The Power of Reclaiming Technology Leadership

Why is technology leadership important? In B2B markets, it helps you to differentiate your products, allows you to sustain premium pricing, and creates confidence among your investors.

Losing technology leadership can be painful. Many leading companies have. It may be hard to remember in 2026, but in the mid-1990s Apple was adrift. There were too many products running on an outdated operating system. Enter Steve Jobs in 1997. He slashed the product line, put his focus on integrating software and hardware, and redefined personal computing again. The iMac, iPod, iPhone and Mac OS X all told a story of a technology leader retaking its position. Today Apple is one of the world’s most valuable companies, with a market capitalization of around $4 trillion.

Apple lost its leadership in the 1990s to Microsoft, which had its share of problems as well.  In the early 2010s, Microsoft missed the mobile wave. Windows 8 wasn’t well received, and it seriously lagged in cloud computing and modern dev tools. Under current CEO Satya Nadella, Microsoft launched Azure, embraced open source, and went all-in on AI, among other things. Today it’s a technology leader again, sitting close behind Apple with a $3 trillion market cap.  

Enter Wolfspeed 

Another company that deserves to reclaim technology leadership? Wolfspeed, the company I have just joined. Over the past 40 years, Wolfspeed has rightfully claimed technology leadership in silicon carbide, a material that was considered both a miracle substance and a pipe dream as recently as 1987.  

Manufacturing silicon carbide remains extremely difficult. It requires growing crystals at 2,500 degrees Celsius, or about half the surface temperature of the sun. Silicon carbide is nearly as hard as diamond, which makes it tough to slice into wafers. But American ingenuity in the form of a team of determined minds at North Carolina State University rose to the occasion.  

The team, which became Cree Semiconductor and ultimately the company Wolfspeed, worked for three decades to produce silicon carbide wafers as the next generation of power semiconductors. This included developing the first silicon carbide blue LED in 1989 and the first silicon carbide MOSFET in 2011.   

Today silicon carbide is well on its way to replacing silicon in high-power applications such as e-mobility, renewable energy systems, battery energy storage, satellites, AI data centers, and defense systems. Thanks to silicon carbide, the electrification trend that started with passenger cars is spreading rapidly to aircraft, ships, and large land vehicles for the military. If it moves, you can electrify it, and thanks to silicon carbide it can be made far more efficient.  

Yet just as we’ve witnessed with solar panels, LEDs, wind turbines, and other technologies, foreign competitors are making up ground on U.S. companies in terms of quality and quantity. Even though Wolfspeed opened the first fabrication facility that can create 200MM silicon carbide wafers, which increases yield 40% on each chip, competitors have rushed in to try to knock us out of our technology leadership.  

Leadership under pressure 

This is the kind of leadership that’s sorely needed today. In order for EVs to continue to grow and for drivers to overcome range anxiety, we must deliver longer range, faster charging and more affordable EVs. Then there is the task to support new applications: off-board chargers for industrial trucks, server power supplies for cloud computing providers, enormous earthmovers with 265-ton payloads, and vertical take-off and landing vehicles.  

Wolfspeed intends to be there at the forefront of innovation. It’s a position we can claim because we invented this market. Competitors are crowding in, but we believe we have a number of advantages: powerful customer relationships built by delivering on commitments that we continuously work to strengthen, a secure supply chain that protects us from geopolitical turbulence and reliance on foreign suppliers, and a global employee base that is passionate about the highest possible quality and increasing yield at our fabs. 

I realize that we have work to do as well. We have lost some credibility and relevance in the market. We must continue to attract and retain the best talent in the industry. We must align with and ideally exceed our customers’ expectations. We must create an industry roadmap for our devices that influences standards and deliver on this roadmap. And we must sign more long-term deals with customers. 

Like a lot of other corporate executives, I believe that 2026 will be a tough year for most semiconductor companies. Supply chains have never been more complex and buyers are anxious about the lack of clarity in the market. However, it is crucial to remember that we are an integral part of a larger whole and that includes customers, partners, and investors. We need all of these groups to believe that they can be more successful working with Wolfspeed, because we are the most resilient company in the world producing the highest-quality materials and devices.

This is how we will exert our leadership and rebuild our brand. I’m excited to lead this new era of Wolfspeed.