Tag Archives: letter-pulse-business

Today, SEMI announced that Innovation Village at SEMICON Japan 2016 has been expanded with participation by 31 start-up companies. SEMICON Japan, held December 14-16 at Tokyo Big Sight in Tokyo, is already the largest and most important gathering of the electronics manufacturing supply chain in Japan. With added exhibition and programming for innovation in the expanded Innovation Village this year, attendees will gain access to early high-tech startups and strategic investors ─ the driving force for future growth of the electronics supply chain. Click here to register for SEMICON Japan exhibition and conference programs.

SEMICON Japan 2016 Innovation Village includes:

  • TechSTAGE Start-up Pitches: from 31 start-up companies including: Adawarprobotics (opensource library for telepresence robot), ArtifactNoise (environmental measurements), Inupathy (a smart communication device for dogs), Osaka University (plasma nanomanufacturing), PixieDust Technologies (ultrasonic waves to generate a sound point source in air), primesap (a smart remote nursing system), Simulatio (AI that processes both natural languages and formulas), Trybots (a penguin robot), Yamanashi Thin Film Technology Developments (zinc oxide films) and ZaaZ (a scent device for head mounted displays).
  • Tabletop exhibition area: start-ups will describe new ideas, technologies, products, and services with attendees.
  • Innovate Reception: results revealed from the pitch contest and a networking opportunity for start-up companies seeking investment capital or strategic industry partners.
  • IoT and Innovation Village Joint Session on “Manufacturing Startups Today”: with a keynote by Junichi Hasegawa of Preferred Networks on “Industrial Revolution Led by Deep Learning” and panel discussion ─ with CEO panelists from AgIC, BONX, and SORACOM ─ moderated by Ken Nishimura of AOL Online Japan.

Innovation Village attendees will gain key insights into new technologies and products, advanced research solutions, investment opportunities, as well as technology transfer and partnerships opportunities.

Osamu Nakamura, president of SEMI Japan, said, “Our industry is driven by innovation. During the four decades of SEMICON Japan history, continuous innovation has moved our industry forward. The Japan semiconductor industry has increased its diversity in processes and product portfolio as well. As we face unprecedented changes, the industry is in need of new innovations to enable us to serve the smart and creative world of today and tomorrow. This year’s Innovation Village at SEMICON Japan will help fuel our industry with new ideas.”

Register now for SEMICON Japan. For a detailed agenda ─ including keynotes, SuperTHEATER, TechSTAGE, IoT sessions, SEMI Market Forum, Sustainable Manufacturing, 200mm Market,  networking events, and standards meetings ─ please see the “SEMICON Japan Schedule-at-a-Glance.”

SEMICON Japan’s Innovation Village is sponsored by: DMM.com, Japan Venture Capital Association, JSR, Leave a Nest, Japan Research Institute, and Tokyo Ohka Kogyo.

Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation, the largest and most advanced foundry in mainland China, and The Institute of Microelectronics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences announced the signing of a cooperation agreement for a MEMS R&D foundry platform to jointly develop MEMS sensor standard processes and build a complete MEMS supply chain.

According to the agreement, SMIC and IMECAS will work together closely to take advantage of IMECAS’s experiences in MEMS Sensor design and packaging technology design and SMIC’s standardized process technology platforms, industry and market influence. Starting with the development of a MEMS environmental sensor and combining the features of other types of MEMS Sensors, SMIC and IMECAS will collaborate to create a platform–based standard as well as mass production technologies to shorten the development cycle from design to production, thus helping the MEMS industry grow more effectively and efficiently.

“SMIC’s R&D team has made a lot of achievements in developing new sensor technology platforms and introducing new customers. SMIC is willing to open our platforms to support commercialized production and the R&D of universities and research institutions,” said Dr. Tzu-Yin Chiu, Chief Executive Officer and Executive Director of SMIC. “SMIC and IMECAS have cooperated in numerous logic process development projects. This time we will expand our collaboration and promote the R&D of complete standardized MEMS sensor technologies to help integrate and improve the MEMS supply chain.”

Ye Tianchun, Director of IMECAS, visited SMIC’s middle-end production line of MEMS sensors and said, “Through the cooperation between SMIC and IMECAS, we can exploit our advantages and jointly build an open MEMS technology service platform and an electronic information integration platform for the MEMS supply chain. With the integration of design, manufacturing, packing, testing, public platform and venture investment, we can form a supply chain ecosystem and support the development of a global as well as domestic Chinese MEMS industry.”

The latest Research and Markets report, “North America Light Emitting Diode (LED) Market (2016-2022)”,  indicates that the North American LED market is expected to reach $11,702.6 Million by 2022 growing at a CAGR of 9.7% during the forecast period.

The General lighting market dominated the North America LED market in 2015, and that trend is expected to continue until 2022, thereby achieving a market value of $ 4,563.6 Million by 2022 growing at a CAGR of 9.5% during the forecast period. The Automotive market is expected to reach a market size of $1,663.5 Million by 2022.

The U.S market dominated the North America LED market in 2015 and would continue until 2022 thereby achieving a market value of $ 8,683.3 Million by 2022 growing at a CAGR of 8.8% during the forecast period. The Canada application market is expected to reach a market size of $1,755.4 Million by 2022. The Mexico market would witness the growth rate of 14.2% during 2016-2022.

High brightness LEDs (HB-LEDs) are widely used in automotive, signals and signage in the North American region. Major mobile companies such as Apple Corporation have incorporated Organic LEDs (O-LED) in their mobile phones, which will contribute to the growth of the LED market. With widespread adoption in North America, the emerging economies also have started using LEDs in various applications, which should further add to the market growth, offering tremendous opportunities for the LED market players to enter into the LED market.

According to the latest market study released by Technavio, the global fan-in wafer-level packaging (WLP) market is expected to reach USD 4.75 billion by 2020, growing at a CAGR of almost 10%.

This research report titled ‘Global Fan-In WLP Market 2016-2020’ provides an in-depth analysis of the market in terms of revenue and emerging market trends. The report also presents a corresponding detailed analysis of the major vendors manufacturing fan-in wafer-level packages in North America, APAC, and Europe.

The increasing number of fabs globally has pushed the demand for IC packaging solutions. The vendors are setting up new fabs in different countries to produce memory devices like dynamic random access memory (DRAM) and not AND (NAND). The transition of semiconductor industry such as miniaturized semiconductor electronics, because of emerging technology such as the Internet of Things (IoT), is also driving the global fan-in WLP market.

The surging demand for compact electronic devices in sectors such as telecommunications, automotive, industrial manufacturing, and healthcare has generated the need for miniaturized semiconductor ICs. With the emergence of products such as 3D ICs and MEMS devices, the electronic equipment is becoming compact and user-friendly, which involves changes in IC designing such as finer patterning.

Technavio’s sample reports are free of charge and contain multiple sections of the report including the market size and forecast, drivers, challenges, trends, and more.

Technavio’s hardware and semiconductor analysts categorize the global fan-in WLP market into five major segments by application. They are:

  •    CMOS image sensor
  •    Wireless connectivity
  •    Logic and memory IC
  •    MEMS and sensor
  •    Analog and mixed IC

The top three segments by application for the fan-in WLP market are:

Analog and mixed ICs

The global analog and mixed IC shipments amounted to 27.57 billion units in 2015 and will reach 40.93 billion units by 2020, growing at a CAGR of 8.22% during the forecast period.

The demand for analog ICs from different segments (such as consumer electronics, communications, and automotive) is gradual but significant. The rising demand for smartphones, phablets, and tablets worldwide is driving their demand in the communications segment. The increasing pace of new product development, the declining cost per function of ICs, and the reduced product replacement cycle have contributed to the high demand for semiconductor ICs and, therefore, analog ICs. The rapid technological developments in the semiconductor industry and the development of efficient analog ICs (which deliver optimized performance) have also increased the proliferation of analog ICs in the global market space.

Wireless connectivity

The global shipments in the wireless connectivity segment amounted to 2.71 billion units in 2015 and will reach 4.79 billion units by 2020, growing at a CAGR of 12.07% during the forecast period.

The wireless connectivity segment includes the demand for fan-in WLP solutions from technologies such as Wi-Fi, RF transceivers, Bluetooth, DC/DC converters, audio/video codecs, RF filters, gyroscopes, and accelerometers, which assist in providing optimum wireless connectivity. Wi-Fi technology is adapting to new protocol versions such as Wi-Fi Direct, 802.11ac, and 801.11ad. With continuous evolution of new technologies and continuous integration of Wi-Fi capability into mobile devices, the demand for wireless connectivity solutions will increase during the forecast period.

According to Sunil Kumar Singh, a lead semiconductor equipment analyst from Technavio, “The global Wi-Fi chipset market is experiencing the transition to 5th Wi-Fi generation, the 802.11ac with MIMO. An increasing number of customers are likely to adopt the technology due to an improvement in speed by up to 1.3 GHz over a long distance.”

Logic and memory ICs

The global shipments in the logic and memory IC segment amounted to 3.51 billion units in 2015 and will reach 4.79 billion units by 2020, growing at a CAGR of 6.42% during the forecast period.

Technological development has led to the introduction of better electronic devices across sectors, such as high-powered smartphones, performance-packed automobiles, automated machinery in the industrial sector, and electronic devices in the healthcare sector for better monitoring of patients. This has increased the demand for better processing to ensure efficient background operations.

The demand for high-powered processors has increased the demand for logic ICs, especially for automation purposes. This will trigger the demand for fan-in WLP solutions in the logic IC segment as they constitute an integral part of IC packaging at the manufacturing level.

The top vendors highlighted by Technavio’s research analysts in this report are:

  •    STATS ChipPAC
  •    STMicroelectronics
  •    TSMC
  •    Texas Instruments

About Technavio

Technavio is a leading global technology research and advisory company. The company develops over 2000 pieces of research every year, covering more than 500 technologies across 80 countries. Technavio has about 300 analysts globally who specialize in customized consulting and business research assignments across the latest leading edge technologies.

MicroVision, Inc. (NASDAQ:MVIS) and STMicroelectronics (NYSE:STM) today announced that they plan to work together to develop, sell, and market Laser Beam Scanning (LBS) technology.

The companies anticipate cooperating closely on market development efforts that will include joint sales and marketing activities for LBS solutions. In addition to the pico projection and heads-up display (HUD) markets that both companies are currently addressing with their LBS solutions, ST and MicroVision anticipate targeting emerging markets and applications including virtual and augmented reality (VR, AR), 3D sensing and Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS).

In addition, MicroVision and ST anticipate exploring options to collaborate on future technology development including a joint LBS product roadmap. This cooperation would combine the process design and manufacturing expertise of ST with the LBS systems and solutions expertise of MicroVision.

“Working with MicroVision, our goal is to build on our matched skills, shared vision, and commitment to grow LBS-enabled markets to open up many opportunities for both companies,” said Benedetto Vigna, Executive Vice President of the Analog and MEMS Group of ST. “This relationship will position ST to pursue all of the growth opportunities for LBS and the complementary power, sensing, and control components.”

“Teaming up with ST, a world leader in its field, is important for MicroVision both for ST’s expertise in semiconductor technology and its global customer reach,” said Alexander Tokman, president and CEO of MicroVision. “Combining ST’s expertise in the development and manufacture of key components for LBS scanning engines with MicroVision’s proprietary system, engine, and applications knowledge, and intellectual property can be highly advantageous for marketing LBS solutions to a wide array of companies for numerous applications.”

The companies have an existing working relationship on production of MicroVision components. ST manufactures MicroVision’s current-generation MEMS die based on MicroVision’s design. ST also manufactures one of the ASICs sold by MicroVision.

Gigaphoton Inc., a manufacturer of light sources used in lithography, has announced that the company has designated 2016, the 16th anniversary of its inception, as the year of its entry into a new stage of development, and has set its sights on achieving new levels of growth.

Established on August 1, 2,000, Gigaphoton commemorated its 15th Anniversary last year. At the time of its establishment, Gigaphoton’s share of the DUV excimer laser market was approximately 10%. Today, however, the company has achieved cumulative sales of over 1,300 units with a 2015 market distribution share of some 60% and levels of record sales. Against this backdrop, Gigaphoton has designated 2016 as the entry point to its second development phase, and aims to achieve even more impressive growth. In addition to continuing its excimer laser business activities in the semiconductor lithography industry, Gigaphoton plans to expand into new fields like FPD manufacturing with its GIGANEX series. Gigaphoton’s EUV light sources have successfully attained reliable outputs of 250W, and the company intends to transcend beyond this achievement by accelerating development focused on implementing mass production of the product.

Towards achieving this goal, Gigaphoton began construction work on a new building this fall as a part of its investment in the future. Scheduled to be completed in June 2017, this endeavor will increase manufacturing space by 50% while increasing production scale by up to 70%. The company is also hiring additional staff to augment the company structure in an effort to ensure it is capable of delivering higher levels of reliability, and can satisfy customer needs more swiftly and attentively than ever before.

Hitoshi Tomaru, President & CEO of Gigaphoton says, “Since the company’s inception, we at Gigaphoton have remain committed to the manufacture and sale of excimer lasers for semiconductor lithography, and presently we are embarking on an exciting new stage of development. Going forward, we intend to dedicate efforts towards our GIGANEX series and EUV products, which offer highly valued solutions, while also improving the quality of our existing DUV lasers and augmenting our customer support structure. Through such efforts, we are committed to continuing to serve as a company that grows together with our clients.”

IC Insights will release the 2017 edition of its IC Market Drivers Report later this month.  The newly updated report reviews many of the end-use system applications that are presently impacting the IC market and are forecast to help propel it through 2020.

Total smartphone shipments are forecast to grow by 4% in 2016 to 1,490 million units after jumping by 13% to 1,430 million in 2015.  Moreover, smartphone shipments are forecast to grow by 5% in 2017, reaching 1,565 million units.  Overall, smartphone unit shipments are now forecast to grow at single-digit annual rates through 2020.

Smartphones accounted for over 50% of total quarterly cellphone shipments for the first time ever in 1Q13 (Figure 1).  Smartphone shipments fell to 340 million units in 1Q16 yet still represented 80% of total cellphones shipped that quarter, the same penetration as in 4Q15.  In 4Q16, it is expected that smartphone shipments will surge to a new record high of 437 million and represent 84% of all cellphones shipped that quarter.  On an annual basis, smartphones first surpassed the 50% penetration level in 2013 (54%) and are forecast to represent 97% of total cellphone shipments in 2020.

In contrast to smartphones, total cellphone handset shipments are forecast to decline by 2% in 2016 and are expected to drop by 1% in 2017 (Figure 2).  As shown, non-smartphone cellphone sales dropped by 30% in 2015 and are forecast to fall by another 22% this year.  Moreover, IC Insights expects the 2017 non-smartphone cellphone unit shipment decline to be steeper than 2016’s drop with a decline of 26%.

Figure 1

Figure 1

Figure 2

Figure 2

Worldwide silicon wafer area shipments increased during the third quarter 2016 when compared to second quarter 2016 area shipments according to the SEMI Silicon Manufacturers Group (SMG) in its quarterly analysis of the silicon wafer industry.

Total silicon wafer area shipments were 2,730 million square inches during the most recent quarter, a 0.9 percent increase from the 2,706 million square inches shipped during the previous quarter. New quarterly total area shipments are 5.4 percent higher than third quarter 2015 shipments and are at their highest recorded quarterly level.

“Global silicon wafer demand continued to grow during this quarter,” said Dr. Volker Braetsch, chairman SEMI SMG and senior vice president of Siltronic AG. “Year-to-date shipments are trending slightly above the same period as last year.”

Silicon* Area Shipment Trends

Millions of Square Inches

3Q 

2015

2Q 

2016

3Q 

2016

Q1 + Q2 + Q3 

2016

Q1 + Q2 + Q3 

2015
Total

 

2,591

2,706

2,730

7,973

7,930

 

Silicon wafers are the fundamental building material for semiconductors, which in turn, are vital components of virtually all electronics goods, including computers, telecommunications products, and consumer electronics. The highly engineered thin round disks are produced in various diameters (from one inch to 12 inches) and serve as the substrate material on which most semiconductor devices or “chips” are fabricated.

All data cited in this release is inclusive of polished silicon wafers, including virgin test wafers and epitaxial silicon wafers, as well as non-polished silicon wafers shipped by the wafer manufacturers to the end-users.

The Silicon Manufacturers Group acts as an independent special interest group within the SEMI structure and is open to SEMI members involved in manufacturing polycrystalline silicon, monocrystalline silicon or silicon wafers (e.g., as cut, polished, epi, etc.). The purpose of the group is to facilitate collective efforts on issues related to the silicon industry including the development of market information and statistics about the silicon industry and the semiconductor market.

Analog Devices, Inc. (ADI) today introduced a breakthrough in switch technology that provides a long-sought replacement for electromechanical relay designs first adopted by the electronics industry more than 100 years ago. ADI’s new RF-MEMS switch technology is enabling faster, smaller, lower power, more reliable instrumentation equipment by resolving multiple performance limitations commonly attributed to relays, whose origins date to the earliest days of the electric telegraph. With the commercial release of products enabled by this technology, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) can significantly improve the accuracy and versatility of automatic test equipment (ATE) and other instrumentation tools to help their customers reduce testing costs, power and time to market. Future products within the MEMS switch series will replace relays in aerospace and defense, healthcare, and communications infrastructure equipment, allowing OEMs in those markets to pass similar size, power and cost savings along to their customers.

The first in a new product series, ADI’s ADGM1304 and ADGM1004 RF MEMS switches are 95 percent smaller, 30 times faster, 10 times more reliable, and use 10 times less power than conventional electromechanical relays.

MEMS switch technology delivers 0-Hz (DC) to wideband RF performance

Unlike other switch alternatives such as solid-state relays, the ADGM1304 and ADGM1004 MEMS switches have superior precision and RF performance from 0 Hz (DC) to 14 GHz. ADI’s MEMS switch solution contains two die to maximize operational performance – an electrostatically actuated switch in a hermetically sealed silicon cap, and a low-voltage, low-current driver IC. The switching element has a highly conditioned, extremely reliable metal-to-metal contact that is actuated via an electrostatic force generated by the companion driver IC. The resultant co-packaged solution ensures best-in-class DC precision and RF performance, and makes the switch extremely easy to use.

Switch breakthrough extends ATE equipment Lifetime and Channel Densities

The highly reliable ADGM1304 and ADGM1004 increase cold-switching lifetime by a factor of 10 compared to electromechanical relays, extending ATE system operating life and reducing costly downtime caused by relay failures. Additionally, the extremely small height of the ADGM1304 and ADGM1004 MEMS switch packages allow designers to surface-mount the devices on both sides of their ATE test boards to boost channel densities at reduced cost and without expanding equipment footprint. An integrated charge pump removes the need for external drivers, further reducing ATE system size, while a multiplexer configuration simplifies the fan-out structure compared to DPDT relay designs.

Datacenters with few other emerging applications will become a multibillion dollar market for silicon photonics by 2025. Transporting high level of data with existing technologies will soon reach its limit and photons will continue replacing step by step electrons throughout networks. Growing investments made by VCs have been identified by Yole Développements’ analysts and few startups have been created in this sector. All these indicators confirm the trend: silicon photonic technologies have reached the tipping point that precedes massive growth.

silicon photonics illustration

Yole Développement (Yole), the “More than Moore” market research and strategy consulting company releases this month the technology & market analysis titled Silicon Photonics for datacenters and other applications. Both experts Dr Eric Mounier, Sr Technnology & Market Analyst at Yole and Jean-Louis Malinge, former CEO of Kotura, now at ARCH Venture Partners combined their knowledge of the silicon photonic industry to perform a deep added-value analysis. Under this report, they examine the current status and future challenges for silicon photonics and data centers application. They detail for all applications, silicon photonic benefits as well as a comprehensive analysis of the industrial supply chain with player’s status.

What is the status of silicon photonic technologies? Could we already speak about commercial solutions? What is the market size today? What about tomorrow? How high are the current investments? Yole’s analysts offer you a snapshot of the story.

The silicon photonics market is still modest with estimated sales below US$40 million in 2015 and very few companies actually shipping products in the open market: Mellanox, Cisco, Luxtera, Intel, STMicroelectronics, Acacia and Molex are part of these leading players.

Silicon photonics has been under development for years. However now, this technology is being pushed hard by large webcom companies like Facebook and Microsoft. “Silicon photonics has reached the tipping point that precedes massive growth,” comments Dr Eric Mounier from Yole. “Indeed we estimate, the packaged silicon photonics transceiver market will be worth US$6 billion in 10 years.”

Silicon photonics is an exciting technology mixing optics, CMOS technology and advanced packaging. This combination benefits from semiconductor wafer manufacturing scalability to reduce costs.

“Silicon photonics offers silicon technology advantages including higher integration, more functionalities embedded with lower power consumption and better reliability compared to legacy optics”, analyzes Jean-Louis Malinge.

In 2020 and more, silicon photonic chips will far exceed copper cabling capabilities. Such solutions will be so deployed in high-speed signal transmission systems. In 2025 and more, the technology will be more and more used in processing such as interconnecting multiple cores with processor chips. Indeed, according to Yole’s analysts, the chip market value should score US$1,5 billion in 2025 at chip level (Estimated to be less than US$40 million in 2015). Step by step photons get closer to the chips!

Data centers are clearly the best opportunity for silicon photonics technology today. And there are also many other applications that silicon photonics can enable. These include high performance computers, telecommunications, sensors, life science, quantum computers and other high-end applications.

Two applications are particularly interesting as silicon photonics can push the integration of optical functions and miniaturization further to achieve successful products. Those applications are lidars for autonomous cars and biochemical and chemical sensors.

Lidars are costly and bulky instruments which make their integration in a car challenging. Within a promising ADAS market expected to reach US$3,9 billion in 2017 silicon photonic-based lidar will play a key role. Indeed silicon photonics allow lidar without moving elements, which can experience issues in a harsh car environment. Last august, MIT’s Photonic Microsystems Group announced a successful DARPA project using silicon photonics for lidar-on-a-chip with steerable transmitting and receiving phased arrays and on-chip Ge photodetectors.

Biochemical and gas sensors are not new, and several applications have existed for a while. Day by day, the interest in gas sensing is gaining importance due to the emergence of promising new large volume portable applications. Integration of biochemical or gas sensors into smartphones or wearables is currently on the roadmap of many companies but size, cost and sensitivity are still issues. To push optical gas sensor miniaturization further, some companies are already considering silicon photonics as an integration platform for their devices.

These non-data center applications will be about US$300 million in 2025, detail Yole’s analysts in the silicon photonics report.