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Here, in our series on the latest EW BrightSparks of 2023, we highlight Claudia Ferreira who is a Materials Engineer at the Compound Semiconductor Applications (CSA) Catapult.
Achievements
Claudia’s manager at CSA described her as an outstanding asset to the Compound Semiconductor Applications Packaging team. Her passion and drive ensure that her and the team deliver exceptional results on CR&D and commercial projects.
Delivering excellent work, and often deputising for experienced colleagues, she has been promoted from Associate Engineer to Materials Engineer. Her manager outlined that Claudia is an outstanding employee supporting several collaborative research and development projects at the Catapult, helping to take projects from initial ideas through to completion.
Having graduated in 2017 – with an Integrated Masters in Engineering of Micro and Nanotechnologies at the New University of Lisbon (Portugal) – Claudia joined CSA Catapult in lockdown as a Graduate Engineer.
She led the SpaceForge project as a Graduate Engineer, an in-space manufacturing company developing the world’s first returnable satellite, while the project lead was away. The project was completed on time with quality results. She did the literature search, set up the laboratory, sourced components, and planned experiments. After the impressive project delivery, the customer visited the Catapult to see the experimental setup and then replicated it for their own manufacturing process.
During the project she coordinated the materials analysis with external vendors, collated data, analysed the results and prepared the project report. And the end-result was a very happy customer, which helped secured new clients for the Catapult.
Her manager outlines some of the technical scope of the work:
“Claudia developed the Cu-sintering process, which is a brand-new semiconductor assembly process used for high-power electronics packaging, that can be used for applications in power electronics assembly for automotive and energy. Thermal management of compound semiconductor devices is crucial to developing reliable and energy-efficient applications. For power electronics devices, the devices heat up to 300C and conventional solder assemblies don’t work. Therefore, these conventional die attachment techniques are replaced by high-temperature tolerant sinter paste materials. Cu-sintering is a new and novel assembly process in the industry and very few companies have got this know-how globally.”
“As with any process, it was a key part of the process trying to understand how we can achieve reliable and repeatable results, making the process more appropriate to replace silver sintering. The Cu-sintering process is superior to the current industry standard silver sintering process, which is expensive. The cost of Cu-sinter paste is 1/10 of Ag sinter paste and so, CSA Catapult can reduce the manufacturing cost of high power and high-temperature electronics assembly, applications are in power electronics assembly for automotive and energy.”
“Claudia developed 300um and 125um wire bonding techniques for one of our major projects, ESCAPE, and led the assembly process for the development of 20 prototypes. She is also supporting the projects SiP and FutureBEV through innovative assembly processes.”
Furthermore, she has generated useful documents on types of wire bonds and their impact on electrical parameters of electronics assembly, which is used by engineers at CSA Catapult and is particularly useful for driving the GaNSiC project.
In summary, Claudia’s extensive technical skills have covered the development of several assembly, inspection, and testing activities.
Highly active in employee engagement activities, she has also won multiple awards in Catapult-wide employee surveys.
Electronics Industry ViewpointAsh Madni, MD of Madni Technologies, also shared his viewpoint on Claudia’s entry.
“Another example of a very good ‘bright spark’ candidate, as Claudia has all the elements of a brilliant engineer,” Ash told us.”
“Armed with technical and soft skills, her career is very bright! Well done Claudia.”
Community
In terms of community work, Claudia is an active member of the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) and participates in volunteering activities.
For example, as an active member of the CSA Catapult Packaging team, Claudia is a STEM ambassador and mentor. She is currently mentoring the UK Electronics and Skills Foundation interns as they undertake their internship at the Catapult, acting as a buddy and engineering role model for the next generation of engineers.
She is described as a proactive member of the team and is involved in several activities across the company. As well as being a member of the Inclusion Group, Claudia was one of the key members who was involved in writing CSA Catapult’s Equality Diversity and Inclusion Charter, we learned.
Claudia is also a qualified Mental Health First Aider and is an avid member of CSA Catapult’s Inclusion Group.
More recently, Claudia was involved in a fundraising event at the Catapult to raise money for the British Red Cross Ukraine Appeal. The activity involved walking, running or cycling over 1,600 miles, over two months. This is the equivalent of the distance from CSA Catapult’s Innovation Centre to Lviv in Ukraine.
Image: CSA – Claudia with her EW BrightSparks award at the 2023 Elektras
See also: Elektra Awards 2023 – The Winners
