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EpiGaN Expanding into Asia with ACAPITAL Investment

August 29, 2016 by Jeff Shepard

EpiGaN announced that the Brussels/Beijing-based European private equity fund ACAPITAL has joined the initial investors in EpiGaN to fund the company's expansion in particular to Asian markets. EpiGaN, operating out of Hasselt, Belgium, is a key global player in developing and delivering GaN-on-Si and GaN-on-SiC (Silicon Carbide) material solutions worldwide. Gallium Nitride, the most important semiconductor after Silicon, started to revolutionize the energy sector by enabling significant energy loss reduction in power handling, smaller and lighter systems, such as for example for consumer power supplies, photovoltaic inverters, industrial sensors and more generally all products linked with IoT.

EpiGaN offers innovative and unique solutions for epitaxial GaN layer structures on 150 mm and 200mm Si substrates in particular with its in-situ SiN (Silicon Nitride) passivation, enabling more robust high-performance devices. EpiGaN's product portfolio covers state-of-the-art solutions for low-loss power switching, radio frequency/mobile communication power and sensor applications.

"We believe ACAPITAL is the right partner to support the expansion of our business activities into Asia, where we see great opportunities right now" said EpiGaN co-founder and CEO Dr Marianne Germain. "Our initial investors stay in place to support the continuous growth of the company." EpiGaN was founded in 2010 by Drs Marianne Germain (CEO), Joff Derluyn (CTO) and Stefan Degroote (COO), as a spin-off from renowned Belgian micro- and nano-electronics research center imec.

Andre Loesekrug-Pietri, founder and managing partner of ACAPITAL commented: "We are very pleased to support the growth of EpiGaN and to join its board of directors. EpiGaN has developed a unique expertise in the gallium-nitride-on-silicon technology for semiconductors, which will allow to build the next generation of energy-efficient devices. Applications are massive: power-electronics, internet of things, smart grid applications, mobile communications and electric mobility: most areas linked with Industry 4.0 and Energy Transition, which are core investment areas for ACAPITAL.”. He added : “EpiGaN is uniquely positioned to grasp a significant share of these high-growth markets. We look forward to help scale EpiGaN internationally and in Asia and China in particular, the largest market in the world."