Ahead of the opening of SEMICON 2025, Korea's largest semiconductor equipment and materials exhibition, global semiconductor-related companies are rushing to visit Korea.

Imec, a global comprehensive semiconductor research and development organization, held a press conference at the Grand InterContinental Seoul Parnas in Samseong-dong, Seoul on the 18th.

At this symposium, where imec's research areas and key achievements were presented, imec CEO Luke van den Hove emphasized collaboration for the advancement of next-generation semiconductor technologies and revealed a vision for future semiconductor technology development looking ahead 5 to 10 years.

“Imec has adopted an industrial partnership model and has collaborated with major companies such as Intel, TI, Samsung Electronics, and TSMC on advanced research,” said CEO Luke van den Hove. “We have attracted major semiconductor companies by transitioning to 300mm wafers and launching core CMOS programs.”

Imec emphasized that global collaboration for semiconductor innovation is more important than ever, even amidst geopolitical crises, and introduced next-generation technologies that Imec is developing over the next 5 to 10 years.

Imec is introducing a backside interconnect roadmap leveraging increasingly precise wafer bonding technology, and is expanding its n-channel and p-channelWe are expanding the concept of stacking nanosheets to achieve scaling beyond lithography-based methods.


CEO Van den Hove said, “The importance of packaging technology is also increasing, and advanced packaging that increases integration is playing a large role in improving performance in the AI era by increasing the interconnect speed between heterogeneous chips,” and predicted, “I think CFET technology will be applied to nanosheets after the third generation.”

CFET is a structure that vertically stacks GAA-type transistors, and is being studied as a next-generation device structure that can maximize semiconductor efficiency by increasing transistor integration and reducing area. Imec is studying this CFET, heralding the emergence of next-generation devices.

Imec also anticipates semiconductor innovations in the medical and pharmaceutical industries. Imec is accelerating DNA sequencing using semiconductor technology, and is integrating photonics, imaging, and microfluidics into semiconductors for this purpose.

Based on this nanoelectronic technology, Imec has developed the Neuropixel probe, the Neuropixel 2.0, which enables recording of neurons in brain regions and circuits by integrating more than 5,000 recording points into a small brain implant. It is expected that this will lead to innovations in brain research and understanding.

CEO Luke van den Hove said in relation to the US-China conflict and the trade war between countries in the Trump 2.0 era, “Although recent geopolitical issues have raised threats, decoupling in R&D will only slow down the pace of innovation,” and predicted that “industry-wide decoupling will not deepen as technological development becomes more difficult.”

Meanwhile, at the Imec Technology Forum Korea (ITF KOREA) held in the afternoon of the same day, CEO Luc van den Hove gave an opening keynote speech, and Samsung Electronics, SK Hynix, ASML, and others participated and presented on the future of semiconductor technology.