Category Archives: MEMS

SiTime Corp. introduced the SiT8920 MEMS oscillator for industrial and high reliability applications. While operating over the widest temperature range, -55°C to +125°C, the SiT8920 consumes half the power of quartz oscillators, is twice as stable, 20 times more reliable and 30 times more robust to shock and vibration. These key benefits dramatically improve system performance and reduce failures in harsh environments.

Piyush Sevalia, executive vice president of marketing at SiTime, said: “SiTime’s MEMS oscillators incorporate unique features that are simply not available from quartz products. For example, the SiT8920 incorporates SiTime’s unique SoftEdge rise/fall time control that reduces system EMI without additional components, expensive shielding or PCB re-design.”

SiTime is also introducing two additional devices that are well suited for replacing quartz oscillators and crystal resonators.

  • SiT1618 – a fixed-frequency oscillator that operates over -40°C to +125°C
  • SiT8918 – a programmable oscillator that operates over the same temperature range and supports any frequency between 1 and 110 MHz as well as 1.8V and 2.5 to 3.3V operation

 These new high-temp oscillators offer many unique features and benefits listed below.

  • Best robustness: 30 times better than quartz oscillators; 0.1 ppb/g vibration sensitivity; 50,000 g shock and 70 g vibration resistance
  • 500 million hours MTBF (2 FIT), 20 times better than quartz oscillators
  • ±25 PPM over the operating temperature for better system timing
  • Low power consumption: < 4 mA typical
  • Five industry-standard package options including a tiny 2.0 x 1.6 mm, all of which are drop-in replacements for quartz oscillators

The SiT8920, SiT8918 and the SiT1618 MEMS oscillators are sampling now with mass production scheduled for April 2013. Pricing is available upon request.

MEMS Industry Group (MIG) will host its second annual MEMS Executive Congress® Europe, March 12, 2013 in Amsterdam. This European edition of MIG’s executive event features an opening presentation by MIG Managing Director Karen Lightman, keynotes by Continental Automotive GmbH and SORIN GROUP, and panels exploring micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) as a core enabling technology in both established and emerging markets.

“European companies and research organizations are breaking new ground in mobile communications, automotive systems, energy production and conservation, and medical/quality of life applications for aging populations—and a share of the astounding progress they are making is attributable to MEMS,” said Karen Lightman, managing director, MEMS Industry Group. “MEMS Executive Congress Europe allows the global MEMS community to tap into the expertise of some of the top European minds in these growing fields. It is a forum for exchanging vital information about business and market challenges and opportunities in using MEMS for life-improving and life-changing applications.”

Keynotes

  • Ralf Schnupp, PhD, vice president, Segment Occupant Safety & Inertial Sensors, Continental Automotive GmbH—“Future Trends in Automotive — Smart Systems and Sensors”
  • Renzo Dal Molin, PhD, advanced research director, SORIN CRM within Cardiac Rhythm Management business unit, SORIN GROUP—“Vision for Implanted Medical Devices Healthcare Solutions and Technical Challenges”

Panels

  • “MEMS in Consumer Products”—MEMS is pervasive in consumer electronics. Consumers are demanding—and receiving—more natural user interfaces in smartphones, tablets and remotes; more immersive gaming experiences; more personalized consumer-health applications; and so much more. European companies are leading innovation in this rapidly growing market—but why? Panelists will explore whether the climate for innovation, including corporate-government partnerships and consumer-OEM relationships, fosters greater innovation in the EU than in other regions. Panelists will also discuss the intense pressures of this highly competitive but lucrative market.
  • “MEMS in Automotive”—MEMS has been critical to advancements in the automotive industry for decades, starting with accelerometers in airbag crash sensors and other automotive safety and environmental control applications. Today MEMS is opening a whole new world of safety, energy-efficiency and performance features in automotive. We are moving towards cars that drive themselves, zero-emission vehicles, and automobiles that meet the ubiquitous connectivity needs of today’s consumer. Panelists will examine how MEMS is enabling new classes of applications in the well-established yet highly competitive and consumer-driven automotive industry. They will explore the maturation of MEMS components into essential elements used in every new automotive technology—and will examine if lessons learned on the journey can be applied to other applications and industries.
  • “MEMS in Energy”—the energy industry is undergoing significant change—from deregulation in existing markets and expansion into new energy sources and regions to the rapid increase of energy costs. With current energy sources not able to meet future global demand, we require new solutions that are portable and highly efficient. Once again the EU is leading the way. European organizations are looking to MEMS in harnessing alternative energy and in generating more energy-efficient, lower-cost power. Panelists will discuss current MEMS initiatives for energy applications and will explore areas of the energy industry that might benefit from integration with MEMS.
  • “MEMS in Medical — Focus on Aging”—medical and quality of life applications that allow people to live longer and more independently are gaining mindshare—and market share. With medical-device manufacturers increasingly pursuing growing commercial opportunities, they are turning to MEMS for patient monitoring, management, rehabilitation, replacement, and drug delivery, including microfluidics. As people in the developed world live longer, and expect a high quality of life to the very end, how can MEMS help to meet the needs of a vast and aging populace? Panelists will address the MEMS’ connection to lifesaving and life-enhancing applications.

About MEMS Executive Congress Europe 2013

MEMS Executive Congress Europe 2013 brings together business leaders from a broad spectrum of industries: automotive, industrial/energy, biomedical/quality of life, and consumer goods. It is a unique professional forum at which executives from companies designing and manufacturing MEMS technology sit side-by-side with their end-user customers in panel discussions and networking events to exchange ideas and information about the use of MEMS in commercial applications.

Premier sponsors of MEMS Executive Congress Europe include: Platinum Sponsor – EV Group; Gold Sponsor – SPTS Technologies; Silver Sponsors – Analog Devices, STMicroelectronics and SUSS MicroTec; and Bronze Sponsor – Applied Materials.

Sponsors include: Akustica, Bosch Automotive Electronics, Bosch Sensortec, Fries Research & Technology (FRT), imec, IVAM, Maxim Integrated, MEMS and Nanotechnology Exchange, MinacNed, Polytec, Roessingh Research and Development, Semicon Europa,Silex Microsystems, Solid State Technology and Tronics.

MEMS Executive Congress Europe will be held March 12, 2013 at the Steigenberger Airport Hotel, Amsterdam, The Netherlands. It is conveniently co-located with Smart Systems Integration 2013.

For more information, please contact MIG via phone: +1 412/390-1644, email: [email protected] or visit MEMS Executive Congress at: www.memscongress.com.

MEMS Industry Group (MIG) is the trade association advancing MEMS across global markets. Close to 150 companies comprise MIG, including Analog Devices, Applied Materials, Bosch, Freescale Semiconductor, GE, Honeywell, HP, Intel, InvenSense, Murata Electronics Oy, OMRON Electronic Components, Qualcomm Technologies, STMicroelectronics and Texas Instruments. For more information, visit: www.memsindustrygroup.org.

January 25, 2012 – Given the ascension of smartphones, it’s no surprise that Samsung and Apple remain far and away the biggest end-users of semiconductors, and are widening their lead on the rest of the field, according to the latest Gartner rankings.

Together they consumed $45.3 billion worth of semiconductors in 2012, nearly $8 billion more than in 2011, growing double-digits while overall chip consumption fell -3% (and several top-10 chip consumers actually fell by double-digits). They now represent 15% of the entire market for chips, up from 12% in 2011. (Samsung also has a big IDM foundry operation by which it supplies chips to others, including Apple.)

A weak macroeconomic environment, and a "dramatic change" in consumer demand hampered overall semiconductor demand in 2012, explained Masatsune Yamaji, principal research analyst at Gartner. The PC market still represented the largest end application, but the market noticeably shifted from traditional desktop and mobile PCs to mobile devices such as smartphones and media tablets which contain less semiconductor content.

On the flip side, the limited computing and storage capabilities of new mobile computing devices will require more resources in cloud computing services, meaning data centers and communications infrastructure will continue to be a key demand driver for semiconductors, Yamaji pointed out. Another factor in mobile computing devices: there’s been very little hardware differentiation, as new capabilities are quickly proliferated among other hardware vendors with commercial system-on-chip (SoC), software, and reference designs. "Semiconductor vendors must aid, or at least monitor, the hardware innovations of the market leaders," he says.

Top 10 semiconductor design total available market (preliminary) in US $B. (Source: Gartner)

Most people are familiar with the concept of RADAR. Radio frequency (RF) waves travel through the atmosphere, reflect off of a target, and return to the RADAR system to be processed. The amount of time it takes to return correlates to the object’s distance. In recent decades, this technology has been revolutionized by electronically scanned (phased) arrays (ESAs), which transmit the RF waves in a particular direction without mechanical movement. Each emitter varies its phase and amplitude to form a RADAR beam in a particular direction through constructive and destructive interference with other emitters.

Similar to RADAR, laser detection and ranging, or LADAR, scans a field of view to determine distance and other information, but it uses optical beams instead of RF waves. LADAR provides a more detailed level of information that can be used for applications such as rapid 3-D mapping. However, current optical beam steering methods needed for LADAR, most of which are based on simple mechanical rotation, are simply too bulky, slow or inaccurate to meet the full potential of LADAR.

As reported in the current issue of the journal Nature, DARPA researchers have recently demonstrated the most complex 2-D optical phased array ever. The array, which has dimensions of only 576µm x 576µm is composed of 4,096 (64 x 64) nanoantennas integrated onto a silicon chip. Key to this breakthrough was developing a design that is scalable to a large number of nanoantennas, developing new microfabrication techniques, and integrating the electronic and photonic components onto a single chip.

“Integrating all the components of an optical phased array into a miniature 2-D chip configuration may lead to new capabilities for sensing and imaging,” said Sanjay Raman, program manager for DARPA’s Diverse Accessible Heterogeneous Integration (DAHI) program. “By bringing such functionality to a chip-scale form factor, this array can generate high-resolution beam patterns — a capability that researchers have long tried to create with optical phased arrays. This chip is truly an enabling technology for a host of systems and may one day revolutionize LADAR in much the same way that ESAs revolutionized RADAR. Beyond LADAR, this chip may have applications for biomedical imaging, 3D holographic displays and ultra-high-data-rate communications.”

This work was supported by funding from DARPA’s Short-Range, Wide Field-of-View Extremely agile, Electronically Steered Photonic Emitter (SWEEPER) program under Josh Conway, and the Electronic-Photonic Heterogeneous Integration (E-PHI) thrust of the DAHI program. Future steps include integrating non-silicon laser elements with other photonic components and silicon-based control and processing electronics directly on-chip using E-PHI technologies currently under development.

Photo courtesy of MIT.

January 15, 2013 – The semiconductor industry is undergoing massive transformation as the rise in mobile computing, changes to the fabless-foundry model, uncertainties in technical innovation, and global macroeconomic trends become the dominant forces in 2013 and beyond, according to industry leaders speaking at the SEMI Industry Strategy Symposium (ISS), opening this week in Half Moon Bay, CA.

Ajit Manocha, CEO of GlobalFoundries, during his keynote presentation discussed the dynamic technology and economic needs of mobile computing that is driving new approaches to the chip design-to-production cycle. Calling it "Foundry 2.0," he sees outsourced semiconductor manufacturing moving toward a more IDM-like model, creating new collaboration models and techniques to close the gap between process teams at foundries and design teams at the fabless companies. With daunting technical challenges like 3D stacking, 450mm fabs, new transistor architectures, multi-patterning, and the uncertainties to lithography-based scaling, product development paths with virtual teams will evolve and adapt rapidly in the coming months and years.

With new fabs now costing upwards of $8 billion and leading-edge manufacturing investments expected to exceed $40 billion this year alone, global economic trends and forces — increasingly influenced by uncertain consumer spending in both developed and emerging markets — have never been more important to the semiconductor ecosystem. Dr. John Williams, president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, said "Many businesses are locked into a paralyzing state of anxiety."

Williams used the ISS conference to lessen uncertainty and anxiety in the capital markets, pledging to keep interest rates near zero until the unemployment rate drops to 6.5%, as long as inflation expectations do not climb above 2.5%.

Bruce Kasman, chief economist and managing director of global research at JP Morgan, shared a positive economic outlook, especially in the second half of the year, that is "bumpy, better and less risky." He sees Asia leading the economic rebound, as China demand accelerates with the change in leadership and improved access to credit. University of Texas Austin Churchill scholar, Matthew Gertken, however, discussed the simmering "Asian cold war" developing as territorial disputes with China generate an emerging "containment policy" by many of China’s neighbors.

How these macroeconomic dynamics are impacting the semiconductor industry was discussed by speakers who saw both perils and opportunities. Andy Oberst, senior VP, strategy and corporate development at Qualcomm, looked at what mobile phones would likely look like in 2020, but also pointed out how disruptive changes — not incremental changes — have always driven the mobile phone market.

Satya Kumar, vice president at Credit Suisse, discussed how original equipment makers like phone and computer manufacturers have always benefitted from the declining cost of transistors and pondered, "Could stopping Moore’s Law be a good thing?"

As the world’s largest semiconductor company, Intel’s view is different. Michael Bell, vice president and general manager, mobile and communications group at Intel, brought the audience up to date on the company’s mobile strategy, offering confidence that Intel’s portfolio of RF baseband technologies, leading-edge scaling performance, and supply chain excellence will ultimately deliver significant success.

Conference speakers on Day 2 and Day 3 of ISS will discuss how these and other mega-trends are specifically impact the R&D, product development, manufacturing, investment, and supply-chain challenges impacting various sectors of IC and microelectronics industry.

The SEMI Industry Strategy Symposium (ISS) examines global economic, technology, market, business and geo-political developments influencing the semiconductor processing industry along with their implications for your strategic business decisions. For more than 35 years, ISS has been the bellwether semiconductor conference for senior executives to acquire the latest trend data, technology highlights and industry perspective to support business decisions, customer strategies and the pursuit of greater profitability.

by Todd Traylor, Vice President of Global Trading for Smith & Associates.

Consumer devices and cutting-edge tech make Consumer Electronics Show (CES) exciting; this year’s show stealers are the components that power it all. If you have any doubt look to center stage and Qualcomm’s opening keynote.

To those embedded (pun intended) in the semiconductor and electronics industry, Qualcomm is not a surprise keynote presenter. But CES is about the consumer, and their keynote highlighted what’s really at the core of consumer electronics’ (CE) success: powerful components. Components, after all, enable the innovative feature capabilities, mobility, power efficiency, and the integration of hardware and software, all which make CE devices "smart."   

Get smarter

The innovation behind the expanding class of smart devices (from phones to cars and all that is between) is the component breakthroughs from manufacturers – the processors, microelectromechanical sensors (MEMS) and sensor hubs, and the chips that are the brains, communication, and power of the devices.

Qualcomm unveiled their Snapdragon 800 and 600 series, processors designed for a range of mobile devices. The 800 series, manufactured using 28nm architecture, enables the integration of the new Krait 400, quad-core CPU with each core running at 2.3GHz, the new Adreno 330 GPU, 4G LTE, and 802.11ac WiFi, all with reduced power consumption, due in part to the smaller and more integrated chipset; the Snapdragon 600 series has similar architecture but slower speeds. The user experiences fast processing power for the next generation of smart devices, but at the level of traditional PCs, with the added benefits of always-on, always-connected plus the enhanced graphics and fast data communication speeds.

Nvidia’s latest Tegra 4 and Samsung’s Exynos 5 are among the direct competitors to the Snapdragon series . Nvidia’s Tegra 4 boasts 72 GPU cores in addition to the powerful quad-core Cortex A15 CPU, code-named "Wayne," for processing plus an additional low-power Cortex A15 running background tasks. The Tegra 4 CPU combination improves power use, essential in today’s devices, while integrating the CPU and GPU to improve performance and signal processing, important for graphics in digital cameras.

Tough competition improves CE field

At CES we see the envelope pushed to  be the  fastest, lightest, smallest, most efficient, best integrated, or first-mover. Intel scooped CES with the announcement of the new, quad-core, 22nm, Atom processor, Bay Trail, due this year to compete with ARM processors in mobile. Beyond speed, Bay Trail is only 8mm thick and enables all-day battery-life, essential to both mobile and Ultrabooks. AMD is showcasing its new Temash chip, based on the Jaguar CPU core, designed for tablets to support long battery life, HD graphics, powerful processing for full-applications for business productivity, as opposed to the reduced capabilities found mostly today. AMD’s Kabini chips are also on display, designed for the new line of low-powered laptops with A8 and A10 quad-core chips. These advances will support Ultrabook adoption in 2013 as prices decreases and features increase.

Expanded connectivity is also CES theme this year, such as Broadcom’s "Connected Life," enhancing consumer experiences in the home, car, and across wired and wireless devices. Pushing connectivity moves CE toward a unified experience as users move through environments. It also paves the growth path for NFC opportunities, content sharing, and allows for the latest in seamless "whole-home connectivity" through Broadcom’s  4th-generation, Gigabit DOCSIS system-on-chip (SoC) series, and dedicated SoC solutions for the fastest TV, internet, and mobile connected solutions.

Another set of breakthroughs comes from Atmel XSense™ flexible touch sensor, winner of CES’ Innovations Award in the Embedded Technologies. Flexible touchscreens are certain to be a desired feature in next-gen mobile devices, and Atmel’s expertise in sensor hubs and innovative material designs will ensure success.

Opportunities for everyone

One final note, it is not just the high-end CE devices that are targeted at CES. There is more attention this year to low-cost solutions designed for the emerging markets, which are set for double-digit growth for these devices, provided low-price points are met.

Author biography:

Todd Traylor began his career with Smith in 1997 in OEM sales, and was promoted to Trading Manager in 1999. In 2001, he transferred to The Netherlands to serve as General Manager of Smith’s Amsterdam office, and was promoted to Managing Director of Europe for Smith in 2002. Todd was named CPU Commodity Manager upon returning to Houston in 2003, and in 2012 was promoted to Vice President of Global Trading. Todd is a 1991 graduate of Texas A&M University, where he earned his bachelor’s degree in Business Management.

By David DiPaola, DiPaola Consulting, LLC.

New product development is an extremely rewarding area of engineering and business. It often brings innovation to unmet needs that can improve quality of life and be extremely profitable for entrepreneurs and large corporations alike. With MEMS technology exploding with new business opportunities, this blog will discuss the critical factors needed for success in the early stage of new product development.

New product development starts with an idea. A product to enable the blind to see is very appealing to consider. However, without a viable business and technical plan to show the path to commercialization, the idea is not worth very much and it’s impossible to influence investors or managers to support it. Hence the first step is to identify an application and a lead customer that a business plan can be developed around. Equally important are a favorable competitive landscape, no or limited patents surrounding the area of interest, and a large impact to society.

Applications that are driven by legislation or regulations are excellent because they have a high likelihood of fruition with definitive timelines. Legislation in automotive resulted in the development of MEMS based occupant weight sensors that provided feedback in systems used to deploy air bags with different force levels or not at all to better protect passengers in the event of an accident.  Even better are applications that give consumers what they want. The Argus II Retinal Prosthesis System is a device that partially restores sight for specific blindness. This device provides electrical stimulation of the retina to elicit visual patterns of light that can be interpreted by the brain (see figure). Hence users can recognize doorways and windows and gain greater independence; a highly desired quality with significant impact. Over 1 million people in the US may benefit from this device and the lead customers are people with profound retinitis pigmentosa.

The Argus II will be the first device to hit the market and hence the competitive landscape is extremely favorable.  Second Sight also benefits from large barriers to enter this market due to the rigorous FDA approval process. However, competition is on their heels. Nano Retina is developing another device that is smaller, fits uniquely in the eye alone and promises to provide greater number of pixels enabling recognition of humans.  Second Sight is also developing the next generation device to be smaller, places the video camera in the eye and provides improved vision with greater number of electrodes.

Timing is another important aspect of new product development. There are limited windows in which a product can be developed and launched. When products are developed without an underlying customer demand, they rarely make it passed the R&D phase into commercialization.  Often, technologies are developed in universities 15 – 30 years before they become mainstream commercialized products. Conversely, if the product comes to market too late, OEMs have already picked development partners and are reluctant to change suppliers. The application space may also be saturated with competitors making it difficult to win market share. Depending on the industry, these windows vary in size considerably. A typical cycle in automotive can range from 2 – 5 years. Consumer electronics can be as little as 6 months and Class III biomedical applications can see cycles greater than 10 years. Hence it is important to fully understand market opportunities and have a detailed schedule to demonstrate the product can be launched within this defined window. Equally important, some core technology elements of the design must be developed to a functional point with limited areas needing major development or it will be challenging to meet the defined schedule.

For the occupant weight sensor, there was a limited time to engage with OEMs and show proof of concept before production suppliers were chosen after the legislation came into law. The sense element and conditioning electronics were proven in another automotive sensor and the packaging was a major development piece. The required compliance with government legislation dictated the schedule for aggressive product development, validation, launch and ramp cycle.

An often mismanaged portion of new product development is the team behind the innovation. A team with robust chemistry, passion and a single leader are key to success. Multiple team leaders and poor chemistry only leads to infighting and redundant efforts. It is also important to limit team size to a critical few to expedite decision making and keep focused on what’s important.   Larger teams tend to get distracted with items outside of the core focus and can miss critical details and deadlines causing product failure. Self assembled teams starting at the grass roots level more times than not have excellent chemistry. They begin with an idea generated by 1 – 2 people and an additional 1 – 3 trusted colleagues are brought in as support roles to help manage the work load that often occurs after hours. This natural selection process brings people with similar passions together and weeds out less motivated people as they do not want the added work load.

An extremely important attribute of successful teams is to keep a low profile and minimize negative influences from external sources. At a project’s beginning, it seems the vast majority of people are against it or have an opinion on why the project will not be successful. In reality, it is a fear of risk and the unknown. Hence those teams who understand this and maintain a high risk tolerance yet work to minimize it, have a definite advantage. Once early project successes are achieved, there will be plenty of time to tell others about the latest innovation. Having an advocate at the vice president level in this early stage is also extremely helpful because it can channel much needed funds to the project and keep middle managers without similar vision from halting activity.

Speaking the language of investors and business leaders is critical to get the financial backing to make the development happen and commercialization a reality. Hence the product’s business plan must show that target profits can be achieved with a reasonable payback time of investment dollars.  It is recommended that the plan include low, medium and high production volume estimations, product costs, product selling price and gross revenues. Operational costs, taxes, equipment depreciation, travel, engineering, marketing and overhead costs all need to be captured as accurately as possible. Concluding the analysis with return on investment, net present value and initial rate of return provide a good financial overview for the project. 

New product development is an exciting area with many opportunities in MEMS applications.  Identification of your lead customer and application, knowing the competitive and patent landscape, creating high impact products, being sensitive to timing, having small, focused teams, and developing a robust business plan can make a large difference in the success of product commercialization. Please stay tuned for future articles that explore additional aspects to achieve success in new product development.

Author Biography:

David DiPaola is Managing Director for DiPaola Consulting a company focused on engineering and management solutions for electromechanical systems, sensors and MEMS products.  A 16 year veteran of the field, he has brought many products from concept to production in high volume with outstanding quality.  His work in design and process development spans multiple industries including automotive, medical, industrial and consumer electronics.  Previously he has held engineering management and technical staff positions at Texas Instruments and Sensata Technologies, authored numerous technical papers and holds 5 patents. To learn more, please visit www.dceams.com.   

The International Data Corporation (IDC) is forecasting that semiconductor revenues worldwide will improve by 4.9% to $319 billion in 2013 and log a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 4.1% from 2011-2016, reaching $368 billion in 2016. Bright spots for the semiconductor market include smartphones, tablets, set-top boxes, and automotive electronics, which IDC expects will continue to be key drivers of growth over the coming years.

The group said that 2012 saw a nominal growth of less than 1% reaching $304 billion, due to weakness in PC demand, DRAM and overall memory price deterioration, and semiconductor inventory rationalization. This was coupled with continued global macroeconomic uncertainty from lower global GDP growth, a slowdown in China, the Eurozone debt crisis and recession, Japan’s recession, and ongoing fear of fiscal cliff negotiations’ impact on IT spending by corporations.

IDC expects semiconductor inventories to come into balance with demand in the second quarter of 2013 with growth to resume in the second half of 2013. "We expect lower, but positive global GDP growth in 2013. Semiconductors for smartphones will see healthy revenue growth as appetite for data, multimedia processing, and multitasking will drive high-end smartphone demand in developed countries while an ongoing transition to 3G networks will accelerate smartphone adoption in developing regions. PC demand will continue to remain in a period of transition next year until more technology and design innovation begin to change the course of demand," said Mali Venkatesan, research manager for semiconductors at IDC.

Regionally, Japan and Europe continue to be the two weakest regions. Although GDP growth has slowed in China, India, and Brazil, demand for smartphones, tablets, and automotive electronics remains strong. In the U.S., 4G phones, mobile consumer devices (tablets and e-readers), network infrastructure, and set-top box deployments will drive a healthy semiconductor growth cycle over the next five years.

Other key findings from IDC’s Semiconductor Application Forecaster include:

  • Semiconductor revenues for the Computing industry segment will log year-over-year growth of 1.7% for 2013 and will show a muted CAGR of only 1.7% for the 2011-2016 forecast period. Semiconductor revenues from mobile PC demand will register 5.5% year-over-year growth in 2013, after declining 7.7% in 2012.
  • Semiconductor revenues for the Communications segment will grow 6.5% year over year in 2013 with a five-year CAGR of 5.5%. Semiconductor revenues for 4G phones will experience annual growth of 140.1% in 2013 and a CAGR of 103.4% for 2011-2016.
  • Media tablets, e-Readers, set-top boxes, and blu-ray players, will continue to see above average semiconductor revenue growth. Sales of traditional devices such as DVD players, DVD recorders, DVD players, portable media players, and game consoles will continue to erode. Overall, semiconductor revenues for the Consumer segment will record year-over-year growth of 9.8% in 2013 and a 2011-2016 CAGR of 6.0%.
  • Driven by strong global demand for automobiles and increased semiconductor content (i.e. applications such as in-vehicle infotainment, automobile body electronics, and driver safety systems), semiconductor revenues for the Automotive segment is expected to grow 5.9% (CAGR) for the five-year forecast period.
  • Regionally, Asia/Pacific will continue to grow its share of semiconductor revenues, with year-over-year growth of 5.5% in 2013 and a five-year CAGR of 5.3%.

IDC’s Worldwide Semiconductor Applications Forecaster database serves as the basis for all IDC semiconductor supply-side documents, including market forecasts and consulting projects. This database contains revenue data collected from the top 100 semiconductor companies for 2006-2011 and market history and forecasts for 2006-2016. Revenue for over twelve semiconductor device areas, four geographic regions, six industries, and more than 80 end-device applications are also included in the database.

January 4, 2012 – Global semiconductor sales in November 2012 were the largest monthly tally of the entire year, up about 2% vs. both the prior month and a year ago, according to updated data from the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA). Total sales were $25.73 billion, marking the first year/year gain of the year.

The real boost in the SIA’s monthly tracking is in North America which shined with 5% monthly growth, and nearly a 10% spike vs. the same month a year ago — its largest year/year increase since April 2011. Other regions seeing a return to growth in November were Asia Pacific (2.7%) and Europe (0.4%), though Japan slipped slightly (-3.4%).

For the three-month moving average — basically fall months vs. summer, as the industry ramped up to meet projected holiday demand — growth in the Americas was even more sparkling at 20%, its largest such increase in the past decade, according to the SIA. Overall 3-mo. growth for all regions was almost 6%.

"The global semiconductor industry navigated difficult macroeconomic conditions in 2012, but encouraging growth led by the Americas in recent months has the industry pointed in the right direction heading into 2013," stated SIA president/CEO Brian Toohey. "To ensure that the industry’s momentum continues, Congress should remove ongoing economic uncertainty by enacting long-term, reliable fiscal policies that boost America’s economic strength and global competitiveness."

Digging into the SIA’s results, Barclays analyst CJ Muse sees "relative outperformance" in NAND (17% M/M and 25% Y/Y), with DSP (-33% Y/Y) seeing the biggest decline. By end markets, communications rose for a third consecutive month (51% Y/Y) and consumer soared 43%, while computing "remained weak" (-15% Y/Y) which suggests "subdued Windows 8 sales, he says. The autos end-market also declined -24%, due mainly to ASP declines, he said.

John Pitzer from Credit Suisse pointed to three-month averages for November, with logic (10%) and flash (5%) doing well, declines by micro (-9%) and DSP (-29%), and ASICs overall performing better (4%) than the broader semi sector (2%).

November’s chip sales numbers might have been good, but 1Q13 still looks like a trough for semi shipments which are "now tracking well below end demand," notes Muse.

For all of 2012, the SIA has endorsed the WSTS’ year-end forecast update which projected a -3% decline, but a bounce back to 4%-5% annual growth in 2013 and 2014.

By Adrienne Downey, Director of Technology Research, Semico Research

In February 2012, Semico forecast 2012 semiconductor capex to reach $59.8 billion.  In December 2012, that forecast was virtually unchanged at $59.9 billion, down 5.6% from 2011.  After two years of double-digit growth (98% in 2010 and 26.2% in 2011), the semiconductor industry needed to back off and regroup.  Most concerning is that the gap between the big spenders and the small has expanded.  The top ten spenders for 2012 made up 81% of the total; this figure is up from the 76% of the total in 2011.  Overall, the top ten combined spent $48.2 billion, which is only 0.3% up from 2011.  Meanwhile, the rest of the companies went from spending $15.3 billion in 2011 to $11.7 billion in 2012, a decline of 24%.  Some of the decline can be attributed to companies like SanDisk, which, along with its partner Toshiba, delayed fab expansion projects until 2013.  Other companies like ST and TI made capacity improvements over the past few years, so spending in 2012 was mainly for maintenance.

In December 2012, most companies have still not announced capex plans for the following year.  This year is no different.  However, a handful of companies have given some indication of what they might spend next year.  For example, TSMC is forecasting 2013 capex to be slightly up compared to 2012.  Most of the other companies that have given a hint of 2013’s capex have indicated flat to down spending compared to 2012.  These companies include GLOBALFOUNDRIES, Avago, Fairchild, Micron, ON Semiconductor, SMIC, Spansion, and STMicroelectronics.  GLOBALFOUNDRIES announced its “Vision 2015” initiative to expand 300mm capacity in Singapore, but no budget was announced for the project. 

That being said, there are several construction projects that may give some indication of spending in 2013.  Samsung is retrofitting its Austin fab to switch from NAND to logic production, with mass production beginning in the second half of next year.  This is a $4 billion project spread out over 2012-2013.  Intel’s D1X and Fab 42 construction will wrap up in 2013; the company will also begin production at 14nm by the end of this year.  Samsung, TSMC, and GLOBALFOUNDRIES are also working on the 14nm and 20/22nm nodes.  UMC has Fab 12A Phases 5 and 6 under construction, with production schedule to begin in 2014.  SanDisk and Toshiba will probably increase their spending to complete the ramp of Fab 5, which they said would be complete by the end of 2013. 

Based on current indications, capital spending would seem to be flat in 2013.  However, Semico predicts healthy revenue growth this year, which may encourage more spending, particularly in the second half of the year.  This may bring total capex for 2013 into the positive range.