11 November 2014

AKHAN announces exclusive patent licensing agreement with Argonne

AKHAN Semiconductor Inc of Chicago, IL, USA and the US Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory have reached an exclusive licensing agreement on a patent portfolio that will provide AKHAN with the intellectual property to become a fully integrated semiconductor designer, developer and manufacturer.

AKHAN Semiconductor Inc was formed in 2012 as a subsidiary of AKHAN Technologies Inc, which was founded in 2007 by Adam Khan to commercialize Diamond Lattice Technology for diamond-based semiconductor devices.

The agreement covers the life of the patents, providing AKHAN with what it reckons to be a competitive advantage in becoming the first company to fully develop the entirety of the diamond semiconductor process, allowing full-scale commercialization across a wide range of commercial applications.

“This agreement gives us the exclusive rights to develop or license product lines that will serve faster supercomputers, advanced aviation and satellite technology, as well as develop superior radar communication and next-generation telecommunication technologies,” says CEO & founder Adam Khan.

AKHAN will be able to exclusively expand the capabilities of the diamond semiconductor platform, allowing improved performance and thermal efficiency of existing silicon-based devices. The agreement should enable incorporation with other next-generation high-performance materials such as graphene, sapphire and quartz, which means greater market addressability and vertical integration of AKHAN’s business and greater market serviceability for both existing and potential customers, the firm reckons.

The standalone patent portfolio covers critical semiconductor processes such as depositing a layer of polycrystalline diamond on a wafer, as well as doping. The portfolio also covers forming circuit elements such as transistors, capacitors and resistors (for connection into memory devices, logic devices and microprocessors etc). Finally, the patents cover the integration of electronic circuits fabricated on a single chip.

The agreement is the result of more than two years of collaboration between AKHAN Semiconductor and Argonne. The company and researchers from Argonne’s Center for Nanoscale Materials first collaborated on the development of the low-temperature diamond deposition technology as well as diamond semiconductor research that demonstrated improved current-carrying capability and dramatically reduced thickness. The agreements are also part of a public-private partnership model that national labs have used to move research from the lab to market applications quickly.

“This agreement represents a stellar example of how Argonne is partnering with industry to move our technology into the marketplace,” comments Argonne’s director Dr Peter Littlewood. “The investment that the American people continue to make in basic science continues to pay dividends in marketable technologies that have the potential to transform entire industries.”

The license agreement follows an announcement made by the State Governor’s office in September that supported a proposed $15m investment in northern Illinois by AKHAN Semiconductor. AKHAN will receive about $3.5m in state investment support and has pledged to create 80 jobs in two years, with the potential for many more. AKHAN is currently expanding its domestic and international operations, and aims to use the funds to help relocate and expand its corporate and manufacturing headquarters in Illinois.

See related items:

AKHAN founder named to 2014 Forbes ‘30 Under 30’ list in Energy & Industry category

AKHAN licenses Argonne’s low-temperature diamond deposition technology

Tags: Diamond

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