Patent ID: 8653556

Claim:
A vertical insulated gate bipolar transistor comprising: a semiconductor body; a first contact on a first side of the semiconductor body; a second contact on a second side of the semiconductor body opposite the first side; wherein a plurality of regions are formed in the semiconductor body, the plurality of regions including, in a direction from the first contact to the second contact, a body region of a first conductivity type into which a source region is formed; a semiconductor region of a second conductivity type separated from the source region via a portion of the body region so that a channel between the source region and the semiconductor region, formed in the portion of the body region, is controllable via the first contact acting as a gate controlling the channel; and an emitter region of the first conductivity type, wherein the emitter region is directly contacted by the second contact, the body and semiconductor regions directly abut each other, and the semiconductor and emitter regions directly abut each other; wherein, in the semiconductor region, a semiconductor zone of the second conductivity type and a field stop zone of the second conductivity type are arranged, wherein the doping density in the semiconductor zone is increased relative to a basic doping density of the semiconductor region such that, upon shutting down the insulated gate bipolar transistor, in addition to one space-charge zone forming between the body region and the semiconductor zone, another space-charge zone forms at the semiconductor zone, thereby reducing a local field strength maximum in down-commuting the vertical insulated gate bipolar transistor, wherein the semiconductor zone separates a first part of the semiconductor region of the basic doping density arranged closer to the body region from a second part of the semiconductor region of the basic doping density arranged closer to the emitter region; wherein the field stop zone is configured to provide an amount of free charge carriers which is cleared by the space-charge zone between the body region and the semiconductor zone spreading into the semiconductor region upon applying a reverse voltage to the vertical insulated gate bipolar transistor so as to stabilize the vertical insulated gate bipolar transistor statically; wherein a maximum value of the doping density in the semiconductor zone is in a range of greater than 10 16 cm −3 and a thickness of the semiconductor zone along the direction from the first contact to the second contact is in a range of smaller than 3 μm, and wherein the field stop zone is thicker along with the direction from the first contact to the second contact that the semiconductor zone and has a doping density between the basic doping density and the doping density in the semiconductor zone.