From Microphones to Photonics: Leveraging CMOS

摘要

Although it may sound like a new heavy metal band, Akustica is actually a spin-off from Pittsburgh-based Carnegie Mellon, and part of the growing ranks of fabless companies that are leveraging the existing base of CMOS foundries to fabricate chips with functionality that has little to do with CMOS. Akustica uses the Metal 1 of the CMOS process to fabricate the mesh of a microphone. "What we've done is figure out how to take standard CMOS — conventional CMOS that's offered by all the foundries ? and, through a series of proprietary post-CMOS etching steps, convert the CMOS into a CMOS MEMS chip," said Akustica CEO and founder Ken Gabriel, talking about new products at one of the SEMICON West technology platforms.