By Candace Stuart
Small Times Senior Staff Writer

CHICAGO, June 7, 2001 — Three people who have been watching small tech evolve over the years expect the MEMS world – and most of their relationships to it – will change in the next 12 months.

Marlene Bourne, an industry analyst with Cahners, predicted a slow movement toward visibility, with more people outside the industry gaining an appreciation for it.

“It is a very fragmented niche market,” she said. “But a year from now people will be better informed.”

But don’t expect the marketplace to be inundated with MEMS. “It is still slow and moving forward,” she said.

This is not a technology that can go from concept to consumer in six months, she warned. “That won’t happen here in the MEMS market.”

Roger Grace, a consultant and president of Roger Grace Associates, sees MEMS filling a greater role in networking systems that require data to get from one point to another. “Wireless integrated MEMS is where it’s at,” he said.

Charles Call, president of MesoSystems Technology Inc., is hoping small tech will help him create affordable detectors that can monitor everything from the air inside an office building to bacteria in dairy products.

“Miniaturization is the key to reducing cost,” he said. He anticipates MEMS companies can assist in that process by providing sensors and other parts for his products.

For now he is concentrating on making a working model that he can show potential clients. Once he gets enough demand, and money, he’ll work on size.

And in a year:

“I probably will have talked to everyone” in the industry, Bourne joked.

“I’ll be doing what I’m doing now,” Grace said.

Call plans to grow the company and form some strategic alliances. But an acquisition would be welcomed. “We’re traditional greedy capitalists,” he said.

null

CONTACT THE AUTHOR:
Candace Stuart at [email protected] or call 734-994-1106, ext. 233.