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Although shipments of microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) sensors used in automotive applications grew 8.4 percent in 2015, revenues were flat compared to the previous year, reaching $2.7 billion. In contrast, the value of this market is expected to recover this year, rising 4.3 percent to reach $2.8 billion in 2016, according to IHS Markit (Nasdaq: INFO).

The automotive MEMS market is forecast to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 6.9 percent from 2015 to 2022, to reach $3.2 billion in 2022. Global shipments will exceed two billion units for the first time at the end of this period, according to the IHS Markit Automotive Sensor Intelligence Service.

“Just three types of MEMS devices used in the automotive industry account for more than 95 percent of market value: pressure sensors, accelerometers and gyroscopes,” said Richard Dixon, principal analyst, automotive sensors, IHS Markit. “The primary systems relying on these devices are electronic stability control systems, airbags, tire-pressure monitors and manifold absolute-pressure sensors, although IHS tracks 34 other automotive MEMS applications.”

While these markets will remain, by their nature, still relatively small by 2022, the fastest growing volume applications in the coming years will include the detection of pedestrians, air-intake humidity measurement, microphones for hands-free calling in infotainment systems and microbolometers for night-vision systems used in driver assistance. New sensor areas on the horizon include scanning mirrors for head-up displays and adaptive LED headlights.

Top 10 automotive MEMS sensor suppliers

For second-tier suppliers of automotive sensors, 2015 was a good year. However, significant devaluations of the Euro and Yen affected the businesses of several companies. Leading Germany-based sensor supplier Robert Bosch was among the companies hit by exchange rate weakness, but its business continues to soar in local currency and shipments.

Sensata followed Bosch in the second-ranked position, exhibiting subdued 2015 revenue growth, despite last year’s acquisition of CST, including the sensor business of Kavlico. Along with its strong position in powertrain pressure sensors, Sensata benefits from its high-profile acquisition of Schrader, which made it the leading supplier of tire pressure monitors.

A name new to the MEMS sensor business is NXP, whose acquisition of Freescale last year catapulted the company into third-ranked position. NXP is known for its automotive magnetic sensors, while pressure sensors and accelerometers are the key sensors brought to the company via the Freescale acquisition.

The remaining seven companies also showed subdued results, with Japanese companies like Denso (ranked fourth) and Panasonic (ranked sixth). Both companies were adversely affected by the continued softness of the Yen.

Top_MEMS_Suppliers_IHS

200mm fabs reawakening


July 13, 2016

By David Lammers, Contributing Editor

Buoyed by strong investments in China, 200mm wafer production is seeing a re-awakening, with overall 200mm capacity expected to match its previous 2006 peak level by 2019 (Figure 1).

Figure 1. By 2019, 200mm fab capacity should be close to the previous peak seen in 2006, according to SEMI. Several new 200mm fabs are expected to open in China. (Source: SEMICON West presentation by Christian Dieseldorff).

Figure 1. By 2019, 200mm fab capacity should be close to the previous peak seen in 2006, according to SEMI. Several new 200mm fabs are expected to open in China. (Source: SEMICON West presentation by Christian Dieseldorff).

Speaking at a SEMI/Gartner market symposium at SEMICON West, SEMI senior analyst Christian Dieseldorff said over the next few years “we don’t see 200mm fabs closing, in fact we see new ones beginning operation. To me, that is just amazing.”

The numbers back up the rebound. Excluding LEDs, the installed capacity of 200mm fabs will reach about 5.3 million wafers per month (wspm) in 2018, almost matching the 2007 peak of 5.6 million wspm. As shown in Figure 1, By 2019 as new 200mm fabs start up in China, 200mm wafer production will surge beyond the previous 2007 peak, a surprising achievement for a wafer generation that began more than 25 years ago. Figure 2 shows how capacity, which held steady for years, is now on the increase.

Figure 2. 200mm fab capacity, which remained relatively constant for years, is now increasing.

Figure 2. 200mm fab capacity, which remained relatively constant for years, is now increasing.

Case in point: On the opening day of Semicon West, Beijing Yangdong Micro announced a new OLED 200mm fab that will be opening in the second half of 2018 to make OLED drivers, according to Dieseldorff.

Over the past few years, Japan-based companies have closed 10 200mm fabs, mostly outdated logic facilities, while expanding production of discrete power and analog ICs on 200mm wafers. But with China opening several new 200mm fabs and the expansions of existing 200mm fabs worldwide, SEMI sees an additional 274,000 wafer starts per month of 200mm production over the 2015-2018 period, adding expansions and additional fabs, and subtracting closed facilities.

“One message from our research is that we believe the existing 200mm fabs are full. Companies have done what they can to expand and move tools around, and that is coming to an end,” he said. SEMI reckons that 19 new 200mm fabs have been built since 2010, at least six of them in China.

SEMI’s Christian Dieseldorff.

SEMI’s Christian Dieseldorff.

Dieseldorff touched on a vexing challenge to the 200mm expansion: the availability of 200mm equipment. “People have problems getting 200mm equipment, used and even new. The (200mm) market is not well understood by some companies,” he said. With a shortage of used 200mm equipment likely to continue, the major equipment companies are building new 200mm tools, part of what Dieseldorff described as an “awakening” of 200mm manufacturing.

 

China is serious

Sam Wang, a research vice president at Gartner who focuses on the foundry sector, voiced several concerns related to 200mm production at the SEMI/Gartner symposium. While SMIC (which has a mix of 200mm and 300mm fabs) has seen consistently healthy annual growth, the five second-tier Chinese foundries – — Shanghai Huahong Grace, CSMC, HuaLi, XMC, and ASMC — saw declining revenues year-over-year in 2015. Overall, China-based foundries accounted for just 7.8 percent of total foundry capacity last year, and the overall growth rate by Chinese foundries “is way below the expectations of the Chinese government,” Wang said.

The challenge, he said, is for China’s foundries which rely largely on legacy production to grow revenues in a competitive market. And things are not getting any easier. While production of has shown overall strength in units, Wang cautioned that price pressures are growing for many of the ICs made on 200mm wafers. Fingerprint sensor ICs, for example, have dropped in price by 30 percent recently. Moreover, “the installation of legacy nodes in 300mm fabs by large foundries has caused concern to foundries who depend solely on 200 mm.”

But Wang emphasized China’s determination to expand its semiconductor production. “China is really serious. Believe it,” he said.

New markets, new demand

The smart phone revolution has energized 200mm production, adding to a growing appetite for MEMS sensors, analog, and power ICs. Going forward, the Internet of Things, new medical devices, and flexible and wearable products may drive new demand, speakers said at the symposium.

Jason Marsh, director of technology for the government and industry-backed NextFlex R&D alliance based in San Jose, Calif., said many companies see “real potential” in making products which have “an unobtrusive form factor that doesn’t alter the physical environment.” He cited one application: a monitoring device worn by hospital patients that would reduce the occurrence of bed sores. These types of devices can be made with “comparatively yesteryear (semiconductor) technology” but require new packaging and system-level expertise.

Legacy devices made on 200mm wafers could get a boost from the increasing ability to combine several chips made with different technologies into fan out chip scale packages (FO CSPs). Bill Chen, a senior advisor at ASE Group, showed several examples of FO CSPs which combine legacy ICs with processors made on leading-edge nodes. “When we started this wafer-level development around 2000 we thought it would be a niche. But now about 30 percent of the ICs used in smart phones are in wafer-level CSPs. It just took a lot of time for the market forces to come along.”

More coverage from this year’s SEMICON West can be found here.

By James Hayward, Technology Analyst, IDTechEx

With hype around some of the core wearable technology sectors beginning to wane, IDTechEx have released their latest analysis of this diverse and growing industry in their brand new report Wearable Technology 2016-2026. The report finds the market to be worth over $30bn in 2016, with over $11bn of that coming from newly popular products including smartwatches and fitness trackers. However, despite the total market growing to over $150bn by 2026, IDTechEx forecast shake-ups in several prominent sectors, with commoditization hitting hard, and product form factors changing rapidly.

Global wearable technology forecast summary, including 39 forecast lines covering all prominent products today (e.g. smartwatches, fitness trackers, smart eyewear, smart clothing, medical devices and more), but also to many incumbent products (e.g. headphones, hearing aids, basic electronic watches and more). Source: IDTechEx Research report Wearable Technology 2016-2026.

Global wearable technology forecast summary, including 39 forecast lines covering all prominent products today (e.g. smartwatches, fitness trackers, smart eyewear, smart clothing, medical devices and more), but also to many incumbent products (e.g. headphones, hearing aids, basic electronic watches and more). Source: IDTechEx Research report Wearable Technology 2016-2026.

The IDTechEx report covers these trends in granular detail, including 39 separate forecast lines by product type and 60 formal company profiles and interviews compiled from primary research by IDTechEx’s expert analysts. The report also covers all of the industry megatrends that are driving innovation, demand and development, as well as describing application sectors including fitness & wellness, elite sportswear, healthcare & medical, infotainment, commercial, industrial, military, and others. For each, general sector-wide themes are described, but also detailed case studies are used to explain value propositions, end user needs and unmet problems that are driving the market forward.

Fuelled by a frenzy of hype, funding and global interest, wearable technology was catapulted to the top of the agenda for companies spanning the entire value chain and world. This investment manifested in hundreds of new products and extensive tailored R&D investigating relevant technology areas. However, the fickle nature of hype is beginning to show, and many companies are now progressing beyond discussing “wearables” to focus on the detailed and varied sub-sectors. Within this report, we include sections on each key of these key product areas, including fitness trackers, smartwatches, smart clothing, smart eyewear (including AR and VR), smart skin patches, headphones and more. For each, the key trends are discussed, the key players characterised, and qualified market forecasts provided.

IDTechEx’s expert analyst team has been covering this topic for over three years, including device level studies, but also looking to the component level at displays, sensors, batteries & power solutions, microcontrollers, e-textiles and haptics. This understanding of the entire value chain is used to qualify the market forecasts, and particularly when looking at the future of personal communication devices.

In a unique aspect of this report, IDTechEx outlines a long term case for standalone wearable communication devices as a future evolution of the smartphone. Today, most smartwatches and many fitness trackers still rely, at least partially, on a connection to a smartphone hub. The ubiquity of the smartphone as a central platform has been a key enabler for growth in wearables so far, but all of the largest manufacturers now look to a future, where the hub itself may become wearable. In the report, the authors describes the growth central, personal hub providing connectivity to peripheral devices, whether they be displays, sensor platforms or otherwise. With many smartwatches already beginning to move in this direction, we extend this case further providing a 10 year forecast for growth of devices of this type.

This is the most thorough and comprehensive report covering the entire wearable technology ecosystem. It provides detailed description of all of the hardware challenges and opportunities across the varied device types, and draws from IDTechEx’s case study database of around 1000 companies in the wearable technology value chain. The report lists around 500 companies actively making products (both hardware and software) to support this report. For full details of Wearable Technology 2016-2026, including the table of contents, please see www.IDTechEx.com/wearable.

 

By Pete Singer, Editor-in-Chief

A new roadmap, the Heterogeneous Integration Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (HITRS), aims to integrate fast optical communication made possible with photonic devices with the digital crunching capabilities of CMOS.

The roadmap, announced publicly for the first time at The ConFab in June, is sponsored by IEEE Components, Packaging and Manufacturing Technology Society (CPMT), SEMI and the IEEE Electron Devices Society (EDS).

Speaking at The ConFab, Bill Bottoms, chairman and CEO of 3MT Solutions, said there were four significant issues driving change in the electronics industry that in turn drove the need for the new HITRS roadmap: 1) The approaching end of Moore’s Law scaling of CMOS, 2) Migration of data, logic and applications to the Cloud, 3) The rise of the internet of things, and 4) Consumerization of data and data access.

“CMOS scaling is reaching the end of its economic viability and, for several applications, it has already arrived. At the same time, we have migration of data, logic and applications to the cloud. That’s placing enormous pressures on the capacity of the network that can’t be met with what we’re doing today, and we have the rise of the Internet of Things,” he said. The consumerization of data and data access is something that people haven’t focused on at all, he said. “If we are not successful in doing that, the rate of growth and economic viability of our industry is going to be threatened,” Bottoms said.

These four driving forces present requirements that cannot be satisfied through scaling CMOS. “We have to have lower power, lower latency, lower cost with higher performance every time we bring out a new product or it won’t be successful,” Bottoms said. “How do we do that? The only vector that’s available to us today is to bring all of the electronics much closer together and then the distance between those system nodes has to be connected with photonics so that it operates at the speed of light and doesn’t consume much power. The only way to do this is to use heterogeneous integration and to incorporate 3D complex System-in-Package (SiP) architectures.

The HITRS is focused on exactly that, including integrating single-chip and multi­chip packaging (including substrates); integrated photonics, integrated power devices, MEMS, RF and analog mixed signal, and plasmonics. “Plasmonics have the ability to confine photonic energy to a space much smaller than wavelength,” Bottoms said. More information on the HITRS can be found at: http://cpmt.ieee.org/technology/heterogeneous-integration-roadmap.html

Bottoms said much of the technology exists today at the component level, but the challenge lies in integration. He noted today’s capabilities (Figure 1) include Interconnection (flip-chip and wire bond), antenna, molding, SMT (passives, components, connectors), passives/integrated passive devices, wafer pumping/WLP, photonics layer, embedded technology, die/package stacking and mechanical assembly (laser welding, flex bending).

Building blocks for integrated photonics.

Building blocks for integrated photonics.

“We have a large number of components, all of which have been built, proven, characterized and in no case have we yet integrated them all. We’ve integrated more and more of them, and we expect to accelerate that in the next few years,” he said.

He also said that all the components exist to make very complex photonic integrated circuits, including beam splitters, microbumps, photodetectors, optical modulators, optical buses, laser sources, active wavelength locking devices, ring modulators, waveguides, WDM (wavelength division multiplexers) filters and fiber couplers. “They all exist, they all can be built with processes that are available to us in the CMOS fab, but in no place have they been integrated into a single device. Getting that done in an effective way is one of the objectives of the HITRS roadmap,” Bottoms explained.

He also pointed to the potential of new device types (Figure 2) that are coming (or already here), including carbon nanotube memory, MEMS photonic switches, spin torque devices, plasmons in CNT waveguides, GaAs nanowire lasers (grown on silicon with waveguides embedded), and plasmonic emission sources (that employ quantum dots and plasmons).

New device types are coming.

New device types are coming.

The HITRS committee will meet for a workshop at SEMICON West in July.

Researchers at the Texas Analog Center of Excellence(TxACE), a Semiconductor Research Corporation(SRC)-funded research effort centered at the University of Texas at Dallas (UT Dallas), are working to develop an affordable electronic nose that can be used in breath analysis for a wide range of health diagnosis.

While devices that can conduct breath analysis using compound semiconductors currently exist, they are bulky and too costly for commercial use, said Dr. Kenneth O, one of the principle investigators of the effort and director of TxACE. The UT Dallas researchers and collaborators at the Ohio State University and Wright State University determined that using CMOS integrated circuits technology will make the electronic nose affordable. CMOS is the integrated circuits technology that is used to manufacture the bulk of electronics that have made possible the smartphones, tablets and other electronic devices used in daily life.

Their research on the CMOS electronic nose was presented today in a paper entitled 200-280GHz CMOS Transmitter for Rotational Spectroscopy and Demonstration in Gas Spectroscopy and Breath Analysis, at the 2016 IEEE Symposia on VLSI Technology and Circuits in Hawaii.

“Smell is one of the senses of humans and animals, and there have been many efforts to build an electronic nose,” said Dr. Navneet Sharma, the lead author of paper. “We have demonstrated that you can build an affordable electronic nose that can sense many different kinds of smells. When you’re smelling something, you are detecting chemical molecules in the air. Similarly, an electronic nose detects chemical compounds using rotational spectroscopy.”

The rotational spectrometer generates and transmits electromagnetic waves over a wide range of frequencies and analyzes how the strength of waves are attenuated to determine what chemicals are present as well as their concentrations in a sample. The system can detect low levels of chemicals present in human breath.

“Think about where breath comes from,” said Professor Philip Raskin, M.D., of University of Texas, Southwestern. “Parts come from gases in your stomach, so this involves the digestive system. Molecules in breath also come from the blood when it comes into contact with the air in the lungs. The breath test is really a blood test without taking blood samples. Breath contains information about practically every part of your body.”

“This is the really opportune moment for the development of these breath sensors, rooted in enabling confluence of semiconductor innovation and system designs rooted in molecular spectroscopy,” said Professor Ivan Medvedev of Wright State University, another member of team. “The device can detect gas molecules with far more specificity and sensitivity than currently used breathalyzers, which can confuse acetone for ethanol in the breath. The distinction is important, for example, for patients with Type 1 diabetes who have high concentrations of acetone in their breath.”

“If you think about the industry around sensors that emulate our senses, it’s huge,” O said. “Imaging applications, hearing devices, touch sensors — what we are talking about here is developing a device that imitates another one of our sensing modalities and making it affordable and widely available. The possible use of the electronic nose is almost limitless. Think about how we use smell in our daily lives.”

The researchers envision the CMOS-based device will first be used in industrial settings and then in doctors’ offices and hospitals. As the technology matures, they could become household devices. The need for blood work and gastrointestinal tests could be reduced, and diseases could be detected earlier — lowering the costs of health care.

The researchers are working toward construction of a prototype programmable electronic nose that can be made available for beta testing sometime in early 2018.

The Texas Analog Research Center and this work are supported in large part by SRC and Texas Instruments. Additional support was provided by Samsung Global Research Outreach.

“SRC and its members, including Texas Instruments, Intel, IBM, Freescale, Mentor Graphics, ARM and GLOBALFOUNDRIES, have been following this work for several years,” said Dr. David Yeh, SRC senior director. “We are excited by the possibilities of the new technology and are working to rapidly explore its uses and applications. It is a significant milestone, but there is still much more research needed for this to reach its potential.”

TxACE, created in 2008 under the umbrella of the SRC, is the largest analog circuit design research center based in an academic institution. The center focuses on analog and mixed signal integrated circuits engineering that improve public safety and security, enhance medical care and help the U.S. become more energy independent.

The research team includes UT Dallas doctoral students Navneet Sharma, Zhong Qian and Jing Zhang; Dr. Mark Lee, professor and head of physics; Dr. David Lary, associate professor of physics; Dr. Hyunjoo Nam, assistant professor of bioengineering, Dr. Rashaunda Henderson, associate professor of electrical engineering; and Dr. Wooyeol Choi, assistant research professor. Other team members include Prof. Philip Raskin, M.D. of UT Southwestern, Professor Frank C. De Lucia, C. F. Neese, and J. P. McMillan of Ohio State University, and Professor Ivan R. Medvedev and R. Schueler of Wright State University.

Today, SEMI announced that 19 new fabs and lines are forecasted to begin construction in 2016 and 2017, according to the latest update of the SEMI World Fab Forecast report. While semiconductor fab equipment spending is off to a slow start in 2016, it is expected to gain momentum through the end of the year. For 2016, 1.5 percent growth over 2015 is expected while 13 percent growth is forecast in 2017.

Fab equipment spending ─ including new, secondary, and in-house ─ was down 2 percent in 2015. However, activity in the 3D NAND, 10nm Logic, and Foundry segments is expected to push equipment spending up to US$36 billion in 2016, 1.5 percent over 2015, and to $40.7 billion in 2017, up 13 percent. Equipment will be purchased for existing fabs, lines that are being converted to leading-edge technology, as well as equipment going into new fabs and lines that began construction in the prior year.

Table 1 shows the regions where new fabs and lines are expected to be built in 2016 and 2017. These projects have a probability of 60 percent or higher, according to SEMI’s data. While some projects are already underway, others may be subject to delays or pushed into the following year. The SEMI World Fab Forecast report, published May 31, 2016, provides more details about the construction boom.

new fab lines

Breaking down the 19 projects by wafer size, 12 of the fabs and lines are for 300mm (12-inch), four for 200mm, and three LED fabs (150mm, 100mm, and 50mm). Not including LEDs, the potential installed capacity of all these fabs and lines is estimated at almost 210,000 wafer starts per month (in 300mm equivalents) for fabs beginning construction in 2016 and 330,000 wafer starts per month (in 300mm equivalents) for fabs beginning construction in 2017.

In addition to announced and planned new fabs and lines, SEMI’s World Fab Forecast provides information about existing fabs and lines with associated construction spending, e.g. when a cleanroom is converted to a larger wafer size or a different product type.

In addition, the transition to leading-edge technologies (as we can see in planar technologies, but also in 3D technologies) creates a reduction in installed capacity within an existing fab. To compensate for this reduction, more conversions of older fabs may take place, but also additional new fabs and lines may begin construction.

For insight into semiconductor manufacturing in 2016 and 2017 with details about capex for construction projects, fab equipping, technology levels, and products, visit the SEMI Fab Database webpage and order the SEMI World Fab Forecast Report. The report, in Excel format, tracks spending and capacities for over 1,100 facilities including over 60 future facilities, across industry segments from Analog, Power, Logic, MPU, Memory, and Foundry to MEMS and LEDs facilities.

BioMEMS have been used for years, for plenty of applications. Some are linked to solid, mature, slow-growing industries, while others are part of booming applications that are adding new fuel to the bioMEMS market. According to Yole Développement (Yole) analysts, this market will triple from US$2.7 billion in 2015 to US$7.6 billion in 2021. Indeed, with the barrier between consumer and healthcare blurring, an increasing number of healthcare-related applications are using MEMS components, resulting in impressive market growth. Why is MEMS technology increasingly finding a sweet spot within the healthcare sector? What is the added-value of this technology? What are the drivers of this market? Who is developing what?…

Yole’s analysts propose today a high added-value survey of the BioMEMS components and their applications within the healthcare industry.

biomems_market_yole_april2016_433x280

Analysts from the “More than Moore” market research and strategy consulting company, Yole propose a comprehensive technology and market review of the microsystems for healthcare applications. Entitled BioMEMS: Microsytems for Healthcare Applications, this report provides an overview of the diverse bioMEMS components and applications, along with a detailed key players’ description at each level of the supply chain with market shares and related activities. It highlights threats and opportunities related to BioMEMS components along with market and technology trends. Yole’s analysis also details the challenges related to implantable devices and highlights the emergence of consumer healthcare with promising and booming applications.

Faced with an aging “baby boomer” population, healthcare is more important than ever. In-vitro diagnostics, pharmaceutical research, patient monitoring, drug delivery, and implantable devices: all of these fields is growing and system integrators need new innovative technologies. Adopting bioMEMS including accelerometers, pressure sensors, flow sensors, micropumps and others bring improved sensing and actuating functions for all of these healthcare fields. “MEMS components are increasingly used by healthcare system integrators,” says Sébastien Clerc, Technology & Market Analyst at Yole. “Indeed BioMEMS are used to bring new functionalities, improve performances and costs and enable miniaturized devices.”

And Yole details:
• Microfluidic devices will cover the largest part of the BioMEMS market in 2021 representing 86% of the total market. Microfluidic chips are increasingly used in life sciences applications. These components will enjoy a 19.2% every year between 2015 and 2021, driven by applications such as Point-of-Care testing.
• In parallel, silicon microphones and flow meters are showing a double digit growth during the 2015 – 2021 period (in value): respectively +23.3% and 18.3%. Though silicon microphones are still an emerging and small market, Yole’s analysts confirm the attractiveness of this MEMS technology for hearing aids application, where it brings higher performance than former technologies. They expect a fast penetration into these devices over the next five years. The trend is also positive for flow sensors: indeed the consulting company Yole highlights an increasing adoption of MEMS disposable devices for drug delivery applications. These disposable BioMEMS components are expected to take an important part of the MEMS flow sensor market in a near future. Until recently, flowmeters were relatively expensive devices and did not suit to drug delivery devices. However today the adoption of disposable sensors for this application opens new high-volumes opportunities for MEMS players. Price reduction was mandatory and MEMS technology successfully addressed the industry needs.

Many other bioMEMS components are also active within the healthcare industry. Yole’s analysts identified pressure sensors, accelerometers, gyroscopes, microdispensers, temperature sensors and more… Their market dynamics highly depend on the related applications and on the ability of MEMS makers to innovate. Lack of strong technical innovations and emerging applications are the characteristics of certain BioMEMS markets. Yole’s analysts give some examples below:
• The pressure sensors market for healthcare applications is showing a slowly growth. 75% of the market is dedicated to the blood monitoring applications. Established for decades, this market is mature with no real disruptive technologies. Reduction of the number of players and attempt to increase volumes are the main trends of this sector for the next years, analyzes Yole in its bioMEMS report. • Accelerometers market is also showing slow growth opportunities. Such devices are today mainly used for CRM applications (implantable pacemakers and defibrillators) which are growing slowly. New applications such as ballistocardiography or fall detection have the potential to boost this market but still represent very low volumes right now.

However the emergence of consumer could change the game and become a real opportunity for MEMS manufacturers with huge volumes. MEMS companies, involved within the consumer market are already considering the consumer healthcare sector. In the meantime, consumer giants acquire promising healthcare and biotech startups and are positioning themselves to address this market. Despite the great promises of consumer healthcare, it will take some time to reach its full potential, highlights the consulting company in its bioMEMS report. Performance, consumer acceptance, reimbursement, reliability, data security… Yole identified numerous barriers preventing rapid explosion of consumer healthcare. Various players have to sit around the table and discuss to find solutions and thus knock down these barriers: Yole expects it will take a few years until consumer healthcare devices are widely adopted.

A combination of device releases, price reductions, and company rationalizations marked the first quarter of 2016 (1Q16) in the worldwide wearables market. According to data from International Data Corporation, (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Wearable Device Tracker, total shipment volumes reached 19.7 million units in 1Q16, an increase of 67.2% from the 11.8 million units shipped in 1Q15.

The first quarter saw its fair share of significant events to entice customers, with multiple fitness trackers and smartwatches introduced at the major technology shows; post-holiday price reductions on multiple wearables, including Apple’s Sport Watch; and greater participation within emerging wearables categories, particularly clothing and footwear. Conversely, several start-ups announced headcount reduction or shut down entirely, underscoring how competitive the wearables market has become.

“The good news is that the wearables market continues to mature and expand,” noted Ramon Llamas, research manager for IDC’s Wearables team. “The wearables that we see today are several steps ahead of what we saw when this market began, increasingly taking their cues from form, function, and fashion. That keeps them relevant. The downside is that it is becoming a crowded market, and not everyone is guaranteed success.”

Still, there are two areas where the market shows continued growth: smart watches and basic wearables (devices which do not run third party applications).

“There’s a clear bifurcation and growth within the wearables market,” said Jitesh Ubrani senior research analyst for IDC’s Mobile Device Trackers. “Smart watches attempt to offer holistic experiences by being everything to everyone, while basic wearables like fitness bands, connected clothing, or hearables have a focused approach and often offer specialized use cases.”

Ubrani continued, “It’s shortsighted to think that basic wearables and smart watches are in competition with each other. Right now, we see both as essential to expand the overall market. The unique feature sets combined with substantial differences in price and performance sets each category apart, and leaves plenty of room for both to grow over the next few years.”

Top Five Wearables Vendors

Fitbit began 2016 the same way it finished 2015: as the undisputed leader in the wearables market. The launch of its new Alta and Blaze devices resulted in million unit shipment volumes for each, pointing to a new chapter of fashion-oriented fitness trackers. It also points to significant declines for its previously successful Surge, Charge, Charge HR, and Flex product lines. Still, with a well-segmented portfolio, pricing strategy, and a strong brand, Fitbit’s position is well-established.

Xiaomi supplanted Apple in 1Q16 and captured the number 2 position. The company expanded its line of inexpensive fitness trackers to include heartrate monitoring and also recently launched a kids’ watch to help parents track their children. It should be pointed out that its success is solely based on China, and expanding beyond its home turf will continue to be its largest hurdle.

According to Apple CEO Tim Cook, the Watch has met the company’s expectations. Its total volumes and revenue trailed far behind its iPhone, iPad, and Mac product lines, and did little to stem their declines. Until the next version of the Watch comes out, it would appear that Apple will continuously update its watch bands to keep the product relevant.

Garmin finished slightly ahead of Samsung on the strength of its wristbands and watches appealing to a wide range of athletes, most especially golfers, runners, and fitness tracker enthusiasts. While the company added two fitness trackers with the vivoactive HR and the vivofit 3, Garmin launched its first eyeworn device, the Varia Vision In-Sight Display, for cyclists.

Samsung landed in the number 5 position on the success of its Gear S2 and Gear S2 Classic smartwatch. What sets the Gear S2 apart from most other smartwatches is that it is among the very few with a cellular connectivity version, forgoing the need to be constantly tethered to a smartphone. It is also compatible with Android smartphones beyond Samsung’s own, broadening its reach. However, its application selection trails behind what is available for Android Wear and watchOS.

BBK tied* with Samsung for fifth place worldwide. This is the second time that BBK finished among the top five vendors worldwide, having debuted in 3Q15 with its Y01 phone watch for children. The company returns with another phone watch for children, the Y02 with improved water resistance and durability.

Top Five Wearables Vendors, Shipments, Market Share and Year-Over-Year Growth, Q1 2016 (Units in Millions)
Vendor

1Q16 Unit
Shipments

1Q16 Market
Share

1Q15 Unit
Shipments

1Q15 Market
Share

Year-Over-
Year Growth
1. Fitbit 4.8 24.5 % 3.8 32.6 % 25.4 %
2. Xiaomi 3.7 19.0 % 2.6 22.4 % 41.8 %
3. Apple 1.5 7.5 % N/A 0.0 % N/A
4. Garmin 0.9 4.6 % 0.7 6.1 % 27.8 %
5. Samsung* 0.7 3.6 % 0.7 5.8 % 4.5 %
5. BBK* 0.7 3.6 % N/A 0.0 % N/A
Others 7.3 37.2 % 3.9 33.1 % 87.9 %
Total 19.7 100.0 % 11.8 100.0 % 67.2 %
Source: IDC Worldwide Quarterly Wearables Tracker, May 16, 2016

* IDC declares a statistical tie in the worldwide wearables market when there is less than one tenth of one percent (0.1%) difference in the unit shipment share of two or more vendors.

Top Five Basic Wearables Vendors, Shipments, Market Share and Year-Over-Year Growth, Q1 2016 (Units in Millions)
Vendor

1Q16 Unit
Shipments

1Q16 Market
Share

1Q15 Unit
Shipments

1Q15 Market
Share

Year-Over-
Year Growth
1. Fitbit 4.8 29.4 % 3.8 38.7 % 25.4 %
2. Xiaomi 3.7 22.8 % 2.6 26.6 % 41.8 %
3. Garmin 0.8 5.0 % 0.6 6.0 % 36.5 %
4. XTC 0.7 4.3 % N/A 0.0 % N/A
5. Lifesense 0.7 4.1 % N/A 0.0 % N/A
Others 5.7 34.5 % 2.9 28.7 % 98.2 %
Total 16.4 100.0 % 9.9 100.0 % 65.1 %
Source: IDC Worldwide Quarterly Wearables Tracker, May 16, 2016
Top Five Smartwatch Vendors, Shipments, Market Share and Year-Over-Year Growth, Q1 2016 (Units in Millions)
Vendor

1Q16 Unit
Shipments

1Q16 Market
Share

1Q15 Unit
Shipments

1Q15 Market
Share

Year-Over-
Year Growth
1. Apple 1.5 46.0 % N/A 0.0 % N/A
2. Samsung 0.7 20.9 % 0.5 29.8 % 40.5 %
3. Motorola 0.4 10.9 % 0.2 11.0 % 98.2 %
4. Huawei 0.2 4.7 % N/A 0.0 % N/A
5. Garmin 0.1 3.0 % 0.1 7.2 % -17.3 %
Others 0.5 14.5 % 0.8 52.0 % -44.2 %
Total 3.2 100.0 % 1.6 100.0 % 100.2 %
Source: IDC Worldwide Quarterly Wearables Tracker, May 16, 2016

Table Notes:

  • Data is preliminary and subject to change.
  • Vendor shipments are branded device shipments and exclude OEM sales for all vendors.
  • The “Vendor” represents the current parent company (or holding company) for all brands owned and operated as a subsidiary.
  • The table labeled “Top Five Wearables Vendors…” represents the sum of both basic and smart wearables equaling the total wearable market size.
  • The table labeled “Top Five Basic Wearables Vendors…” represents the total basic wearable market size.
  • The table labeled “Top Five Smartwatch Vendors…” does not equal total smart wearable market size as certain form factors (i.e. eyewear, wristbands) are excluded.

In addition to the tables above, an interactive graphic showing worldwide market share by device type over the previous five quarters is available here. The chart is intended for public use in online news articles and social media. Instructions on how to embed this graphic can be found by viewing this press release on IDC.com.

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) this week announced worldwide sales of semiconductors reached $26.1 billion for the month of March 2016, a slight increase of 0.3 percent compared to the previous month’s total of $26.0 billion. Sales from the first quarter of 2016 were $78.3 billion, down 5.5 percent compared to the previous quarter and 5.8 lower than the first quarter of 2015. All monthly sales numbers are compiled by the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) organization and represent a three-month moving average.

“Global semiconductor sales increased in March for the first time in five months, but soft demand, market cyclicality, and macroeconomic conditions continue to impede more robust growth,” said John Neuffer, president and CEO, Semiconductor Industry Association. “Q1 sales lagged behind last quarter across nearly all regional markets, with the Americas showing the sharpest decline.”

Regionally, month-to-month sales increased in Japan (4.8 percent), Asia Pacific/All Other (2.3 percent), and Europe (0.1 percent), but fell in China (-1.1 percent) and the Americas (-2.8 percent). Compared to the same month last year, sales in March increased in Japan (1.8 percent) and China (1.3 percent), but decreased in Asia Pacific/All Other (-6.4 percent), Europe (-9.8 percent), and the Americas (-15.8 percent).

“Eighty-three percent of U.S. semiconductor industry sales are into markets outside the U.S., so access to overseas markets is imperative to the long-term strength of our industry,” Neuffer said. “The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a landmark trade agreement that would tear down myriad barriers to trade with countries in the Asia-Pacific. The TPP is good for the semiconductor industry, the tech sector, the American economy, and the global economy. Congress should approve it.”

March 2016

Billions

Month-to-Month Sales                               

Market

Last Month

Current Month

% Change

Americas

5.03

4.89

-2.8%

Europe

2.66

2.67

0.1%

Japan

2.47

2.59

4.8%

China

8.02

7.93

-1.1%

Asia Pacific/All Other

7.83

8.01

2.3%

Total

26.02

26.09

0.3%

Year-to-Year Sales                          

Market

Last Year

Current Month

% Change

Americas

5.81

4.89

-15.8%

Europe

2.96

2.67

-9.8%

Japan

2.55

2.59

1.8%

China

7.83

7.93

1.3%

Asia Pacific/All Other

8.57

8.01

-6.4%

Total

27.70

26.09

-5.8%

Three-Month-Moving Average Sales

Market

Oct/Nov/Dec

Jan/Feb/Mar

% Change

Americas

5.75

4.89

-15.0%

Europe

2.77

2.67

-3.6%

Japan

2.57

2.59

0.8%

China

8.45

7.93

-6.1%

Asia Pacific/All Other

8.08

8.01

-0.8%

Total

27.62

26.09

-5.5%
Year-to-year percent change in world semiconductor revenues over the past 20 years.

Year-to-year percent change in world semiconductor revenues over the past 20 years.

By Debra Vogler, SEMI

The demand for smartphones and other portable devices that need efficient power management is driving the analog IC market. Additionally, growth is fueled by the Internet of Things (IoT) and the MEMS/sensors devices that enable it. To explore the supply chain opportunities within the analog sector, including MEMS/sensors, SEMI introduced the Analog and New Frontiers Program at SEMICON West 2016. This program — part of the Extended Supply Chain Forum — will feature four, hour-long sessions, each focusing on a different supply chain challenge or area of interest within the analog sector. One of the featured speakers will be Dr. Peter Hartwell, senior director of Advanced Technology at InvenSense. Dr. Hartwell’s pre-show interview provides a provocative look at supply chain challenges facing MEMS/sensors manufacturers.

Perhaps the most significant challenge facing manufacturers of MEMS/sensors is commoditization of sensors and where the profits end up. “The windfall is going to the people enabling the applications at the top,” Hartwell told SEMI. “Especially with mobile devices and IoT.” He pointed out that if there isn’t a way for value capture at the lowest levels – i.e., the companies that enable the systems and devices that create the IoT experience – he predicts a plateau of innovation. “We won’t have the resources to push technology forward, so as a sensor company, we are trying to find ways to move further up the value chain to extract some of that value.”

Moving up the value chain, however, requires sensor companies to become more aware of system considerations. Design convergence is one way to accomplish this. “We think of design convergence as SiPs (System in Package) or SoCs (System on a Chip),” said Hartwell. “We start to put together our sensors with other capabilities, whether that means having processing power in our package or looking at different kinds of sensors that come together.”

He speculates about a time when there will be a single-chip IoT device, i.e., a one-chip device comprising sensors, storage, radio, power management, and perhaps even energy harvesting. “Maybe that’s where the convergence goes.” Still, in the end, the challenge becomes how the industry gets the money back to the bottom of the supply chain. “We’re inching up towards where that money is by building those systems and understanding what it takes to make them.”

The fabless model for MEMS/sensors

Aside from the commoditization conundrum, Hartwell sees another supply chain opportunity arising if the industry embraces a truly fabless business model. Such a model would be based on companies that only design the devices with the process kits arising from different companies. The fundamental question with that scenario, Hartwell notes, is how the various MEMS/sensors houses differentiate themselves.

Hartwell noted that InvenSense embraces the fabless model — the company has a Shuttle program with its foundry partners, TSMC and GLOBALFOUNDRIES. The InvenSense Shuttle gives MEMS developers the opportunity to fabricate their designs on the patented InvenSense Fabrication MEMS-CMOS integrated platform. Though competitors are not able to take part in the Shuttle program, it is available to universities and start-up partner companies. That said, Hartwell noted that the company keeps its ‘cards pretty close to the vest.’ So the challenge is how to open up that model while retaining differentiation when fabs and foundries tend to want to wring out cost from process development by using as much standardization as possible.

“The million dollar question,” said Hartwell, “is could we ever get to the point where the foundry tells the sensor companies what to do — the EDA companies would love to see this happen because it would lead to standardization of design tools and simulators.”

Opportunities for test and the digital interface

Test and packaging are two more opportunity areas for the supply chain. Hartwell pointed out that most MEMS/sensors companies do their own testing using their own test infrastructure. “It’s one differentiator that we haven’t been willing to give up,” said Hartwell. “So this is an opportunity for someone to come in and turn over the apple cart.”

With the proliferation of sensors that need to interface with a multi-chip system comes the challenge of having to connect using more and more pins. And though the industry has solutions for a digital interface to the sensor world, additional work needs to focus on making that interface robust. Hartwell explained that multiple interrupts and digital lines are needed and it gets complicated when you have five, six, or seven sensors in a system. “There are just not enough pins,” said Hartwell. “So we’re seeing a change in the wiring and the interface will have to be something new to solve the integration problem, which has become nontrivial.” He further observed that IoT is driven by four attributes: size, cost, power, and performance. “To get to the promise of IoT, it will take breakthroughs to get to a trillion sensors. You will have to reduce size, cost, power and performance, and some of those by one or two orders of magnitude.”

Wringing out costs with packaging (or, “no” package)

Hartwell minces no words when it comes to tackling size and cost in MEMS: packaging is MEMS. “This is the biggest opportunity to take out size and cost,” Hartwell told SEMI. “The influence of packaging on the transducer can’t be ignored. Packaging hurts the size, it hurts performance, and it’s something for which I don’t want to pay. It’s a huge opportunity for a shift.”

For Hartwell, the crux of the challenge is how to take a single piece of silicon that has a 6-axis sensor system, and then test it, trim it, ship it, and put it into whatever system it’s going into without changing its trim. While chip-scale packaging could be the opportunity the MEMS industry needs, he wants to keep the options open for other ways to break the paradigm.

What’s clear is that ample business opportunities exist for the supply chain within the MEMS/sensors sector to get rid of cost and size, address the test challenge, get rid of the package, and finally, new ways to handle and assemble parts.

To learn more, attend the Analog and New Frontiers Forum (part of the Extended Supply Chain Forum) at SEMICON West. The forum will be held on Wednesday, July 13, in four, hour-long sessions on the Keynote Stage, North Hall, Moscone Center. Check the SEMICON West 2016 website for more details and a list of confirmed speakers for each of the sessions.