LONDON — The market for gallium nitride (GaN) radio frequency devices was $17 million in 2007, according to Yole Developpement. The market was split 65 percent in R&D, 17 percent defense and satellite, 16 percent 3G basestations and 2 percent deployed in LTE/WiMax applications.
With strong penetration of GaN into LTE/WiMax Yole is forecasting the market for GaN RF transistor could increase to about $100 million in 2010. This would imply 80 percent average annual growth and a market of about $30 million in 2008.
Yole predicted that in 2012 the GaN market will show that the R&D proportion will have fallen to 6 percent, defense and satellite 27%, 3G basestations 31 percent, LTE and WiMax 29 percent. The broadcast market would be 4 percent. Yole did not say how large the market would be in 2012.
"These GaN devices are now challenging the dominant position of silicon in an industrial playground in which a power amplifier market size of about $900 million is forecasted for 2008," said Philippe Roussel, project manager for compound semiconductors at Yole, in a statement.
Up to 2005, silicon LDMOS covered about 90 percent of the high power RF amplification applications in the 2-GHz and higher frequency range; the remaining market share was addressed by GaAs pHEMT technology.
Military applications were the first to use wide bandgap devices, especially with the silicon-carbide MESFET being developed through DARPA- and DoD-funded programs in the United States.
In 2006, Eudyna Devices Inc. (Yokohama, Japan) announced with Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corp. that a first 3G network using GaN HEMT had been deployed in Tokyo for test purposes. Commercial offerings from Cree RFMD and Nitronex followed, targeting both 3G and WiMax basestations and general purpose applications. In parallel, the first products for space applications are expected to be implemented in the next few years.
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