Sumitomo Metal Mining to Double Sapphire Substrate Output

Sumitomo Metal Mining (SMM) will double output capacity of sapphire substrates to 10,000 substrates per month at Ome plant, Tokyo by the end of September 2008. Sapphire substrates are applied to white light emitting diode (LED) chips. The firm started commercial production of sapphire substrates in 2007 with initial capacity at 5,000 substrates per month. The firm plans to continue capacity expansion along the demand growth and aims 70,000 substrates per month in 2010.SMM can provide large-size sapphire substrates with more than 3-inch diameter while offshore makers mainly provide 2-inch substrates. Japanese consumers offer substrates with more than 3-inch diameter since they can cut out more LED chips from larger substrates. The consumers recently request 4-inch substrates.SMM supplies sapphire substrates to epitaxial wafer makers. White LED chips are cut out from an epitaxial wafer; a sapphire substrate on which gallium nitride epitaxial layers are grown. Fuji-Keizai, Japanese market researcher, forecasts global market of white LED could grow to 28 billion units in 2011 from 11 billion units in 2007.