Diamond Foundry unveils world's first 200mm single-crystal diamond wafer for AI chip cooling

Diamond Foundry has announced the world's first 200mm single-crystal diamond wafer, a massive lab-grown gem aimed at semiconductor cooling as AI chips create larger thermal problems. The company says single-crystal diamond can act as an extreme efficient thermal conductor while keeping electrical insulating properties. The wafer is about the same size that semiconductor fabs use for older processes, and Diamond Foundry says "Single-crystal diamond has entered the wafer-scale era."

Why diamond for cooling

Diamonds have exceptional cooling capabilities because of excellent thermal conductivity. The material is estimated to be at least five times more conductive than copper. Diamond Foundry's 200mm single-crystal diamond wafer is made as a high-quality single-crystal piece rather than a polycrystalline gem. Although the former is difficult to manufacture, it allows diamond to become an extreme efficient thermal conductor while retaining electrical insulating properties. This efficiency should help cut down on hotspots, making single-crystal diamonds an excellent solution for AI chip cooling.

Scaling and next steps

Diamond Foundry was founded in 2012 and acknowledged scientists who have worked on the scale problem of single-crystal diamonds since the early 2000s. The sample shown by the company remains unpolished, meaning it still needs to go through some processes to make it suitable for chipmakers. The company also showed a graph indicating that it is now thought possible to create a D300 single-crystal diamond wafer before 2030, matching the size of wafers used in leading node processes.

Other companies in diamond cooling

Diamond Foundry is not the only company looking at lab-grown diamonds for semiconductor cooling. Akash Systems secured $18.2 million in CHIPS Act funding in 2024 to produce gallium nitride fused with synthetic diamond, which it claims will reduce temperatures by 20 degrees C. The De Beers Group is building a copper-plated diamond composite material aimed at improving cooling efficiency for AI, high-performance computing, and GaN RF devices. Frore Systems is also diving into diamond-infused watercooling cold plates for Nvidia's next-generation AI GPUs.

CEO comment

"This is one of those milestones that once seemed almost impossible. Hundreds of DF engineers, scientists, and technicians contributed to us getting here. It is the accumulated result of countless experiments, failures, inventions, rebuilt machines, and insights over more than a decade," Diamond Foundry CEO Martin Roscheisen said. "Stefan and Martin pursued this goal for 25 years. There are very few examples in technology of someone sticking to a really hard scientific challenge with that level of perseverance. They kept going when the prevailing view was that single-crystal diamond simply could not be made at this scale. Today, the perseverance shows as the first-ever D200mm single-crystal diamond. And best of all, it makes D300mm predictable as well."

Sources: Tom's Hardware