NY Creates and CEA-Leti announce partnership

These devices will be produced using the industry-standard 300mm wafer scale. The partnership was unveiled at the annual Leti Innovation Days in Grenoble.

Representatives from the New York Center for Research, Economic Advancement, Technology, Engineering, and Science (NY CREATES), located in Albany, New York, and CEA-Leti of Grenoble, France, formalised this joint development agreement. The collaboration aims to leverage each organisation’s strengths in memory device research and development. CEA-Leti will bring its expertise in magnetics, spintronics, and device testing, while NY CREATES will offer its state-of-the-art facilities, process integration knowledge, and materials process development for 300mm silicon platforms.

“By expanding our partnership with CEA-Leti and applying their recognised expertise in device physics and architectures, NY CREATES looks forward to jointly developing innovative technologies for computing. While we are known for our world-class Albany NanoTech Complex with experts in R&D focus areas ranging from advanced logic technologies to heterogeneous integration and more, this initiative’s focus on novel memory is an area in which we can break barriers together,” said Dave Anderson, President, NY CREATES. “A first objective of this collaboration will be to develop novel magnetic memory architectures and integration. This international partnership will help to address present-day memory needs as computing power continues to progress, and we anticipate a fruitful collaboration.”

“This collaboration will allow CEA-Leti to expand its capability to validate innovative concepts in synergy with the various facilities we have in Grenoble,” said Sébastien Dauvé, CEO, CEA-Leti. “We strongly believe that our collaboration will be a key enabler for both NY CREATES and CEA-Leti to be much more efficient in the lab-to-fab transition and to better impact our respective local ecosystems with more mature innovations.”

The first research initiative under this partnership aims to explore two new types of memory devices: Spin Orbit Torque (SOT) Magnetoresistive Random Access Memory (MRAM) and Spin Transfer Torque (STT) MRAM. Both technologies employ the magnetisation of different materials to store data, with STT MRAM being known for its non-volatile nature and minimal power leakage, while SOT MRAM is recognised for its speed and efficiency.

The leaders of both research organisations anticipate that this two-year collaboration will leverage the extensive 300mm wafer research and development ecosystem at NY CREATES’ Albany NanoTech Complex, North America’s most advanced non-profit semiconductor R&D facility. CEA-Leti will contribute its top-tier engineering services and expertise to produce functional memory elements on 300mm wafers.