In the Spotlight: Intematix
Oct 1, 2005

Bright Ideas Quarterly

Given Intematix’s recent success in developing, licensing and pioneering new markets for phosphor and LED technologies, we feel the company is a worthy choice for this quarter’s Spotlight.

Founded in March 2000 and based in Fremont, California, Intematix Corp. develops next-generation nano, bulk, and thin-film materials. The founders of the Company, Dr. Xiao-Dong Xiang and Dr. Yi-Q un Li, are leading experts in phosphor materials design, validation, and manufacturing. Their expertise has led to proprietary discovery methods that rapidly increase the time between material discovery and high vol-ume manufacturing. For example, whereas conventional materials discovery can take up to five to 10 years, Intematix claims that its technology and processes can achieve similar results in as little as six to 12 months. The keys behind Intematix’s innovation include a top-down materials design and discovery process, coupled with massively parallel synthesis and characterization of materials. Intematix’s technology has application in several distinct end markets, including solid-state lighting (LEDs), security and medical imaging, fuel cells, and next-generation high-density non-volatile memory.

Currently, Intematix is focused on the LED market, developing and providing advanced phosphor materials to LED manufacturers for use in a variety of display and lighting applications. Within this high growth market, Intematix’s core competency is the development of new phosphors for white LEDs, including the capability to provide customized white lighting color according to its customers’ specifications. The firm also offers red, orange, yellow, green, and blue phosphors for blue and ultraviolet LED applications. At this point, Intematix is shipping its White Lightning Y450 and White Lightning Y460 phosphors for white LEDs. Products that are sampling cur-rently include both warm white and green phosphors for the blue and ultraviolet LED market. Importantly, Intematix’s products provide an alternative to those from Japan-based Nichia Corp., which holds the patent for the dominant phosphor technology known as YAG:Ce (yttrium aluminum garnet with celium). While Toyoda Gosei/Tridonic, GEL-core, and Cree hold patents related to phosphor technology, the other major supplier of phosphors to the market is OSRAM. Although Nichia locked up the majority of garnet-based phosphor material combinations, their patent claims failed to mention Ter-bium (Tb), which allowed OSRAM to lay claim to TAG (Terbium Aluminum Garnet) phosphor technology. As an alternative phosphor provider to Nichia's patented YAG solution, Intematix has generated significant interest in its technology. Initial customers include LED packagers such as Unity Opto, Edison, Pro Light, Advanced Optoelectronic Technology, and Lumi Micro, to name a few. In addition, Intematix is working with two of the four top Japanese trading companies (Sumitomo, Mitsui, Mitsubishi and Maru Beni). From a competitive standpoint, Intematix claims that its Y460 phosphor is a direct replacement for YAG while its Y450 product is superior to YAG in terms of brightness. The disadvantage of TAG is its conversion efficiencyroughly 80% of YAG. Consequently, we estimate Nichia controls roughly 80% to 90% of the white phosphor converted market, which is also the most profitable segment of the LED market.

As we mentioned above, there is a “new kid” on the phosphor block, Intematix, which has discovered, licensed, and is now manufacturing silicate-based phosphor technology. The company claims to have delicately maneuvered around the patent minefield that its predecessors such as OSRAM, Nichia, TG/Tridonic, and GELcore have laid down. How does Intematix do this? Based on the information available to us, Intematix appears to use a different material structure, particle size, and conver-sion technologythree critical elements that have been scrutinized in past infringe-ment lawsuits (e.g., OSRAM Opto vs. Dominant Semiconductor). First, Intematix uses a silicate-based phosphor rather than a garnet structure, effectively solving the material issue. Secondly, Intematix claims particle size between 10-20µ, and their average particle size, or D50, is not 5µ, which Osram's patents claim. Finally, with respect to conversion technology (or the way in which the phosphors are excited), Intematix claims their excitation is very different than either YAG or TAG structures. Specifically, the silicate phosphors that Intematix uses prefer to be excited below 460nm continuously to ultra violet (UV) range, whereas the YAG phosphors typically peak at 360nm and 460nm. Intematix believes this point highlights a clear difference in conversion or excitation. Given Intematix’s breakthroughs, we conclude this rather small private company is changing the LED market by enabling LED packagers to pioneer new applications such as LCD backlighting, solid state lighting, and other applications that were limited by multi-chip designs. We suspect Intematix is becoming a well-known name in the LED industry and encourage others to monitor their progress.

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