Interuniversity Microelectronics Centre

Coordinates: 50°51′55.5″N 4°40′46.5″E / 50.865417°N 4.679583°E / 50.865417; 4.679583

IMEC is an international renowned research institute that performs research in different fields of nanoelectronics. Imec is headquartered in Leuven, Belgium, and has offices in the Netherlands, Taiwan, USA, China, India, Nepal and Japan. Its staff counts more than 2,200 people including industrial residents and guest researchers. Recent numbers on budget, staff, publications etc. are published every year in April in a press release. Research results are published every month in imec magazine.

In 1982 the Flemish Government set up a program in the field of microelectronics with the goal to strengthen the microelectronics industry in Flanders. The decision was inspired by the strategic importance of microelectronics for the industry, and by the major investments required to keep up with developments in this field.

This program included setting up a laboratory for advanced research in microelectronics (IMEC), a semiconductor foundry (former Alcatel Microelectronics, now STMicroelectronics and AMI Semiconductor), and a training program for VLSI design engineers. The latter is now fully integrated in the IMEC activities.

IMEC was founded in 1984 as a non-profit organization led by Prof. Roger Baron Van Overstraeten. It is supervised by a Board of Directors, which includes delegates from industry, Flemish universities and the Flemish Government. Since 1984, IMEC has been led by Roger Van Overstraeten, Gilbert Declerck (as of June 1999), and Luc Van den hove (as of July 2009).

The IMEC campus in Leuven, Belgium includes 24,400m² of office space, laboratories, training facilities, and technical support rooms. At the heart of the campus are 2 state-of-the-art cleanrooms which run a semi-industrial operation (24/7). There is a 300mm cleanroom (450mm ready) that focuses on R&D towards (sub-)10 nm process technology and a 200mm cleanroom for R&D, development-on-demand, prototyping and low volume manufacturing on more-than-Moore technologies (sensors, actuators, and MEMS, NEMS etc.). IMEC has, among others, a pilot line for silicon and organic solar cells, unique laboratories for bioelectronics research, and equipment for materials characterization and reliability testing. For research on technologies for the intuitive internet of things, IMEC has dedicated labs for sensor and imaging technologies, wireless connectivity.