We create process equipment that enables technologies for a cleaner and more
productive world. We design, develop, manufacture, market, and support thin
film equipment to meet the demands of key global trends such as improving energy
efficiency, enhancing mobility, and increasing connectivity. Our equipment is
used to make electronic devices which enable these trends, including light emitting
diodes (“LEDs”), micro-electromechanical systems (“MEMS”),
wireless devices, power electronics, hard disk drives (“HDDs”),
and semiconductors. We may also license our technology to our customers or partners.
We develop highly differentiated, “best-in-class” equipment for
critical performance steps in thin film processing. Our products provide leading
technology at low cost-of-ownership. Core competencies in advanced thin film
technologies and decades of specialized process know-how help us stay at the
forefront of these rapidly advancing industries.
Headquartered in Plainview, New York, we were organized as a Delaware corporation
in 1989. We have sales and service operations across the Asia-Pacific region,
Europe, and North America to address our customers’ needs.
We are focused on:
Providing differentiated process equipment to address customers’ current
production requirements and next generation product development roadmaps;
Investing to win through focused research and development in markets that we
believe provide significant growth opportunities or are at an inflection point
in process equipment requirements, including LED, power semiconductor devices,
and advanced packaging technologies;
Leveraging our sales channel and local process applications support teams to
build strong strategic relationships with technology leaders;
Expanding our portfolio to improve the performance of our systems, including
spare parts, upgrades, and consumables to drive growth, reduce our customers’
cost of ownership, and improve customer satisfaction;
Cross-selling our product portfolio across our broad customer base and end markets
to both maximize sales opportunities and diversify our business;
Utilizing a combination of outsourced and internal manufacturing strategies
to flex manufacturing capacity through industry investment cycles without compromising
quality; and
Pursuing partnerships and acquisitions to expand our product portfolio into
adjacent markets and drive sales growth.
Our systems are used in the creation of a broad range of microelectronic components,
including LEDs, MEMS, radio frequency (“RF”) filters, power semiconductors,
thin film magnetic heads (“TFMHs”), and compound semiconductor devices.
Our customers who manufacture these devices invest in our systems to develop
next generation products and deliver more efficient, cost effective, and advanced
technological solutions. We operate in a cyclical business environment, and
our customers’ buying patterns are dependent upon industry trends. Our
products are sold into multiple markets, and the following discussion focuses
on the trends that most influence our business within each of those markets.
Lighting, Display & Power Electronics
LED technology has existed for more than 50 years; however, commercial adoption
of LEDs was limited to niche applications until the most recent decade. In the
early 1990’s, researchers developed a process utilizing Gallium Nitride
(“GaN”) that created a low cost LED to produce white light. With
that breakthrough, the LED industry started, and the number of applications
for LEDs began to expand. The first wave of LED growth occurred between 2003
and 2006 driven by mobile phones, which implemented the use of LED technology
for display backlighting. The LED industry experienced its second period of
rapid growth as LEDs were adopted for TV display backlighting. Starting in 2009,
LED producers, particularly in South Korea and Taiwan, made significant investments
in LED process equipment to capture share in these markets. Our metal organic
chemical vapor deposition (“MOCVD”) technology is at the core of
the manufacturing process for GaN-based LEDs. Over the next couple of years,
our sales increased considerably driven in part by Chinese government subsidies
for MOCVD equipment. Following this investment wave, there was an oversupply
of MOCVD equipment, and our business went into a deep decline.
The adoption of LEDs for solid state lighting helped drive improvements in industry
conditions in 2014. LED technology offered energy and cost savings opportunities
in lighting, which played an important role in the global shift toward energy
efficiency initiatives. LEDs are up to 80% more efficient than traditional incandescent
bulbs and up to 25% more efficient than compact fluorescent bulbs. LED penetration
into the lighting market is growing, and for the first time, LED unit demand
for general lighting surpassed demand for display backlighting in 2015. While
LED industry conditions softened in the second half of 2015, due largely to
weak TV and LED display backlighting demand, we expect to benefit from the ongoing
adoption of LED lighting over time.
MOCVD technology is equally important in the manufacturing of red, orange, and
yellow (“ROY”) LEDs, which are used in signage and automotive lighting
applications. For these LEDs, our K475 MOCVD platform is used to deposit highly
uniform Arsenic Phosphide (“AsP”) films which create amber and red
hues. While ROY LEDs are predicted to grow at a slower pace than LED units for
general lighting, we expect to benefit from growth driven by increased adoption
of LED technology for automobiles and outdoor display/signage applications.
In addition to depositing the critical GaN layer with our MOCVD products, our
Precision Surface Processing (“PSP”) products address multiple etch
and clean steps required for the LED manufacturing process.
Our products are also crucial in the manufacturing of GaN-on-Silicon based power
electronic devices. Global demand is increasing for advanced power electronics
with greater energy efficiency, smaller footprints, higher operating temperatures,
faster switching capabilities, and greater reliability. These devices support
many needs, including more efficient IT servers, electrical motors, electric
vehicles, wind turbines, and photovoltaic power inverters.
While silicon-based transistors are widely used in power electronic devices
today, GaN-on-Silicon based power electronics developed on MOCVD tools can potentially
deliver higher performance (e.g., smaller power supply form factors, higher
efficiency, and faster switching speeds). These devices are ideal for applications
such as IT servers, where heat generation is an ever-increasing problem as server
banks become larger and where heat management and energy efficiency requirements
continues to rise. In 2015, global industry leaders in power electronics continued
to focus on research and development (“R&D”) programs to commercialize
this new technology. Device manufacturers will likely begin to transition from
development to production of these devices over the next couple of years; we
can benefit from this transition as our customers invest in process equipment
to support this production ramp-up.
Advanced Packaging, MEMS & RF
Advanced Packaging includes a portfolio of wafer-level assembly technologies
that enable the miniaturization and performance improvement of electronic products,
such as smartphones, smartwatches, tablets, and laptops. Our PSP products have
been gaining traction in the rapidly growing area of Advanced Packaging. Demand
for higher performance, increased functionality, smaller form factor, and lower
power consumption in mobile devices, consumer electronics, and high performance
computing is driving the adoption of advanced packaging technology. Independent
Device Manufacturers (“IDMs”) and Outsourced Semiconductor Assembly
and Test (“OSAT”) companies are implementing multiple advanced packaging
approaches including Fan-Out Wafer Level Packaging (“FO-WLP”) and
Through Silicon Via (“TSV”) to enable stacked memory, 2.5D, and
3D packaging devices.
MEMS devices are used for an increasing number of applications, including accelerometers
for automobile airbags, pressure sensors for medical uses, and gyroscopes for
a variety of consumer products, such as gaming consoles and mobile devices.
One of the fastest growing MEMS applications has been RF filters for mobile
devices, driven by increasingly complex wireless standards and the exponential
growth of mobile data. In order to address these growing demands, a high-end
smartphone can have as many as 60 discrete RF filters, a figure that has more
than doubled in recent years. These trends are positive for us, particularly
for our PSP products as well as our ion beam etch and Molecular Beam Epitaxy
(“MBE”) products, which are used to create Bulk Acoustic Wave (“BAW”)
and Surface Acoustic Wave (“SAW”) RF filters.
Data Storage
The Data Storage market involves the storage of data in electromagnetic or other
forms for use by a computer or device, including HDDs used in large capacity
storage applications. While HDDs face significant competition from flash memory,
we believe that HDDs will continue to provide the best value for mass storage
and will remain at the forefront of large capacity storage applications. This
is especially true for data center applications where large volumes of data
storage are required to serve an increasingly mobile population. The HDD manufacturing
industry continues to optimize its existing manufacturing capacity to address
demand. While we have seen signs of capacity constraints in some process areas
and have experienced incremental orders for our equipment in 2015, future orders
are likely to be focused on implementation of new technologies as opposed to
capacity expansion. Future demand for our data storage systems is unclear and
orders are expected to fluctuate from quarter to quarter. Our process knowledge
and magnetic materials expertise from the Data Storage market positions us well
for certain front-end semiconductor and MEMS opportunities, as thin film magnetic
manufacturing methods become increasingly used in these markets.
Scientific & Industrial
The Scientific and Industrial markets include advanced materials research and
a broad range of manufacturing applications including laser diodes, infrared
detectors, optical coatings, and extreme ultraviolet (“EUV”) photomasks.
Our MBE systems are used by scientific research organizations and universities
to drive new discoveries in the areas of materials science. MBE enables precise
epitaxial crystal growth for a wide variety of materials, which supports the
development of new performance materials used for emerging technologies. MBE
technology is also used in the manufacturing of products such as laser diodes
and infrared sensors. Our tools create highly uniform Gallium-Arsenide (“GaAs”)
or Indium-Phosphide (“InPh”) film layers, which are critical to
the performance of these devices. Our PSP products are also used to manufacture
infrared sensors.
Our Ion Beam Deposition (“IBD”) tools are used to produce high quality
optical films for multiple applications including laser mirrors, optical filters
and anti-reflective coatings. Our tools deposit thin layers of advanced materials
on various substrates to alter how light is reflected and transmitted. Our ability
to precisely deposit high quality films with extremely low particulate levels
make our ion beam deposition technology ideal for manufacturing defect-free
EUV photomask blanks. The front-end semiconductor industry is expected to adopt
EUV lithography to meet future device requirements. Future growth will depend
on overall EUV production readiness.
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