Dr. Lesaicherre holds an MBA with a focus on International Business and Strategy from INSEAD, and has an MS degree and a PhD degree in Material Science from the Grenoble Institute of Technology (Grenoble INP). He is a Board Leadership Fellow, Governance Fellow and Director Certified for NACD (National Association of Corporate Directors) and an active member of NACD and SVDX (Silicon Valley Director’s Exchange).
Tell us about your company?
Finwave is a leading GaN (Gallium Nitride) semiconductor company with a disruptive 8” GaN-on-Si technology for 5G/6G cellular infrastructure, handset market and other RF applications. Finwave was founded in 2012 by world-leading technologists from MIT, whose ground breaking invention has been recognized by the prestigious IEEE George Smith Award. Finwave has developed a proprietary, low-cost manufacturing process that leverages existing 8” Si fab infrastructure for significant cost reduction and that is particularly well suited to deliver high-performance RF Switches and Power Amplifiers. With its scalable technology innovation, Finwave is unlocking the true power of GaN for RF applications.
What problems are you solving?
Finwave’s GaN on Si technology unlocks the true power of GaN. Finwave’s 3DGaN FinFET technology brings significant linearity improvement and power efficiency improvement for 5G/6G infrastructure applications.
In addition, Finwave’s enhancement-mode, low-voltage GaN MISFET technology enables high-performance handset RF Front-End (RFFE) applications for the first time, besting the competing GaAs technology in both cost and performance.
Finwave’s GaN-on-Si Switch technology delivers broadband, high-power RF switches with fast switching and fast settling at mmWave frequencies and above.
Lastly, Finwave’s GaN-on-Si technology is produced on standard 8” Si CMOS fabrication tools, not only significantly reducing manufacturing cost but also enabling “Moore’s Law” for GaN technology to be scaled from 8” to 12”, from 0.18um to deeply scaled transistor nodes.
What application areas are your strongest?
The strongest applications for Finwave in order of importance are (i) 5G/6G infrastructure (Base Stations, FWA – Fixed Wireless Access, CPE – Customer Premise Equipment), (ii) 5G/6G handset front-end modules and (iii) Military and Aerospace applications (Satcom, Radar, military communications and other Mil/Aero RF applications). Finwave products are also used in Test Equipment and Medical Equipment applications.
What keeps your customers up at night?
In most advanced RF communication applications, the issues of linearity, power efficiency, ability to deliver high power at mmWave frequencies and switching speed are front and center. Cost and the ability to integrate RF components into an RF Front-End device or RF Front-End module are also very important considerations.
With Finwave proprietary GaN-on-Si technology, we offer high-performance RF devices in a very cost-efficient process technology, as well as the ability to integrate an RF Switch, Power Amplifier and Low Noise Amplifier into a single technology and possibly a single chip, thus simplifying our customers’ system design and lowering their component sourcing costs.
With Finwave proprietary GaN-on-Si technology, we offer Power Amplifier products with enhanced linearity and enhanced power efficiency as well as RF Switch products with fast switching times and high-power capability up to 40W at mmWave frequencies.
What does the competitive landscape look like and how do you differentiate?
We are one of the few RF semiconductor companies with a portfolio of RF Switches and Power Amplifiers manufactured in GaN-on-Si technology. Most existing GaN-on-Si semiconductor companies are focusing on Power Electronics rather than RF applications.
We differentiate ourselves from other RF semiconductor companies with our high-performance and proprietary GaN-on-Si process technology and device architecture that allow Finwave to deliver performance for RF Switches and Power Amplifiers not achievable with other technologies.
In the Telecom Infrastructure space, we compete with GaN-on-SiC semiconductor companies, who have a much less favorable cost structure because of the high cost of SiC wafers and the limitations in scaling SiC wafer manufacturing up to 8” and eventually 12”.
In the handset Power Amplifier and Rf Front-End module market, we compete with GaAs HBT technology, which has limitations in its ability to deliver high power at mmWave frequencies.
In the RF Switch market, we compete with RF-SOI technology and pin-diode manufacturers. RF-SOI has limitations in terms of the power that can be delivered, especially above 10W, and pin-diodes are expensive components that require a lot of board real estate as well as additional components to operate.
How do customers normally engage with your company?
To engage with Finwave, customers can either talk to us directly or through a network of RF semiconductor distributors that we are in the process of expanding. The easiest way to get in touch with us or to get information about our technology and products is through our company web site at https://www.finwavesemi.com/
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