AIXTRON Acquires PlasmaSi

AIXTRON a leading provider of deposition equipment to the semiconductor industry, today announced that it has acquired privately held Silicon Valley-based PlasmaSi, Inc. effective April 1, 2015. The purchase price may reach up to $16 million and will be paid in cash.

PlasmaSi enables the encapsulation of organic thin-films by depositing ultra-thin and flexible barrier films through its proprietary technology which are particularly well-suited for next-generation OLED* (Organic Light Emitting Diode) display products including mobile phones, hand-held devices, tablets, wearables and large screen HDTV. While initially designed and targeted for those applications, PlasmaSi’s technology can also be used to manufacture large area OLED lighting products as well as to address future opportunities in encapsulation markets. AIXTRON will integrate PlasmaSi’s thin-film encapsulation process into its existing OLED cluster for customer demonstration purposes.

“While increasingly expanding our business focus towards OLED in the coming years, we were looking to broaden our technology portfolio as well as to strengthen our customer access by adding PlasmaSi to our product portfolio”, comments Martin Goetzeler, President and CEO of AIXTRON SE. “Thin-film encapsulation is an essential process step for OLED high volume manufacturing, specifically for flexible devices. In combining our OVPD technology with PlasmaSi’s innovative approach, we will be able to add significant value in the production of flexible OLED applications.”

Adam Kablanian, CEO and Chairman of the Board of PlasmaSi, explained: “We are delighted that we have found a strong partner in AIXTRON, a company that has an impressive track record in the successful commercialization of deposition technologies in the semiconductor equipment industry. Therefore, joining forces with AIXTRON is the best option for us and we are now looking forward to take our technology to the next level together. Thereby, we will strongly benefit from AIXTRON’s R&D and production capabilities as well as from its worldwide sales, service and support network.”