. This achievement marks the first time in 60 years that any technology rivals silicon both in terms of performance and cost, and signals the ultimate displacement of the venerable, but aging power MOSFET.

EDN
Alex Lidow
February 18, 2015

EPC’s CEO and Co-Founder, Alex Lidow, has spent much of his career developing a superefficient replacement for silicon. Hear his interview on Bloomberg TV.

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Bloomberg TV
February 17, 2015

For the first time in 60 years, a new higher-performance semiconductor technology is less expensive to produce than the silicon counterpart. Gallium nitride (GaN), has demonstrated both a dramatic improvement in transistor performance and the ability to be produced at a lower cost than silicon. GaN transistors have unleashed new applications as a result of their ability to switch higher voltages and higher currents faster than any transistor before. These extraordinary characteristics have ushered in new applications capable of transforming the future. But this is just the beginning.

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EDN
By: Alex Lidow
January, 2015

The market for SiC and GaN power semiconductors is expected to grow at 63 percent CAGR between 2011 and 2017, reaching around $500 million, according to The Information Network, a US market research company.

Compound Semiconductor
October, 2014
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Intent on flooding power device markets with GaN-on-silicon FETs, Alex Lidow, EPC, talks to Compound Semiconductor about future market opportunities.

Compound Semiconductor
July, 2014
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