IMEC expands research activities

April 7, 2009

April 7, 2009--IMEC (Leuven, Belgium), the Belgian nanoelectronics research institute, has begun expanding its Leuven campus facilities, starting with 2800 square meters of research labs and including the extension of its state-of-the-art clean room. With this extension, IMEC will expand its research on sub-32 nm CMOS, low-cost and high-efficiency solar cells, and biomedical electronics. IMEC also plans to construct a new office building later this year.

April 7, 2009--IMEC (Leuven, Belgium), the Belgian nanoelectronics research institute, has begun expanding its Leuven campus facilities, starting with 2800 square meters of research labs and including the extension of its state-of-the-art clean room. With this extension, IMEC will expand its research on sub-32 nm CMOS (see "IMEC builds 11 megapixel micromirror array for industrial applications"), low-cost and high-efficiency solar cells, and biomedical electronics. IMEC also plans to construct a new office building later this year.

The 2800 square meters of extra lab space includes 1200 square meters of ultra-clean processing area as an extension of its current 300 mm clean room. The clean room will be 450 mm-ready so that IMEC's advanced process technology research continues to follow industry standards. About 1600 square meters of new lab space will also be realized to expand both its research on silicon and organic solar cells and on biomedical electronics.

Today, IMEC employs about 1650 people. With this nearly $93 million dollar expansion (half paid by IMEC and half paid by the Flemish Government), IMEC looks to create about 300 new jobs in the coming years for researchers, operators, and lab assistants in both engineering and chemistry.

Gilbert Declerck, CEO of IMEC, said, "In 2009, IMEC lights 25 birthday candles [See "25-year anniversary"]. Thanks to the unbridled commitment of our researchers and the continuous vision and support of the government of Flanders, we succeeded in putting Flanders on top of the world in nanoelectronics research. IMEC today is addressing the major challenges of our planet: environment, energy and the ageing population. Concrete programs in areas such as solar energy, smart-grid, energy scavenging and in several biomedical and medical applications address those challenges. We are proud that we can further expand IMEC's activities so that we continue to offer valuable R&D programs to the industry that will contribute to Flanders, Europe and the world of tomorrow."

For more information, go to www.imec.be.

--Posted by Gail Overton, [email protected]; www.laserfocusworld.com.