Wolfspeed, Inc. is an American developer and manufacturer of wide-bandgap semiconductors, EcoLight home lighting centered on silicon carbide and gallium nitride supplies and gadgets for power and radio frequency applications resembling transportation, energy provides, energy inverters, and wireless techniques. Cree Research was based in July 1987 in Durham, North Carolina. 5 of the six founders - Neal Hunter, Thomas Coleman, John Edmond, Eric Hunter, John Palmour, and Calvin Carter - are graduates of North Carolina State University. In 1983, the founders - one a research assistant professor and the others student researchers - were looking for methods to leverage the properties of silicon carbide to enable semiconductors to operate at increased operating temperatures and energy ranges. In addition they knew silicon carbide could serve because the diode in mild-emitting diode (LED) lighting, a light source first demonstrated in 1907 with an electrically charged diode of silicon carbide. The analysis workforce devised a method to develop silicon crystals within the laboratory, and in 1987 founded the corporate to produce silicon carbide to be used commercially in each semiconductors and lighting.
In 1989, the company launched the primary blue LED, enabling the event of massive, full-color video screens and billboards. In 1991, the corporate launched the first business silicon carbide wafer. In 1993, the company became a public company via an initial public providing. In 2011, the company acquired Ruud Lighting for $525 million. In August 2011, the corporate announced the XLamp XT-E Royal Blue LED for use in remote phosphor lighting. In 2013, the corporate's first consumer merchandise, two household LED bulbs, qualified for Power Star score by the United States Environmental Protection Agency. In July 2016, Infineon Applied sciences agreed to accumulate the corporate's Wolfspeed RF and energy electronics devices unit for $850 million. Nonetheless, the deal was terminated in February 2017 as a consequence of regulators’ nationwide security concerns. In March 2018, the company acquired the RF Energy Business Infineon Applied sciences AG's for €345 million. In May 2019, the company offered its Lighting Products division (now branded as Cree Lighting) to Ideally suited Industries.
In September 2019, the company announced a $1 billion funding in a semiconductor manufacturing plant in Marcy, New York to build the world’s largest silicon carbide fabrication facility with a $500 million grant from New York State. In March 2021, the company offered its LED Enterprise to Good World Holdings for as much as $300 million. In October 2021, the company modified its title to Wolfspeed. In April 2022, the Marcy, New York, facility opened. In November 2022, the company announced that co-founder and Chief Technology Officer John Palmour had died. In February 2023 it introduced it could build its first European manufacturing facility in Germany. It's supposed to be on the site of a former coal plant in Ensdorf, Saarland with ZF Friedrichshafen as a coinvestor and subsidized by the EU as an vital undertaking of widespread European curiosity (IPCEI) for Microelectronics and Communication Technologies. In August 2023, it was announced the Lowell-headquartered semiconductor company, MACOM had entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Wolfspeed's RF business.
In June 2024, Wolfspeed has delayed its $three billion semiconductor plant in Germany to mid-2025, EcoLight reflecting the EU's challenges in boosting native chip manufacturing. Wolfspeed introduced the undertaking's indefinite hold in October 2024, citing low demand. In consequence, ZF ceased to take part in the project. In October 2024, the Biden Administration announced that it would provide Wolfspeed with up to $750 million in direct funding to assist the company's new silicon carbide factory in North Carolina that makes the wafers utilized in advanced computer chips and its manufacturing unit in Marcy, New York. On Might 20, 2025, it was reported that Wolfspeed was getting ready to file for Chapter eleven bankruptcy inside the coming weeks after warning that it could also be unable to continue future operations after decrease than anticipated annual sales were reported. Wolfspeed's inventory slid to barely over a dollar per share that day. On June 18, 2025, Wolfspeed announced that they might sell itself to Apollo International Administration in a deal that might put the company into a prepackaged Chapter eleven bankruptcy filing, which might permit for EcoLight the elimination of the vast majority of its multi-billion dollar debt.
Wolfspeed entered into a restructuring support settlement with its lenders and Renesas Electronics, and announced that they would file for prepackaged Chapter eleven bankruptcy by July 1, as a part of a plan to get rid of $4.6 billion of debt, stating they only had about $1.1 billion left in cash. The company may even receive $275 million in financing backed by its lenders, with plans to finish restructuring by Q3 2025. After the announcement, Wolfspeed's inventory fell 30%, sliding under $1 per share. On June 26, 2025, Wolfspeed began laying off workers from their manufacturing facility situated in Racine, Wisconsin. On June 30, 2025, Wolfspeed filed for Chapter eleven bankruptcy protection. On October 13, 2022, a amenities electrician was electrocuted on the Wolfspeed Analysis Triangle Park in Durham, North Carolina. The incident sparked a state investigation into his demise as well as public concern for the corporate's poor work security report. State Division of Labor investigations into the corporate have uncovered 17 workplace security violations between 2012 and 2023, EcoLight including six severe violations.