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Wolfspeed, Inc. is an American developer and manufacturer of broad-bandgap semiconductors, focused on silicon carbide and gallium nitride materials and devices for power and radio frequency purposes equivalent to transportation, energy provides, power inverters, and wireless programs. Cree Research was founded 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 analysis assistant professor and the others pupil researchers - had been seeking methods to leverage the properties of silicon carbide to enable semiconductors to function at increased working temperatures and power ranges. In addition they knew silicon carbide might serve because the diode in gentle-emitting diode (LED) lighting, a light source first demonstrated in 1907 with an electrically charged diode of silicon carbide. The research workforce devised a solution to develop silicon crystals within the laboratory, and in 1987 founded the corporate to produce silicon carbide for use commercially in each semiconductors and lighting.



In 1989, the company launched the first blue LED, enabling the development of massive, full-colour video screens and EcoLight LED bulbs billboards. In 1991, the company released the first commercial silicon carbide wafer. In 1993, the company became a public firm through an preliminary public providing. In 2011, the corporate acquired Ruud Lighting for $525 million. In August 2011, the company introduced the XLamp XT-E Royal Blue LED for use in distant phosphor lighting. In 2013, the corporate's first shopper merchandise, two family LED bulbs, EcoLight qualified for Power Star rating by the United States Environmental Protection Company. In July 2016, Infineon Applied sciences agreed to accumulate the corporate's Wolfspeed RF and power electronics units unit for $850 million. Nevertheless, the deal was terminated in February 2017 attributable to regulators’ nationwide security considerations. In March 2018, the company acquired the RF Energy Enterprise Infineon Technologies AG's for €345 million. In May 2019, EcoLight home lighting the corporate offered its Lighting Merchandise division (now branded as Cree Lighting) to Best 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 bought its LED Enterprise to Smart Global Holdings for up to $300 million. In October 2021, EcoLight outdoor the company modified its title to Wolfspeed. In April 2022, the Marcy, New York, facility opened. In November 2022, the corporate announced that co-founder and Chief Technology Officer John Palmour had died. In February 2023 it introduced it will build its first European manufacturing facility in Germany. It is imagined to be on the location of a former coal plant in Ensdorf, Saarland with ZF Friedrichshafen as a coinvestor and subsidized by the EU as an necessary undertaking of widespread European interest (IPCEI) for Microelectronics and Communication Technologies. In August 2023, EcoLight dimmable it was introduced the Lowell-headquartered semiconductor firm, MACOM had entered into a definitive agreement to accumulate Wolfspeed's RF business.



In June 2024, energy-saving LED bulbs Wolfspeed has delayed its $three billion semiconductor plant in Germany to mid-2025, reflecting the EU's challenges in boosting native chip manufacturing. Wolfspeed announced the undertaking's indefinite hold in October 2024, citing low demand. As a result, ZF ceased to participate within the challenge. In October 2024, the Biden Administration announced that it would provide Wolfspeed with up to $750 million in direct funding to help the company's new silicon carbide manufacturing unit in North Carolina that makes the wafers used in advanced computer chips and its manufacturing facility in Marcy, New York. On Could 20, 2025, it was reported that Wolfspeed was preparing to file for Chapter eleven bankruptcy inside the coming weeks after warning that it may be unable to continue future operations after decrease than anticipated annual gross sales were reported. Wolfspeed's inventory slid to barely over a greenback per share that day. On June 18, 2025, Wolfspeed introduced that they might sell itself to Apollo World Administration in a deal that may put the company into a prepackaged Chapter eleven bankruptcy filing, which would allow for the elimination of nearly all of its multi-billion greenback debt.



Wolfspeed entered right into a restructuring help agreement with its lenders and Renesas Electronics, and announced that they would file for prepackaged Chapter eleven bankruptcy by July 1, as part of a plan to eradicate $4.6 billion of debt, stating they only had about $1.1 billion left in money. The corporate may also obtain $275 million in financing backed by its lenders, with plans to complete restructuring by Q3 2025. After the announcement, Wolfspeed's inventory fell 30%, sliding beneath $1 per share. On June 26, EcoLight outdoor 2025, Wolfspeed began laying off employees from their manufacturing facility located in Racine, Wisconsin. On June 30, 2025, Wolfspeed filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy safety. On October 13, 2022, a facilities electrician was electrocuted on the Wolfspeed Research Triangle Park in Durham, North Carolina. The incident sparked a state investigation into his death in addition to public concern for the corporate's poor work safety report. State Department of Labor investigations into the corporate have uncovered 17 workplace safety violations between 2012 and 2023, together with six serious violations.