Smoltek Semi’s recent acqui­si­tion of a plas­ma-enhanced atom­ic lay­er depo­si­tion (PEALD) sys­tem is a tech­ni­cal­ly sig­nif­i­cant announce­ment. The fig­ures men­tioned in the press release – reduc­ing an iter­a­tion loop from up to a month to a sin­gle day – are remark­able in them­selves. But to under­stand the full strate­gic val­ue of this invest­ment, we need to go deep­er. We must under­stand what the tech­nol­o­gy is, why it was a crit­i­cal bot­tle­neck, and what it means to move it from an exter­nal ser­vice to an inter­nal core competence.

What is atomic layer deposition?

Atom­ic Lay­er Depo­si­tion (ALD) is an advanced man­u­fac­tur­ing method used to build ultra-thin mate­r­i­al films. The process works via a repeat­ing chem­i­cal cycle, build­ing up mate­r­i­al lit­er­al­ly one atom­ic lay­er at a time.

What makes ALD unique is its extreme pre­ci­sion. The method pro­vides atom­ic-scale con­trol over thick­ness, which is impos­si­ble to achieve with tra­di­tion­al meth­ods. Crit­i­cal­ly, ALD has the unique abil­i­ty to per­fect­ly and uni­form­ly coat com­plex 3D struc­tures, reach­ing deep into com­plex geome­tries where oth­er tech­niques fail.

Why the ALD process is crucial for Smoltek

In Smoltek’s man­u­fac­tur­ing of CNF-MIM capac­i­tors, the ALD process serves a crit­i­cal, dual func­tion. It is used to apply both the ultra-thin, insu­lat­ing dielec­tric lay­er and the con­duc­tive met­al elec­trodes that encase the car­bon nanofibers (CNF).

The car­bon nanofiber struc­ture is inher­ent­ly com­plex and three-dimen­sion­al. Only ALD can coat these nanofibers uni­form­ly from all angles, ensur­ing all lay­ers are per­fect­ly con­sis­tent across the mas­sive sur­face area the fibres cre­ate. Any thin spots or gaps would cause the capac­i­tor to fail; any thick spots would reduce its capac­i­tance density.

Smoltek has specif­i­cal­ly invest­ed in plas­ma-enhanced ALD (PEALD). This process adds ener­gy via an ionised gas plas­ma (typ­i­cal­ly argon or nitro­gen). This plas­ma pro­vides addi­tion­al reac­tive species – ener­gised atoms and rad­i­cals – mak­ing it pos­si­ble to cre­ate high-qual­i­ty, dense films at much low­er tem­per­a­tures, which is essen­tial to pro­tect the sen­si­tive mate­ri­als and struc­tures with­in the capacitor.

From bottleneck to strategic accelerator

Before this invest­ment, Smoltek Semi was depen­dent on exter­nal ser­vice providers for ALD coat­ings. This cre­at­ed a fun­da­men­tal bot­tle­neck in the devel­op­ment work.

A sin­gle iter­a­tion cycle – where sam­ples were sent, queued for coat­ing, coat­ed, returned, and then analysed – could take up to one month. This long feed­back loop made mean­ing­ful process devel­op­ment and opti­mi­sa­tion almost impos­si­ble. Fur­ther­more, each exter­nal coat­ing rep­re­sent­ed a sig­nif­i­cant oper­a­tional cost.

By bring­ing the process in-house, Smoltek Semi becomes its own top pri­or­i­ty. The team can now com­plete an entire coat­ing cycle in a sin­gle day. The ALD sys­tem is installed at the Chalmers MC2 world-class clean­room, a facil­i­ty that main­tains Class 1000 and Class 100 stan­dards and pro­vides access to essen­tial char­ac­ter­i­sa­tion equip­ment and research exper­tise. With Smoltek’s oth­er CVD tools already at MC2, the entire R&D work­flow is now seam­less­ly inte­grat­ed in one location.

An investment that minimises three key risks

The imme­di­ate time sav­ing is obvi­ous, but the strate­gic val­ue lies just as much in proac­tive­ly elim­i­nat­ing sev­er­al crit­i­cal busi­ness risks.

1. Sup­ply chain and ven­dor risk: The depen­den­cy on exter­nal ven­dors is gone. Smoltek no longer needs to wor­ry about a supplier’s equip­ment down­time, price changes, or pri­ori­ti­sa­tion of com­pet­ing clients. The com­pa­ny now has full con­trol over one of its most crit­i­cal processes.
2. IP risk: Every time sam­ples were sent out, pro­pri­etary infor­ma­tion about device archi­tec­ture, mate­r­i­al stacks, and process para­me­ters was dis­closed to third par­ties. By keep­ing the process in-house, all this vital know-how is protected.
3. Qual­i­ty and con­sis­ten­cy risk: Dif­fer­ent exter­nal ven­dors may use dif­fer­ent equip­ment and stan­dards, intro­duc­ing vari­abil­i­ty. With its own in-house ALD, Smoltek main­tains com­plete vis­i­bil­i­ty and con­trol, stan­dar­d­is­ing the process and opti­mis­ing it specif­i­cal­ly for the company’s pro­pri­etary car­bon nanofiber structures.

A knowledge generator that builds an IP moat

While the invest­ment deliv­ers sig­nif­i­cant oper­a­tional cost sav­ings, its pri­ma­ry val­ue is strate­gic. This invest­ment is fun­da­men­tal­ly an accel­er­a­tor for future rev­enue generation.

The tim­ing of rev­enue depends on how quick­ly the com­pa­ny can val­i­date and launch Gen-One of the CNF-MIM capac­i­tor tech­nol­o­gy. By com­press­ing the devel­op­ment time­line, this invest­ment direct­ly accel­er­ates the time-to-market.

In the long term, the new tool is a “knowl­edge gen­er­a­tor”. By oper­at­ing ALD process­es in-house, Smoltek accu­mu­lates pro­pri­etary data, opti­mi­sa­tion insights, and process recipes that become increas­ing­ly dif­fi­cult for com­peti­tors to repli­cate. This knowl­edge com­pounds over time and cre­ates a gen­uine com­pet­i­tive moat. This new know-how can, in turn, be patent­ed, fur­ther strength­en­ing Smoltek’s patent portfolio.

A signal of progress and industrialisation

The tim­ing of this invest­ment is no coin­ci­dence. It sig­nals a strate­gic shift. While ear­ly research can tol­er­ate slow feed­back cycles, the cur­rent phase of val­i­da­tion and indus­tri­al­i­sa­tion demands a com­plete­ly dif­fer­ent pace. The one-month exter­nal coat­ing cycle was no longer acceptable.

For share­hold­ers and investors, the pur­chase of the ALD sys­tem is a con­crete man­i­fes­ta­tion of progress. It shows the com­pa­ny is tak­ing con­trol of its own des­tiny, proac­tive­ly man­ag­ing risk, and is laser-focused on accel­er­at­ing the com­mer­cial­i­sa­tion of the Gen-One capac­i­tor. It is about build­ing long-term, defen­si­ble val­ue – one atom­ic lay­er at a time.