Porotech’s microLED innovation is hailed by former Rolls-Royce CEO as new headquarters opened

Porotech, a pioneer of new microLED technology, has celebrated the opening of its new headquarters.

The company welcomed Warren East, former CEO of Rolls-Royce Holdings, who delivered an opening speech to guests before joining Porotech’s co-founder and CEO, Dr Tongtong Zhu, to cut the ribbon on the state-of-the-art premises at Evolution Business Park in Impington.

The University of Cambridge spin-out, which also has facilities in Hsinchu in Taiwan and in Arizona, in the United States, gave guests the chance to tour the new site and enjoy demonstrations of its game-changing technology, including its screens, augmented reality glasses and transparent displays. They were able to quiz Dr Zhu about its innovations in microLED and gallium nitride (GaN) semiconductor technology, and the exciting future for the company.

Warren, who spent 12 years as CEO of Arm Holdings before moving to Rolls-Royce, said: “Porotech has some fundamental building blocks here to be hugely successful. Its innovation, the application of their hard work, and their ability to remain agile in how they approach the market and their customers means it’s all the more likely that something impressive will spring out of this building.”

Dr Zhu, who has a PhD in materials science from the University of Cambridge, added: “I am delighted to celebrate the opening of our new facility. This new space will enable us to expand and help us reach our full potential.”

Porotech, which announced a $20m Series A investment one year ago, has developed a new trademarked technology called DynamicPixelTuning (DPT) for microLEDs using its proprietary PoroGaN material.

While normal microLED displays require red, green and blue sub-pixels to produce their colours, a single microLED chip containing Porotech’s technology is able to produce any visible colour from a single pixel, including white light.

This has the potential for a revolutionary impact in display technology, by enabling a fourfold increase in pixel density, boosting brightness by 20 times and reducing size by a factor of three.

It means DPT can provide dramatic improvements in resolution and efficiency for every type of display – from large signage and TVs, to phone, tablets, laptops, smartwatches and HUDs, or in AR and VR applications.

Porotech says by having identical emitters on the same wafer that are able to produce full-colour displays, major roadblocks to the commercial viability of microLED displays can be circumvented.

Following the open day event last Thursday, Dr Zhu, who also has physics, electronics and engineering expertise, along with years of experience in the field of III-nitride semiconductor materials and devices, told the Cambridge Independent: “Our new HQ is imperative for our expansion plans. We have a new state-of-the-art facility which allows us to mass produce our PoroGaN materials in volume and continue to develop the material technology in-house. In addition, our expanded test and characterisation facility will enable us to create new test methodologies for quality assurance and actively improve the management of our global supply chain.

“The new facility marks a major milestone for the company. Firstly, this marks and signifies our mass production on monochrome single colour microLED materials, chips and displays, based on our groundbreaking PoroGaN material platform. The commercial launch of an end product with our technology embedded would be as early as Q1 2024. Secondly, our unique DPT technology offers a strong product-market fit and strong value propositions across multiple segments in the display industry.

“These are being continually refined as we co-develop the technology with major technology companies and players in the field. We are finalising significant long-term design-in projects with these players and prepare for mass production with our own manufacturing supply chain partners in order to proliferate the technology across multiple applications and worldwide.”

The company expects to double its 50-strong global workforce this year.