World leading manufacturer of short wavelength UV LEDs, Sensor Electronic Technology, Inc. (SETi), announced that it has put an expansion plan in motion to both expand its R&D efforts and to transition to its production line to high volume manufacturing, making it the first high volume supplier of UV LEDs shorter than 365nm, initially scaling to supply quantities of over 100 million LEDs per year.

SETi was first to market with short wavelength UV LEDs in 2004 and has remained the leading supplier with its product portfolio of LEDs and high power LED lamps from 240nm to 355nm.

SETi currently operates a 15,000 sq.ft. ISO9001 certified facility in Columbia, SC, where it runs a vertically integrated R&D and small volume production line with epitaxial growth, chip fab, packaging and test and analysis, plus a prototyping line for integration of its LEDs into complete systems. The first phase of the expansion, currently underway, involves retrofitting this facility to 20,000 sq.ft and converting it to the company’s R&D center. The expansion in this facility will predominantly be focused around additional clean room space for chip fab and device packaging, where new mask designs, processing techniques and packaging solutions will be developed to further improve the performance of SETi’s UVTOP® and UVClean® devices and ensure that SETi maintains its world leading position in the UV LED market.

SETi has recently closed on the purchase of a new property, also in Columbia, SC, where it will focus its high volume manufacturing lines. SETi’s growth plans include the expansion of this new facility to 130,000 sq.ft. Initially, this facility will house SETi’s proprietary production MOCVD reactors where the company will focus on the high volume manufacturing of its MEMOCVD® process that will be used for the scale up in volume of its UV LEDs and a new Engineering Center for the development of new applications and production of custom solutions.