LGDinTECH Insights: Episode 6

Liz Chatelain: Welcome back to LGDinTECH podcast. This is the place where we explore the intersection of advanced material and the next frontier of human innovation. I wanna introduce a new term to you today: TGD, which stands for Technology Grade Grown Diamond.

Today we’re moving to the Atomic Heart of Quantum Revolution. When people think of diamond, they think of luxury, but in the labs around the world, diamond is something entirely different: the world’s most powerful semiconductors, and ultimately the platform for quantum sensing.

Joining us today is a visionary at the center of this transformation, Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier, the CTO and Co-founder of QuantumDiamonds, born as a spinoff from the Technical University of Munich.

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: Thanks for having me.

Liz Chatelain: Can you just give us a little bit of background and maybe some overview of what’s happening at QuantumDiamonds?

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: Yeah, sure. The core of the technology is diamond based. We use defects in diamond called nitrogen vacancy centers to detect and measure mostly magnetic fields, and we apply this in the semiconductor industry where we are looking at magnetic fields produced by computer chips to localize failures and defects.

This helps industry leaders like Nvidia or Intel improve their products, find defects in manufacturing, and make more reliable chips for the next generation.

At the moment, we’re launching the first tools here. We’re also looking forward to moving toward inspection in the production line itself, inspecting every die and every wafer manufactured for defects, reducing the cost of each chip by introducing new metrology tools.

Liz Chatelain: Fascinating. I didn’t know about that whole inline process. That’s very exciting.

Liz Chatelain: Why don’t you share with us the short-term and long-term goal for QuantumDiamonds?

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: In the short term, we’re focusing on failure analysis, which is more of a lab-based market. In parallel, we are developing a tool for inline metrology where the name of the game is throughput. You really want to measure quickly, keep up with production machines, and be very reliable.

We hope to launch something around 2028.

Liz Chatelain: Most people view diamonds as valuable because of their flawless nature. However, in the quantum world, value comes specifically because of intentional defects in the NV centers. How important are these NV centers?

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: For us they’re incredibly important. But they also have to be placed in the most flawless diamonds that we can produce. It’s crucial that the diamonds are what we call electronic grade, very pure.

These defects are atomic scale. One nitrogen atom replaces a carbon atom, and one carbon atom is missing. They trap electrons, and we can use their emitted light to measure magnetic fields.

Liz Chatelain: So lab-grown diamond enables applications that natural diamonds just can’t match?

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: I don’t think we’ve ever tried natural diamonds seriously. We are really looking for high-quality crystalline material. Every defect traps electrons, every electron makes noise, and that prohibits our measurements.

Liz Chatelain: Diamond also allows quantum applications to work at room temperature, correct?

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: Exactly. Diamond is such a good electronic insulator. That’s why it is so suitable for quantum technologies and why you can use it at room temperatures. That’s one of the core advantages compared to other quantum platforms.

Liz Chatelain: Where do you see the biggest impact first?

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: In sensing there are many applications. Biomedical is promising. Battery navigation is a big one. But in semiconductors it’s the most prominent. Diamond can be used for failure analysis, inspection, heat management, and even as a semiconductor material itself.

Liz Chatelain: People compare silicon pricing to diamond pricing. How do you address that?

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: Diamond pricing is a big topic. In high-tech systems, diamond is only a fraction of the total cost. But for mass manufacturing, cost matters more. Lab-grown diamonds still need to get cheaper.

Liz Chatelain: How important is local supply chain for a company like yours?

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: Supply chain is very critical for us. We try to keep the nitrogen vacancy process in-house. On the substrate side, we prefer a US or European supply chain because semiconductors are a strategic topic.

Liz Chatelain: Any final thoughts?

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: We see ourselves as a semiconductor tooling company. We compete with existing technologies, and we believe diamond-based metrology and inspection tools will help enable the next generation of semiconductor fabs.

Liz Chatelain: Thank you so much for joining us today.

Dr. Fleming Bruckmaier: Thank you.