The structural and optical properties of semipolar (1 1 -2 2) GaN grown on m-plane (1 0 -1 0) sapphire substrates by molecular beam epitaxy were investigated. An inplane orientation relationship was found to be [1 -1 0 0] GaN || [1 2-1 0] sapphire and [-1 -1 2 3] GaN || [0 0 0 1] sapphire for semipolar GaN on m-plane sapphire substrates. The near band emission (NBE) was found at 3.432 eV, which is slightly blue shifted compared to the bulk GaN. The Raman E2 (high) peak position observed at 569.1 cm-1, which indicates that film is compressively strained. Schottky barrier height (φb) and the ideality factor (η) for the Au/ semipolar GaN Schottky diode found to be 0.55 eV and 2.11, respectively obtained from the TE model. © 2013 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.