Rice university Patents - goolop27-weebit.s3-ap-southeast ...



The technology that Weebit uses was developed from James Tours research. The major breakthrough in this research was being able to use silicon oxide as the switching material in ReRAM. Originally James Tour’s research was funded by Sandisk, but they didn’t believe that they had created a silicon oxide switch and pulled their funding. James Tour and Rice university then took their discoveries patented them. Rice university PatentsSilicon oxide based memresistive device patent: Silicon oxides, particularly silicon dioxide (SiO2) have long been considered to be a passive, insulating component in the construction of electronic devices. However, in the embodiments presented herein, it is shown that silicon oxides (e.g., SiO2 and SiOx) may serve as the active switching material and electron transport element in electronic devices upon being converted into a switchably conductive state.In summary, the electronic devices disclosed herein have advantages that are among the following:Non-volatility: Once written or erased, the memory state remains when unbiased (i.e., there is no current flowing) for an indefinite amount of timeTwo-terminal structure: The write, erase, and read functions of the present electronic devices share the same electrodes in a two-terminal configuration, allowing for increased ease of miniaturization over the three-terminal structure of conventional transistors.Nondestructive reading endurance: The reading voltage used does not affect the stored memory states, if the reading voltage is below a certain level. Reading endurance shows no degradation after 10,000 continuous reading cycles for both ON and OFF states.Non-charge based memory state: No degradation was observed for the stored memory states after X-Ray, heavy ion and proton radiation exposure, demonstrating the non-charge based nature of the electronic devices and their potential use in radiation hardened electronics.Improved ON/OFF ratio: High ON/OFF ratios of up to 106 or greater can be achieved, particularly after further miniturization.Fast switching time: Pulse widths of ?1 μs and lower may be used for the writing/erasing operations.Potential high density: The two-terminal nature and small sizes of the electronic devices potentially allow compact 2-D and 3-D memory arrays to be patibility with CMOS technology: The structure and materials are fully compatible with standard CMOS technology.The benefits of Silicon oxide are discussed by James Tour here: “Silicon oxide is abundant, it is sand. There is plenty of it and it is non toxic. Silicon oxide is the best known material in the world studied more than any other material in the world. It has had over a trillion dollars and over a million person years invested into it because all of the silicon industry runs on silicon, silicon oxide interfaces. The reason we use silicon is because it can grow a stable oxide and we know how to control its growth. So, we know a lot about the material there is no retooling. We have chosen the material that works best.” Related papersYao, J.; Zhong, L.; Natelson, D.; Tour, J. M.?In situ?Imaging of the Conducting Filament in a Silicon Oxide Resistive Switch.?Nature Scientific Reports?2012,?2:242, 1-5., J.; Zhong, L.; Natelson, D.; Tour, J. M. Intrinsic Resistive Switching and Memory Effects in Silicon Oxide.?Appl. Phys. A?2011,?102, 835-839., J.; Zhong, L.; Natelson, D.; Tour, J. M. Silicon Oxide: A Non-innocent Surface for Molecular Electronics and Nanoelectronics Studies.?J. Am. Chem. Soc.?2011,?133, 941-948. siox materials for improvement in siox switching device performancesFrom patent: Despite great switching properties in SiOx unipolar memory, the switching properties have two limitations: - few endurance cycles (~ 1000 cycles) - high electroforming voltage (> 20 V). The above deficiencies can be obviated by using a porous SiOx. New RRAM memory structures employing a nanoporous (NP) silicon oxide (SiOx) material are discussed herein, which enables unipolar switching through an internal vertical-nanogap in the NP silicon oxide rather than an edge.Some benefits of porous silicon oxide mentioned in the patent: - the porous material reduced the forming voltage—the power needed to form conduction pathways—to less than two volts, a 13-fold improvement over the team's previous best and a number that stacks up against competing RRAM technologies - the porous silicon oxide also allowed the elimination of the need for a "device edge structure. That means it can take a sheet of porous silicon oxide and just drop down electrodes without having to fabricate edges, Tour said. "When we made our initial announcement about silicon oxide in 2010, one of the first questions I got from industry was whether we could do this without fabricating edges. At the time we could not, but the change to porous silicon oxide finally allows us to do that." - porous silicon oxide material increased the endurance cycles more than 100 times as compared with previous nonporous silicon oxide memories. - the porous silicon oxide material has a capacity of up to nine bits per cell that is highest number among oxide-based memories, and the multiple capacity is unaffected by high temperatures.SiOx Based Invisible / Transparent Nonvolatile MemoryPCT/US2012/025435 Patent: Invisible/transparent nonvolatile memory devices are discussed herein. More particularly, memory devices that are transparent regardless of memory density are provided herein. If transparent materials are utilized for the entire design, then the entire memory would be transparent, regardless of the density. My understanding: Transparent memory devices may allow the development of transparent electronics. With transparent memory you can, for example:have memory embedded within glass, i.e. make glass smart,use it for exotic new devices like transparent flexible memory chips use it to built on top of plastic, so it can even be part of the coating you’re looking at through the screen.Related papers:Yao, J.; Lin, J.; Dai, Y.; Ruan, G.; Yan, Z.; Li, L.; Zhong, L.; Natelson, D.; Tour, J. M. Highly Transparent Nonvolatile Resistive Memory Devices from Silicon Oxide and Graphene.?Nature Commun.?2012,?3, 1-8. “SiOx Based Nonvolatile Memory Architecture” Addressable SiOx Memory Array with Incorporated Diodes” Pat. 8,390,326 “Method for Fabrication of a Semiconductor Element and Structure Thereof”’s memory chips also received a ‘Hard-Rad’ status from NASA, meaning they are “impervious to the effects of radiation”. This is important for storage needs in satellite, military and similar niches. patents with LetiWeebit Nano and Leti filed two new patents optimising ReRAM performance. Electrical performance means the device behaviour in a product and the importance of these patents are the ability of the device to meet the specified requirements over time.Weebit Nano and Leti filed three new patents for improved yield and reliability of advanced ReRAM products.Weebit license agreement with Rice UniversityOn the 21st of December 2018, the licenese agreement between Rice University and Weebit was updated. Summary of key changes to the license agreement are:Payment structure refined to reflect the current commercialisation schedule and the additional focus on the embedded memory market, as well as revising the structure of royalties First annual minimum royalty payment delayed by one year from 1 January 2019 to 1 January 2020 to reflect the current commercialisation scheduleThe original Details on the Weebit licence agreement are below:(Fees and Royalties): Weebit is required to pay Rice University a license initiation fee of $20,000 and the following royalties and fees:royalties calculated at 1.5% on adjusted gross sales (sales of licensed products less costs attributable to such sales); and 25% of any cash or non-cash consideration received as consideration under a sub-licence(Annual Minimum Royalties): in addition to the above, Weebit will pay Rice University annual minimum royalties on the following milestone dates:1 January 2019 - $10,000;1 January 2020 - $20,000;1 January 2021 - $100,000;1 January 2022 - $250,000; and1 January 2023 and each 1 January of every year thereafter - $500,000, with each annual minimum milestone payment creditable towards royalties due in the forthcoming year; (First Commercial Sale): Weebit or a sublicensee will make a first commercial sale of a licensed product on or before 1 July 2019 and thereafter keep available such licensed product for sale. Rice University may terminate or render the agreement non-exclusive at any time after 4 years from the execution date of the Rice University License Agreement if Rice University determine that progress reports do not demonstrate effective achievement of the commercialisation of the licensed products; ................
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