Faster processors. More powerful lasers. Smaller systems. But what happens when the materials supporting that technology can’t keep up?
Riddhika Poddar, Director at URR Manufacturing, joins LattiSpec Insights to discuss a different side of lab-grown diamonds: engineering materials designed for demanding technology applications, not jewelry.
Riddhika explains how URR develops tech-grade CVD diamond, including polycrystalline and single-crystal materials, for applications such as thermal management, semiconductor technologies and quantum computing.
We also discuss why growing the diamond is only part of the work, how material characterization connects to real-world performance, and what’s changing for India’s diamond research talent.
Her point: this isn’t about replacing every conventional material with diamond. It’s about giving engineers another option when existing materials start reaching their limits.
Riddhika Poddar: So, URR is an advanced materials company. We’re focused mainly on tech-grade CVD diamonds for next-generation industrial applications. What’s really interesting about this industry is that technology is advancing incredibly fast, but the materials supporting the technology don’t always advance at the same pace.
We always hear, “Oh, we’re building a faster processor, we’re building powerful computing systems or high-performance lasers,” et cetera. So as these lasers become more powerful and compact, they start running into challenges around heat, efficiency, and reliability.
That’s where we see diamond chips playing an interesting role. Most people associate diamonds with jewelry, but here at URR, we look at it very differently. We see it as an engineering material. It has properties that can solve many challenges. Our focus at URR is mainly to develop diamond chips for applications ranging from thermal management to semiconductor technologies, quantum computing, and so on. Here, we’re not just growing diamonds; we’re engineering a material that can help enable the next generation of technology.
Marty Hurwitz: Tell us about some of your specialties or the unique qualities of the products you’ve been focusing on or have developed a customer base for — particularly things like thermal-grade polycrystalline wafers, which are so hot in the market right now.
Riddhika Poddar: Yeah, I completely agree. As we’ve established, here at URR we focus exclusively on tech-grade diamonds. We work with both polycrystalline and single-crystal diamond. Within that, our expertise is in thermal-grade and quantum-grade diamond, which can be made in any shape or size and with whatever characteristics one needs.
But what I’d like to point out is that, beyond the material itself, I think our specialty and our strength lie in our infrastructure. We have a dedicated facility for growing tech-grade diamond, as well as capabilities for characterizing and measuring the diamond’s performance. Along with that, we have a highly accomplished team of researchers with deep knowledge of materials science.
The other thing that’s important to us is that we’re not looking at diamond in isolation. We’re looking at how the material actually gets used in a product. We work across the entire value chain, from material growth to characterization and application-specific development. That’s important because the tech-diamond industry is quite broad, and the opportunities aren’t limited to just one market.
You’re seeing applications across thermal management, RF technologies, defense, aerospace, and more. So, ultimately, our strength is not just growing high-quality diamond, but also understanding how to engineer it for real-world applications.
Marty Hurwitz: You mentioned your team, and this is critical, because one of the biggest challenges as the tech-diamond industry grows is a shortage of qualified materials scientists who have experience growing diamonds. This is particularly true in India, where there are so many diamond-growing chambers that were focused on the gem industry. But, as you know, it’s very different to grow diamonds for technology than it is to grow them for gems. I’m really interested to hear how you’ve been able to get materials scientists and technicians on board, and how have they integrated into your company?
Riddhika Poddar: So, if you remember, you asked me this last year, and I have a very different answer this year, because fortunately our government has really supported this area and put effort into bringing it out into the open.
There are a lot of people who always thought, “We do research with diamond, but it’s never going to happen.” Now they’re all flourishing and coming forward, saying, “Yes, 10 years ago we thought it could happen. We thought it could happen 15 years ago.” It’s only because of the government’s support. The government has been open about how diamond can be used and has provided funding for research. I think that really helped.
Marty Hurwitz: Where are you seeing customers using your tech-diamond material? In which industries are customers already pushing toward commercial viability for their products, electronic components, or whatever they’re developing?
Riddhika Poddar: I think this industry has reached a very interesting point. In some cases, the limiting factor is not the technology itself; it’s the material. You can continue making a faster processor or system, but eventually you have to ask, “How do you manage the heat? How do you keep improving performance in a smaller system?”
So that’s where I feel diamond plays a very important role. That’s where diamond has become so compelling. It has a combination of properties that can be extremely valuable in these demanding environments. That’s why we’re seeing interest from industries that have very different applications but a very similar underlying problem: the need for a material that can perform under extreme conditions repeatedly.
So for our customers, it’s not necessarily about replacing the material they’re using today. It’s about giving engineers another material option when conventional materials start reaching their limits.
