News and Events

We are delighted to report that the Director of the EPSRC National Epitaxy Facility, Professor Jon Heffernan, attended the Innovate UK Global Expert Mission (GEM) in Semiconductors in the Republic of Korea (ROK) from 29th January to 2nd February.

The visit was arranged to enhance collaboration in semiconductor innovation between UK businesses and academia and ROK’s significant semiconductor industry. Through a series of meetings, the mission reviewed key technologies, policies, and strategies to develop a long-term engagement between the two countries.

The week was a great success and included discussions with Samsung Electronics and HK Hynix, and a tour of the Semiconductor Research Centre facilities and clean room based at Seoul National University. The GEM also attended the SEMICON Korea 2024 conference, which included meetings with key players in the Korean semiconductor industry.

The group of UK semiconductor experts met private and public sector organisations in South Korea to find out more about the semiconductors landscape and explore a potential collaboration in manufacture, design and development, compound semiconductors (e.g., photonics and quantum), and advanced packaging such as heterogeneous integrations and silicon photonics.

The visit was a great opportunity for the National Epitaxy Facility to work together with leading innovators in semiconductor research in South Korea and to further international collaborations as part of the UK Semiconductor Strategy.

Innovate UK Global Expert Missions (GEM) are designed to develop collaborations between governments, organisations, enterprises, societies, and people across the world.

Follow-on calls for collaborative R&D between the UK and ROK will be framed based on the findings of this successful visit.

To read more about the visit, please click: Innovate UK’s Global Expert Mission to South Korea

A tour of the training cleanroom facilities of the Inter-University Semiconductor Research Centre (ISRC) at Seoul National University