Theo
4 weeks ago
Virtu Financial LLC Invests $216,000 in Atomera Incorporated
"Virtu Financial LLC acquired a new position in shares of Atomera Incorporated (NASDAQ:ATOM – Free Report) in the 1st quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund acquired 34,990 shares of the technology company’s stock, valued at approximately $216,000. Virtu Financial LLC owned 0.13% of Atomera as of its most recent SEC filing."
Theo
1 month ago
Con't...
JDA1
We continue working with JDA1 to move into a more definitive production program, but have not yet achieved this result.
HMmmmmmmm....doesn't sound promising to me...
JDA2
JDA2, however, is in active negotiations with us on a license, now that we have results from wafer runs completed in the last quarter. We hope to make this a comprehensive company agreement covering multiple technologies.
THAT sounds much much better...
Admission of failure
"Progress in converting these engagements to licenses on the path to production has not met our expectations. We know that our ability to develop technology and to build customer interest has been excellent, but we need to do better at closing deals."
You'll get no argument from me on that point...
"Recently, we've taken a hard look at our sales and marketing efforts to find ways to improve. As a result of this process, we decided to make changes that start with bringing on a new Head of Business Development and Marketing, Shawn Thomas"
At least you've made a move rather than simply sitting on your as............laurels. 😒
MST-SPX
This is a relatively new direction and refers to power transistors. (5V to 48V). Interesting and good read.
"I'd like to highlight one of our new technologies called MST-SPX targeting 5 to 48 volt transistors. On Friday, we released a white paper detailing what we've accomplished, but allow me to give a brief summary. We have found that combining MST with the advanced structures used in high-power transistors, allows us to achieve better performance than has been published by any other semiconductor maker. As seen in the chart on slide 5, where lower is better. This is pretty amazing stuff.
We've also calculated that it makes financial sense for our customer to implement MST at less than a 3% improvement in RSP. But what we're seeing and what we're showing on this chart show improvements between 15% and 30%, confirming that our technology offers best-in-class performance and compelling economics for next-generation powered chips.
Let's turn that into revenue!
Validation of Atomera's work and focus:
"At SEMICON West earlier this month, Dave Thompson, Intel's VP of process technology and research gave a talk on the solutions the industry will need in the future for evolving transistor architectures. Virtually, all the examples he brought up, including source drain resistance, channel mobility, dopant control, gate dielectric issues, and even gallium nitride were things Atomera is working on. His message was clear, the industry sees increasing technical challenges moving beyond three nanometers and finding solutions will require a strong cooperative effort by ecosystem partners across the industry.
This is a type of statement that entirely validates the direction we've been taking at Atomera and shows the importance and potentialof the work we're doing today. For this reason, we are very optimistic about the prospects of our company. Our ST engagement is progressing nicely and should form the base of our revenue starting next year. And each of the other segments I've outlined can grow on top of that base."
CHiPS Act
"This past quarter, we also submitted our first of hopefully many proposals under the Chips and Sciences Act. Atomera's potential is being recognized across the industry, and it's only a matter of time before several of these potential opportunities turn into more business prospects for Atomera. We're working very hard to make that happen."
Finally!
Con't...
Theo
1 month ago
Last CC con't...
DRAM- "...Atomera is working at various stages of adoption with more than one of the major memory manufacturers...., these customers are laser focused on cost, which historically has made them late adopters of new materials that could affect yield or increased costs including via royalties...
...Once adopted though, new materials technologies have long legs and wafer volumes are the highest in the industry. We're excited about the potential for our technology in this space..."
Scott does not exude as much confidence in the DRAM sector at the moment compared to the others imo. Doesn't mean it won't pan out, just that I doubt this sector is advancing as quickly as others. Again, that's just me.
(GAA (Gate All Around) "...advanced node market is one of the largest by revenue and the smallest by device count approximately $150 billion in 2023, more than 28% of the overall semiconductor industry. Atomera is working with the major gate-all-around manufacturers on solutions for the leading nodes down to three nanometers. But we are also exploring development at the nodes leading from two nanometers down into the angstrom range.
The revenue potential for Atomera might be the highest in this market segment because the cost of leading logic chips is higher than other semiconductor products. Our MST technology could add significant value to these devices that are at the heart of the AI revolution, driving higher performance, lower power consumption, and better yield. On our website, we have white papers describing exactly how MST provides these benefits...
... That said, we're not sure when we might be able to announce something specific in the gate-all-around sector, because the development programs are so large and the timeframes are so variable, but the interest in work is real and the upside for us is significant
I get the impression from Scott's dialogue here that there's a real push by Atomera to get into this market. Indeed, he belabors the point of Atomera's white papers focused on this market segment. Great! Rock and roll dude- git 'er done.
GaN (gallium nitride technology) I'm intrigued with the prospects in this segment.
"It might initially appear that GaN is a departure from our core business, but it is not. MST GaN would be applied in the manufacturingprocess in the same manner as the other applications we've already covered to improve the yield of a myriad of GaN related semiconductor products...
...Interest by potential customers and partners has been surprisingly strong. Indeed, we are already in discussions with four potential customers and partners...
...our R&D team is still working to turn this into a full product release. We believe with this high level of customer interest, early revenues from MST GaN might be possible in the near term, even possibly later this year.
Con't...
Theo
1 month ago
From the last CC:
Scott Bibaud-
"Given the current stock price, we sense that might be a feeling among investors that our technology, innovative development, and customer activity are somehow stalled. Nothing could be further from the truth."
Good to know
"Atomera continues to work very closely with ST Microelectronics on the next-generation smartpower products and is making solid progress on a production release, which will result in compelling royalty revenue for Atomera."
Hope so
An undisclosed prospective customer-
"After reviewing the details of our technology, this customer decided to license our MSTcad software and spent several months modeling how MST could improve their transistor performance. Simulations of their actual devices showed even better performance gains than we had claimed, which has led to a proposal for them for running wafers and licensing MST from us, which we hope to doin the coming quarters."
Soitec's RFSOI
"Atomera continues to work with the majority of RF-SOI wafer consumers. So we are very well positioned in this market." -- I originally thought that RFSOI would be first to market- they still could I guess but either way- additional revenue 😊
More of my take later--
Theo
2 months ago
Now there are multiple ways that MST can be deposited on wafers for customers going to production. MST-enhanced thin RF-SOI wafers could be supplied by a wafer manufacturer, deposited by the foundry making the devices, or implemented directly by an IDM Imo, this is a huge advantage for Atomera and a significant advancement on their part. For the past 2-3 years, it was TCAD that was Atomera's selling point- something (software program) a prospective customer could use to "try out" and experiment MST with. Now, you can get an actual chip (built to your specs) and try it out.
I am referring to RFSOI exclusively at this point- but I don't see why this won't or couldn't apply to POWER, DRAM, and others in the future as well.
Theo
4 months ago
crheat brought this to light-
The race to 2nm process technology heats up — Samsung will discuss its next-gen 2nm node in June
"Samsung Foundry is set to detail its third generation process technology featuring gate-all-around (GAA) transistors at the VLSI Symposium 2024 in June. The technology is called SF2, and it will be the company's initial 2nm-class fabrication process. The node is projected to offer significant improvements when it comes to performance and efficiency.
Samsung will outline key details about its SF2 fabrication technology at a session on June 19, 2024. Based on the company's own description, the upcoming node will further refine Samsung's multi-bridge channel field-effect transistor architecture with a unique epitaxial and integration process. This will enable it to increase transistor performance by 11–46 percent and reduce variability compared to an unspecified FinFET-based process technology by 26%, while decreasing leakage by about 50%.
"A product performance aware 3rd generation MBCFET (SF2) is revealed to maximize gate-all-around benefit fully by introducing unique epitaxial and integration process, which overcomes the scaling and GAA structure conflict with a product gain," the description by Samsung reads. "The product major narrow NS transistor was boosted by N/PFET +29/+46%, as well as a wide NS transistor +11/+23%. In addition, through transistor global variation reduction by 26% from FinFET, a product leakage distribution was significantly scaled by ~50%."
Business Korea reports that Samsung is not only pushing technological boundaries but is also strengthening its ecosystem for its 2nm-class fabrication process. The company is working with over 50 intellectual property (IP) partners and holds more than 4,000 IP titles, though for obvious reasons only a handful of them are aimed at GAA nodes in general and SF2 in particular..."
Theo
4 months ago
So far, it would appear that GaN would amount to being more or less a manufacturing process as opposed to having to meet performance specs and through-put testing and faster to market- maybe even by the end of this year. Per Scott:
"While we still have work to do, if our current trajectory continues, we should be able to enter the market and generate revenue much more quickly than in our traditional engagements with semiconductor customers, potentially even before the end of this year. "
So, there is multiple ways that our business model can be used for GaN. We can just license our MST technology, just like we do today with regular semiconductor makers to adopt MST on wafers and then build GaN wafers on top of that. That’s one way that we could do it. We will probably license our GaN technology separately from the rest of our licensed technology because it may have very high value. The second thing we could do is maybe we could become a manufacturer of GaN wafers at least in modest volumes, and that would allow us to generate revenue. And if it was a very high-value technology, maybe we could make a very nice-looking gross margin there and help to subsidize the rest of our business. We don’t have a decision to do that yet. I mean we have a very strong philosophy about making a business model that’s got a lot of leverage to the bottom line. And so, if we were to become a manufacturer, obviously, we would have to have a lot more CapEx, which might not work well with that. But we could do something on the smaller volume manufacturing side. And – but I think for our customers who would go into high-volume manufacturing, it’s most likely that we have licensed directly to them. So, we have been looking at the GaN market for a while. We have had a lot of marketing studies going on about how to approach it, but we haven’t got a final determination about what we do. I can tell you, I think it’s a – it would be a much faster time to market. And I am pretty excited about the prospects of MST there and the prospects in a few other areas in the compound semiconductor market.
ktcougar
4 months ago
Very interested to see what they do to address the GaN market.
So, the GaN market is very interesting. Actually, this whole compound semiconductor, it’s an area that we have been doing research on for a few years. So, although this is our first announcement, it isn’t something we just started thinking about. So, there is multiple ways that our business model can be used for GaN. We can just license our MST technology, just like we do today with regular semiconductor makers to adopt MST on wafers and then build GaN wafers on top of that. That’s one way that we could do it. We will probably license our GaN technology separately from the rest of our licensed technology because it may have very high value. The second thing we could do is maybe we could become a manufacturer of GaN wafers at least in modest volumes, and that would allow us to generate revenue. And if it was a very high-value technology, maybe we could make a very nice-looking gross margin there and help to subsidize the rest of our business. We don’t have a decision to do that yet. I mean we have a very strong philosophy about making a business model that’s got a lot of leverage to the bottom line. And so, if we were to become a manufacturer, obviously, we would have to have a lot more CapEx, which might not work well with that. But we could do something on the smaller volume manufacturing side. And – but I think for our customers who would go into high-volume manufacturing, it’s most likely that we have licensed directly to them. So, we have been looking at the GaN market for a while. We have had a lot of marketing studies going on about how to approach it, but we haven’t got a final determination about what we do. I can tell you, I think it’s a – it would be a much faster time to market. And I am pretty excited about the prospects of MST there and the prospects in a few other areas in the compound semiconductor market.
ktcougar
4 months ago
Compound semiconductor materials have traditionally been difficult to manufacture due to crystal defects, some of which can be caused by a mismatch with nonnative substrates. The mismatch creates stresses at the interface, which propagate through the wafer causing cracks and other defects that have limited both the size and the yield of wafers, making economical manufacturing difficult. Atomera’s MST film can relax or de-strain the interface between two different crystal latices, and we’ve been filing a number of patents over the years related to this effect. Recently, we began working with one of the world’s leading authorities in compound semiconductor fabrication, Professor Edwin Pinar at Texas State University to investigate how MST could help solve this whole manufacturing problem.
A material which can significantly improve the quality of GaN wafers and potentially enable them to be manufactured at a larger size is a game changer that the industry is currently seeking. Early experiments growing GaN wafers using MST have shown very promising results. While we still have work to do, if our current trajectory continues, we should be able to enter the market and generate revenue much more quickly than in our traditional engagements with semiconductor customers, potentially even before the end of this year.
This could be pretty big imo.
kt
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