Infineon to Produce World’s First 300mm GaN Power Fab in Europe - Electronics For You BUSINESS

Infineon's 300mm GaN power fab is not a capacity play—it is a cost-structure weapon. Current GaN lines run at 150-200mm, yielding roughly one-quarter to one-sixth the die count per wafer. Once 300mm yields stabilize, unit cost in the 650V-900V segment will compress to SiC parity within 18 months, fundamentally reshaping mid-power economics. Upstream, MOCVD epitaxy toolmakers (Aixtron, Veeco) face a 300mm chamber bottleneck that will gate the entire supply chain. Downstream, STMicroelectronics and Navitas must accelerate their own 300mm roadmaps or cede EV 800V traction inverters and AI data-center power supplies to Infineon by 2026. The European siting is a geopolitical hedge: it locks in EU Chips Act subsidies, insulates against export-control-driven equipment restrictions, and satisfies OEM localization mandates. Over the next 12-24 months, expect GaN-on-Si to erode SiC's position below 1200V. Wolfspeed's 200mm SiC investment faces a dimensional-downgrade threat. Compound-semiconductor players in Taiwan, China and mainland China that cannot crack 300mm epitaxy yield within two years will be locked into low-margin packaging niches in the global power chain.