Merck renames displays business as it buys French metrology company

Merck in Germany is boosting its electronics business with the acquisition of Unity-SC in Grenoble, France, for €155m and renaming its displays business.

Unity-SC makes metrology and inspection instrumentation and expands portfolio in key technologies for AI applications and will become part of the Electronics business, while the Display Solutions business unit will operate under the name “Optronics” from 2025 as its converges with the semiconductor business.

Both are part of the Electronics business which in the United States and Canada operates as EMD Electronics. Having developed expertise in optical physics and materials through the work with LCD and OLED displays, the Electronics business is now driving the convergence of optics and semiconductors to meet the demands of next-generation AI, photonics and on-chip optic technologies.

• CEO interview: Unity-SC

“As the industry moves towards more complex and integrated systems, the need for comprehensive solutions and precise metrology and inspection tools has become increasingly important. With our Optronics business and the acquisition of Unity-SC, we have significantly expanded our portfolio to include metrology solutions for semiconductor and opto-electronic manufacturing. This convergence signals an extension of our relevance in the electronics ecosystem; where materials science, delivery, metrology and inspection, work hand-in-hand to enable better, faster, more efficient and more reliable production of next-generation chips and devices,” said Kai Beckmann, Member of the Executive Board of Merck and CEO Electronics.

Further developments of advanced Liquid Crystal (LC) and OLED materials remain an important part of the portfolio for Augmented Reality/Virtual Reality/Mixed Reality (AR/VR/MR), combining  optronics and semiconductor knowledge with metrology systems,

Unity-SC is based in Montbonnot-Saint-Martin near Grenoble, France, and employs approximately 160 people, of whom 70 work in research & development. They will join the approximately 8,000 employees of Merck’s Electronics business.

UnitySC specializes in equipment for optical inspection and metrology in the semiconductor industry and supplies a leading wafer & chip maker in France, as well as leading Chip makers in Taiwan, Korea, & worldwide. It is a key supplier of metrology tools for controlling TSV (Through Silicon Via), a critical step in the manufacturing of HBM (High Bandwidth Memory) stacks and is also a key supplier in the compound semiconductor industry.

It is starting construction of a new factory in Saint-Ismier, France (above), which will become the cornerstone of its industrial production when production starts in 2026, and it will eventually increase the company’s annual metrology and inspection machine output by four times.