Electronic News: 9月 2015

2015年9月30日星期三

Taiwan market: Acer launches Predator products

Acer has launched a number of gaming products including a tablet, and several notebooks and desktops under its Predator brand. The products will become available in Taiwan starting November.

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TSEC secures orders with shipments scheduled through next 6 months

Crystalline silicon solar cell maker TSEC has obtained orders with shipments scheduled through the next six months, according to company chairman Ellick Liao.

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General Energy Solutions to obtain 30% stake in Phanes Group

PV EPC (engineering, procurement, construction) contractor General Energy Solutions (GES) has revealed it will invest in Phanes Group, a Europe-based PV project developer and project financing planning consultant, for a 30% stake.

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China exports LED lighting worth US$355 million to India in January-August

China-based makers exported LED lighting products worth US$355 million in total to the India market during January-August 2015, hiking 76.61% on year, and the export value included US$88 million for ceiling lamps, US$73 million for panel lights and US$30 million for projection lamps, according to industry sources in Taiwan.

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Epistar to invest in Malaysia-based Dominant Opto Technologies

LED epitaxial wafer and chip maker Epistar will acquire 11 million shares of Dominant Opto Technologies Sdn Bh, a Malaysia-based SMT LED packaging service provider, at a total price of MYR64.845 million (US$14.55 million), with the investment to strengthen existing strategic cooperation, according to Epistar.

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Commentary: Will EPD demand increase due to LCD impact on vision?

Display makers believe device vendors are increasingly concerned about the effects LCD screens have on peoples' eyes and therefore believe that EPD solutions will see increased demand in the market.

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MediaTek, Huawei to tap SSD controller market

MediaTek and Huawei are reportedly looking to enter the market for SSD controllers bringing more competition to the market.

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Upgraded components in iPhone 6S Plus costs Apple an extra US$16 per device, says IHS

Upgraded components in the new iPhone 6S Plus cost US$16 more than the components in the earlier iPhone 6 Plus. The bill of materials (BOM) for an iPhone 6S Plus equipped with 16GB of NAND flash memory costs US$231.50, according to IHS.

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ASKey to reduce capital by over 30%

Asustek Computer has announced that its cable modem manufacturing subsidiary ASKey will reduce its capital by 30.77% or 213.3 million shares, equivalent to NT$2.13 billion (US$64.63 million), according to a posting on the Taiwan Stock Exchange.

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11 Test Products Introduced in September 2015

September bought numerous new test & measurement products to the market. Here's a sampling.

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16 Deals Feeding 2015 Chip Biz's Merger Fever

The semiconductor industry has undergone an unprecedented wave of consolidation over the past 18 months, with both the volume and size of deals standing out even in an industry always been heavy on mergers and acquisitions. Here are 16 of the biggest deals.

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Compensate For Cable Voltage Droop

Have you ever used an extra-long USB cable to charge your phone or tablet, only to find that it was taking an extra long time to charge? It probably wasn't your imagination and was a situation that involved excessive voltage drop across the universal serial bus (USB) cable.

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Water on Mars: Never-Before-Seen Close-Up Photo

The HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter boasts special e2v sensors that allow it to collect images of unprecedented detail.

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iPhone 6S: A9 May Be Dual Sourced

The list of components that make up the iPhone 6S is similar to that of the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, according to a teardown of a unit performed by engineering consultants Chipworks.

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Latest & Greatest in the Cunning Chronograph Competition

In which cunning ideas to spiffy-up the display are presented and new 3D models for the base-plate and face-plate are made available.

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Who Is Dumber, You or Your Home?

It's time to set aside the false hope that billions of connected devices installed in smart homes will save the electronics industry. Smart homes won't carry the chip industry -- in need of the next market driver -- at least for now, possibly not ever.

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GE Connects Industrial IoT

Connecting manufacturing and industry to the Internet is the next great frontier for OEM and manufacturer General Electric. The company showcased analytics platforms alongside hardware at an industrial Internet event.

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UK firm harvest ambient RF for IoT

Ambient RF signals are a viable source of energy, claims UK-based Drayson Technologies, which has patented a technique to harvest them.

Branded Freevolt, it uses an antenna, ‘non-linear device’, RF filter and a power manager (PMM in diagram).

“To integrate Freevolt into different devices, Drayson Technologies has developed standard harvesters but can also provide different antenna and rectifier designs, depending on the application requirements,” said the firm, adding: it is important to note that a harvesting antenna can have different and unique characteristics depending on the application.

It gives the example of a device placed on a wall, where the antenna can be optimised to cover a broad angle and have the appropriate polarisation and frequency bands to take advantage of the maximum number of existing RF sources.

In a white paper, the firm predicts efficacy, and describes ambient field measurement results that yielded 600-700nW/cm² peak in a office block from Wi-Fi, GSM and 4G LTE, and a peak of 6.7uW/cm² from 3G signals in busy outdoor London locations.

Drayson is marketing a UK-made RF-powered air quality sensor tag called CleanSpace. “This technology creates a crowd-sourced network of personal air sensors, initially across the UK and then expanding to major cities across the world, which will all be powered by Freevolt,” said the firm.

steve bush

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Secrets to Success in the Hot IoT Space

AMD unveils desktop and mobile processors

AMD has introduced its most powerful line of AMD PRO A-Series mobile and desktop processors.

Formerly called Carrizo and Godavari PRO, the processors are intended to run Windows 10, said AMD.

Mobile

These have the firm’s fastest mobile processor – version A12 running at up to 3.4GHz. There are 12 cores (4 CPU + 8 GPU).

Graphics are Radeon R7, with up to 800MHz clocking and 512 graphics compute cores. “It is the first commercial processor in the industry designed to be compliant with the Heterogeneous Systems Architecture [HSA] 1.0,” said AMD.

The device is ARM TrustZone hypervisor capable, enabling TrustZone to run on the on-board secure processor, and it has a HEVC (High-Efficiency Video Compression) decoder for streaming HD content.

The chips are already available in some HP EliteBook laptops.

Desktop

“With support for Quick Stream PRO, the new AMD PRO desktop processors virtually eliminate the lag in latency-sensitive applications like VoIP and streaming video.,” said AMD, “Quick Stream PRO uses built-in intelligence to identify and allot more bandwidth for businesses’ highest priority applications.”

The chips are already installed some Lenovo M79 Towers and HP EliteDesk 705 Micro Towers.

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Wristband heartrate sensor includes DSP

AMS has launched an optical heart rate sensor for wrist wearables.

Called AS7000, it measures heart rate by shining light into blood vessels, which expand and contract as blood pulses through them, and analysing scattered reflections – which is called photoplethysmography (PPG).

In a 6.1 x 4.1 x 1mm package, the device include two green LEDs and a photo-sensing signal processing IC – based around an ARM Cortex-M0. Green is chosen to best-sense pulse, and transducer spacing makes it most sensitive to scattering from an appropriate depth.

Although barriers in the package block light travelling direct from LEDs to photodiodes, said AMS, reflected pulse information is only a ~1% ripple on top of dc returns and large perturbations from movement.

“Unlike existing optical analogue front-ends which produce raw PPG readings, AS7000 integrates a digital processor which converts PPG readings into digital heart rate and heart rate variation”, claimed the firm.

To work properly. the module has to be paired with an external accelerometer. This allows internal algorithms to filter-out the motion artefacts. “This means that the module can maintain high accuracy whether the user is resting or exercising.” said AMS.

The module also enables skin temperature and skin resistivity measurements through interfaces to and external thermistor and two skin electrodes.

Alongside the module, AMS is offering opto-mechanical design-in support which provides OEMs with electrical, mechanical and optical design guidelines to simplify optical design considerations such as air gap and glass thickness, and the design and material of the wrist strap and housing.

A wristband demonstration kit is available, which uploads readings via a Bluetooth interface board to an Android phone or tablet. An app presents results and allows real-time logging.

AMS has compared the demo kit to a traditional chest band sports heartrate sensor (Plolar RC3GPS) and claims close agreement.

AMS AS7000 app circuit only green LEDs are implemented

	AS7000AA	AS7020	AS7024
MCU	ARM Cortex M0	no	no
memory	32k rom 4k ram	128byte FIFO	128byte FIFO
Analogue front ends	2	2	2
skin temp + resistance	yes	yes	yes
ECG amplifiers	no	yes	yes
LEDs	green + green	red + infra-red	green + IR, green
Dimensions mm (target)	6.1 x 4.1 x 1 20pin 0.4mm pitch	5 x 2.7 x 1 18pin 0.4mm pitch	6.1 x 2.7 x 1 20pin 0.4mm pitch
samples	available	available	Nov. 2015
c-samples	available	Jan 2016	Feb/Mar 2016
Focus application	Simple wristband	phone	Smart band / watch

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Startup Raises Online Tool Debate

Upverter upgraded its online service for circuit-board designers, raising questions about the outlook for cloud-based design.

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ST digital division is on the block

The French business weekly magazine Challenges reports that the future of ST’s digital division is now in the hands of President Francois Hollande.

The French Economics Minister and the Defence Minister have reviewed the possible divestment or closure of Crolles, the finance Ministry has had it say, the CFE-CGC union has been to see Hollande’s advisers and now the decision on what to do rests with the President.

ST CEO Carlo Bozotti is accused of sabotaging the digital division by publicly referring to its “unacceptable losses” – remarks which are alleged to have caused customers to freeze contracts, so further weakening the division and adding to the justification for closing it.

At stake are 2,500 jobs at Crolles and the last vestige of European-controlled access to advanced semiconductor production..

There are various proposed scenarios – sale or closure of the entire site involving 2,500 jobs, a reduction in jobs by between 1,000 and 1,200 people, or a reduction to a rump of only 300.

However there are warnings that a big hit at Crolles could affect another 20,000 jobs in the Grenoble region.

ST management is criticised for “supporting the share price at the expense of investment planning for the future.” ST is said to have spent $2.6 billion on dividends between 2005 and 2014 while the company has made losses of $3.6 billion. Last year it paid out $354 million to shareholders while losing $465 million.

Arguments for keeping Crolles going are the importance of the military not having to rely on American components and the opportunity presented by FD-SOI for providing leadership in IoT and connected cars.

France and Italy have 27.5% stakes in ST but waived their dividends to provide resources for investment. Italian government sources are staying schtum on the issue of the digital division.

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FTDI Chip boosts EVE ecosystem

FTDI Chip has enlarged the development ecosystem surrounding its Embedded Video Engine (EVE) platform for advanced human machine interface (HMI) implementation.

The latest additions concern the FT810 series of high resolution EVE ICs, which are now in full scale production. In order to support these devices, the company has announced the VM810C50 family of compact development modules. They extend the functionality offered by the VM800C family that accompanies the FT800 series, so that large higher clarity imagery can be rendered and faster data transfer rates benefitted from.

The VM810C50A-D features a 5.0-inch TFT display with WVGA (800×480 pixel) resolution and a resistive touchscreen. Conversely, for the VM810C50A-N, the display is not included.

Instead, through use of its 40-pin FFC interface, a suitable 4.3/5.0-inch LCD (with SVGA, WVGA, VGA, WQVGA or QVGA resolutions and a 4-wire resistive touch screen interface) may be attached. This means that the appropriate display can be chosen and subsequently connected.

Both of these credit card sized units act as SPI slaves connecting to the specified system microcontroller through their single SPI interfaces.

They each have a built-in micro speaker, audio power amplifier, 3-stage audio filter, an audio line out option and LCD backlight control.

Power can be drawn for these modules via either the 2.0mm power jack, the USB Micro-B port or SPI interface. The SPI interface supports 5V tolerant buffers when using a 5V SPI supply.

The FT810 EVE devices from FTDI Chip combine touch, display and audio functionality on a single chip and employ the innovative approach to HMI implementation that has been pioneered by the company. Here images, templates, overlays, fonts and sounds are treated as objects.

Using this object-orientated methodology, graphics can be rendered line-by-line at 1/16th pixel resolution, as opposed to pixel-by-pixel.

This streamlines implementation, allowing marked reductions in cost, board real estate and system complexity. The FT810 and other members of the FT81x series are able to work with displays of up to 800×600 pixels.

They have 18-bit or 24-bit RGB interfacing options, plus 1Mbytes of RAM capacity for storing graphics data. A built-in JPEG decompression engine provides better graphics data usage and enables more effective HMI implementation.

These devices support multiple colour palettes of 16-bits and 32-bits with transparency. Their SPI interfaces support 30MHz operation.

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3D Memory Chips Packs in MEMS, Sensors and Mixed Signals

Novati Technologies Inc. (a wholly owned subsidiary of Tezzaron Semiconductor) already gone beyond Micron's 3D Hybrid Memory Cube (HMC) by doubling the number of memory die to eight, but now its adding analog, mixed signal, microelectromechanical system (MEMS) and the sensors to the mix--enabling systems-on-chip to pack at lease 18 layers into the same footprint of its Integrated Sensor Platform.

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Qualcomm to Invest $150 Million in Indian Startups

Qualcomm Inc. has said it will invest up to $150 million in Indian startup companies at all stages of development.

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Failure should not be an option for Al caps

The aluminium capacitor is a common feature of power supplies, since it is the most suitable for functions such as energy storage and low- or high-frequency filtering. Unfortunately, aluminium capacitors are also often the components most prone to failure: the operating lifetime of an aluminium capacitor will tend to determine the operating lifetime of the entire power supply, writes Marcin Chelminski.

This means that designers have to take great care when calculating the parameters of aluminium capacitors to choose the most appropriate part for their device.

The choice of capacitor also has to balance cost against performance: after magnetic components, aluminium capacitors are often the most expensive passive components in a power supply.

The reliability of an aluminium electrolytic capacitor is generally measured by its expected life in use.

Minor factors that affect their life include humidity, vibration and heat transmitted through the printed circuit board patterns.

But three other factors have a greater effect on useful life, these are: ambient temperature, ripple current and applied voltage.

The basic application guidelines for aluminium capacitors say that operating temperature, applied ripple current and applied voltage should always stay below the specified maximum allowable values.

But these guidelines do not provide enough information to enable power‑supply designers to optimise for long operating life.

For this, they need to estimate the effect on lifetime of variations in operating conditions within the maximum allowable limits.

By accurately estimating the effect of changes in operating conditions, designers can extend the lifetime of aluminium capacitors in any given application.

The latest generation of dedicated power-supply capacitors, which benefit from the most recent advances in design and materials, can offer long lifetimes of up to 15 years in a surprisingly wide range of operating conditions without incurring the cost ultra high reliability capacitors.

Aluminium capacitor failure modes

Aluminium capacitors implement a variety of functions, depending on their position in the circuit.

As an input buffer in an AC-DC converter, an aluminium capacitor provides energy when the mains input voltage is too low, or stores energy when it is too high.

As an output buffer, an aluminium capacitor performs filtering and acts as a current sink for an inductor.

In operation, these capacitors can fail in a number of ways:

catastrophic failure occurs when the capacitor completely breaks down, due to a short or open circuit.
degradation occurs when the capacitor continues to function, but its performance has deteriorated to some extent.

In the case of degradation, for instance, the device’s capacitance might fall over time. Whether the change in value is acceptable or not depends on the requirements of the application. If it is unacceptable, the device has effectively failed.

A short circuit between the electrodes can be caused mechanically, by shock, vibration or stress on the leads.

It can also be caused electrically, by the application of a pulse current or voltage which exceeds the rated maximum value.

There can be various causes of an open circuit. For instance, if the capacitor is subjected to too high a force at the time of mounting, the connection between the lead wire and the tab could be twisted or distorted.

High temperature is also dangerous, either by operating at a temperature above the rated maximum, or through exposure to excessive heat transmitted through the circuit board’s tracks, which vaporises the capacitor’s electrolyte.

Similarly, exposing the capacitor to excessive ripple current causes its internal temperature to rise, drying the electrolyte.

A fall in capacitance and increased power losses due to high equivalent series resistance (ESR) occur when:

• a reverse voltage is continuously applied

• the capacitor is subjected to a very high number of charge/discharge cycles

• applied current exceeds the maximum rated ripple current.

Optimise for conditions

Standard load life test limits applied to aluminium capacitors (at their rated voltage and maximum rated temperature) typically measure the elapsed time until the capacitor suffers a 20% or 30% decrease in capacitance from its initial value, a 200% or 300% increase in loss tangent (a measure of the power losses attributable to the dielectric), or a 200% increase in leakage current – whichever occurs first.

These standard limits provide a quick but rough means of comparing the performance of competing devices. But they do not necessarily reflect the requirements of any given application.

So to optimise the lifetime/cost trade-off and find the best possible capacitor for a specific power supply, the designer must calculate the expected life of capacitors under evaluation in the expected operating conditions of the application.

Before doing so, it is worthwhile considering how the operating conditions of the power supply might be modified so as to minimise the hazard to any aluminium capacitors on the board.

The electrical characteristics of aluminium electrolytic capacitors are more sensitive to temperature than those of other types of capacitors, because the properties of the liquid electrolyte in aluminium capacitors, (such as conductivity and viscosity) are strongly affected by temperature.

To reduce the device’s exposure to high temperatures, the designer needs to understand the flow of thermal energy through it (Figure 1).

Inside the dotted line, all the materials are at the device’s junction temperature (Tj); outside the dotted line is the ambient temperature (Ta).

The heat generated inside the dotted line is carried outside it by convection, radiation and conduction.

Figure 1: the three ways in which heat escapes from a power supply’s capacitor

If the designer can implement a means to improve the heat flow out of the capacitor, its expected operating lifetime will be extended.

Indeed, according to the Arrhenius theory, the life of an aluminium capacitor doubles with every 10°C fall in ambient temperature.

Such a fall has a direct effect on the designer’s lifetime calculation when the heat generated by resistive losses (for instance, in timing circuits) is negligible.

The basic method of cooling a capacitor is to mount it in free space. The natural circulation of air around the device will provide sufficient cooling for most applications.

If this is not enough, a heat sink will increase the flow of heat from the device. The most common type of heat sink is an aluminium extrusion attached to the closed end of the capacitor. An alternative is a semi-circular extrusion designed to clamp to the case of the capacitor.

Whichever capacitor is used in a power supply, the designer can ensure that the device survives for its average rated lifetime by regulating the temperature, ripple current and applied voltage to within the manufacturer’s specified limits.

Marcin Chelminski, central applications engineer, Future Electronics (Poland)

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AMD Adds to Embedded Graphics Lineup for Industrial and More

Three new graphics module series from AMD address a broad range of applications, from industrial control to casino gaming.

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LCD TV shipment declines to influence panel maker shipments

As LCD TV shipments are expected to be lower than originally estimated for 2015, panel makers are also lowering shipments, which include adjustments for the second half of 2015.

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Digitimes Research: China boosting economic transformation via developing IoT, big data, cloud

In March 2015, China's Premier Li Keqiang announced the Internet of Things (IoT) plus concept, looking to accelerate industry transformation and will treat the concept as a new core of the country's economic development. Digitimes Research has found that China's strategy to raise its GDP growth by relying on its strong exports in the past several decades is no longer working and the government has started turning to focus on expanding domestic demand as the new economic growth engine.

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Annual dual-fuel engine revenues in the US expected to exceed US$58 million by 2024, says report

Dual-fuel engines, which use diesel fuel to ignite natural gas, are becoming increasingly popular in the US, where they are often used to power drilling rigs and hydraulic fracturing spreads. The technology reduces the amount of diesel fuel used in these applications and allows for the use of field gas that would otherwise be flared off. According to a new report from Navigant Research, annual dual-fuel engine revenue in the US is expected to grow to more than US$58.1 million by 2024.

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Acer Taiwan denies layoffs

In response to reports that Acer Taiwan will lay off 10% of its personnel, president Towny Huang for Acer Taiwan regional operations on September 29 clarified that Acer Taiwan's average contribution per employee was found to be 10-20% lower than competitors' and therefore it will propose measures to hike contributions.

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Governments in Middle East and North Africa to spend US$11.4 billion on IT in 2015, says Gartner

Governments in the Middle East and North Africa will spend US$11.4 billion on IT products and services in 2015, according to Gartner. This forecast includes spending on internal services, software, IT services, data center, devices and telecom services. Government comprises state and local governments and national government.

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Pegatron lands OEM orders for Asustek gaming notebook

Pegatron Technology has obtained orders for Asustek Computer's gaming notebooks including the GX700 flagship model featuring GTX980 graphics card, a 17-inch Ultra HD panel and water-cooling, according to Taiwan-based supply chain makers.

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LCD makers expect record-low profit margins in 4Q15

LCD panel makers are expected to record record-low gross profit margins in the fourth quarter of 2015 due to weakening demand for various applications.

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Memsstar raises funding to boost exports

Memsstar, the Livingston manufacturer of MEMS manufacturing equipment has secured a significant funding deal with Santander supported by a guarantee from UK Export Finance.

Memsstar makes etch and deposition systems for MEMS manufacturing. It also represents SMEs in a range of European funding programmes.

Memsstar exports around 90% of its products and is looking to capitalise on this momentum in key markets.

The business currently has an annual turnover of circa £8 million but is targeting to grow this to £13 million over the next two years.

“This will provide the company with a source of working capital to enable the ongoing development of our customer base and ensure that we remain competitive for our existing customers,” says the company’s CFO Keith Rutter.

“This is a great example of how a government guarantee can work alongside a trade specialist bank to help a leading, innovative UK firm,” says Jonathan Leonard of UK Export Finance.

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2015年9月29日星期二

Digitimes Research: Panasonic aims at automotive lighting revenues of JPY60 billion for FY2018

Panasonic has been transforming its lighting business operations to focus on automotive lighting and aims at revenues of JPY60 billion (US$500 million) from automotive lighting for fiscal year (FY) 2018 (April 2018-March 2019), five times those for FY2014, according to Digitimes Research.

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China August mobile phone users reach 1.296 billion, says MIIT

There were 1.296 billion subscribers of mobile communication services in China as of the end of August 2015, growing 0.12% on month and 2.30% on year, according to China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).

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China software industry posts January-August revenues of over CNY2.7 trillion, says MIIT

China's software industry generated total revenues of CNY2.708 trillion (US$434.5 billion) in January-August 2015, growing by 16.7% on year, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).

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Taiwan high court rules in favor of ASE in pollution case

The Kaohsiung branch of Taiwan's high court has overturned a district court ruling by acquitting Advanced Semiconductor Engineering and its five employees of pollution charges in connection to the company's discharging untreated wastewater into a river.

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Taiwan market: 8.66 million 4G users in August, says NCC

The total number of 4G mobile communication subscribers in the Taiwan market increased by 730,000 to 8.664 million in August, according to the National Communications Commission (NCC).

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Targeting niche markets: Q&A with ST Liu, president of Acer handset unit

Notebook vendor Acer aims to ship at least five million smartphones in 2015 and plans to hike the shipments to 10 million units in 2016. But Acer will not spend a lot of money for just ramping up its market share. Instead, Acer will develop models with innovative specifications for specific market segments, according to ST Liu, president of Acer's handset unit.

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HTC unveils flagship smartphones

HTC on September 29 unveiled two flagship smartphones, HTC One M9+ and Butterfly 3, in Japan, with the two models to be launched in the Taiwan market on October 5 at contract-free retail prices of NT$20,900 (US$633) and NT$19,900 respectively, according to the company's North Asia president Jack Tong.

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Taiwan IC design firms to post gross margin decreases in 3Q15

Most Taiwan-based fabless IC firms are expected to report sequential decreases of 1pp to 2pp in gross margins for the third quarter of 2015, due to falling chip prices, according to industry sources.

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Touchscreen controller IC prices falling

Prices for smartphone-use touchscreen controller ICs have been falling as an increase in the number of suppliers has led to more competition in the market, according to industry sources.

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Weak demand causes 5% drop in TV sales in China during Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day, says report

Combined TV set shipments of the six major China TV brands – Changhong, Hisense, Haier, Konka, Skyworth and TCL – will total 58.43 million in 2015, according to WitsView. The year's estimated annual shipments from these six vendors represent a 2.7% increase compared with the 56.91 million sets shipped in 2014. Demand saturation and growing popularity of emerging Internet brands are adding to the challenges that China vendors will face in their domestic market during the upcoming holiday sales events. Vendors' main source of growth will therefore be based on their expansion and development of overseas markets.

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Notebook vendors interested in using more common components, say Taiwan makers

Notebook vendors are interested in adopting more common components including motherboards, heat-sinks, hinges and chassis in an attempt to minimize production costs, according to Taiwan-based supply chain makers.

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ASE argues SPIL shares offered to Foxconn at low price

Advanced Semiconductor Engineering (ASE) has argued that the implied price of Siliconware Precision Industries' (SPIL) new shares to be issued and sold to Foxconn Electronics (Hon Hai Precision Industry) is low compared with the NT$45 it offered to buy SPIL's shares through a tender offer.

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Worldwide shipments of 3D printers to reach more than 490,000 in 2016, says Gartner

Worldwide shipments of 3D printers will reach 496,475 units in 2016, up 103% from the predicted 244,533 units in 2015, according to Gartner. 3D printer shipments are forecast to more than double every year between 2016 and 2019, by which time worldwide shipments are expected to reach more than 5.6 million.

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MEMS Move to 300mm-Diameter Wafers

French research institute CEA-Leti has manufactured accelerometer MEMS devices on 300mm-diameter wafers.

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Why Lightbulbs Will be Hacked

Network connected lighting may not seem like much of a security risk, but it can open the door for big problems.

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ST to Shift Auto MCU from Power to ARM

With an eye toward becoming the world's third largest automotive MCU supplier by the end of the decade, STMicroelectronics is staking its automotive future on ARM's new 32-bit ARMv8-R technology.

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India Scores Support of Silicon Valley Giants

U.S. tech giants have committed to participate in Digital India and Smart Cities projects after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Silicon Valley on Saturday (Sept. 26).

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Electronic Design’s Products of the Week (9/27-10/3)

Here we've rounded up some of the latest products to optimize your applications, devices, and systems.

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Microsoft's Azure IoT Suite Is Now Available

Azure users now have the option of joining the Internet of Things and collecting and analyzing their machine data with Microsoft's IoT Suite.

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Plessey raises £30m to expand GaN-on-Si LED production

Plessey is to carry out a major expansion of the company’s LED manufacturing facility in Plymouth, after securing a £30 million loan from Deutsche Bank.

The £60 million expansion will provide the base for new solid state lighting technologies and products, increasing the Company’s production capabilities by a factor of 30, more than tripling its workforce to about 535 employees and positioning Plessey to capture a significant share of the multi-billion dollar, and growing, solid state lighting market.

Plessey’s MaGIC GaN-on-Silicon technology can cut the cost of LED lighting by using standard silicon manufacturing techniques instead of sapphire-based manufacturing.

“Deutsche Bank is providing us with a senior secured term loan facility that meets our financial needs for the next three to five years,” says Plessey CFO Iain Silvester, “the bank has come up with a progressive flexible facility that supports our expansion plans for our manufacturing capacity here in Plymouth. Plessey will increase its manufacturing capacity from over 100 million square millimetres of Gallium Nitride material per year to more than 3 billion square millimetres. The facility modifications, which are also supported by £6.7 million from the Regional Growth Fund, will take place during 2015, with additional manufacturing tools and facilities coming on stream through the end of this year through to 2017. During this time we expect about 400 new jobs to be created.”

Michael LeGoff, Plessey’s CEO added: “We are entering a very exciting period for the company with our new technology and products now gaining traction in one of the fastest growing technology markets, solid state lighting. “The expansion is highly significant for the Company but also for British high-tech manufacturing,” says Plessey CEO Michael LeGoff, “it aligns well with national strategies, such as the Growth Review, that support manufacturing and make the UK a global leading exporter of high value goods.”

david manners

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New EU Directives Have No Transition Period

Unlike previous Directives that had transition periods, The RED, LVD, and EMC Directives have hard cutoffs. You'll have to deal with them.

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Shifting the Mobile & Wearable Market -- SoC vs. SiP

While Moore's Law is slowing System-in-Package (SiP) and heterogeneous integration are taking up the challenge.

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Cypress Bid to Acquire Atmel has Expired

Cypress Semiconductor Corp. has issued a statement saying that an offer to acquire Atmel Corp. has expired and that Cypress is no longer interested in such an acquisition.

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Electronic Component Testing: A Non-Contact Sport

FLIR Systems

As electronic circuit boards and components become smaller and more powerful, inherent heat can cause significant damage. Infrared thermography can identify hot spots, allowing for improved thermal management and greater advances in circuit board design.

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Socionext in volume production of camera engine supporting new sensor functions

Socionext, the Fujitsu-Panasonic SoC jv, is in volume production of a camera front engine specialized for Bayer data processing that supports the latest sensors.

The MB86S29 is a Milbeaut Image Processor aimed at smartphones. By supporting the latest image sensors, the MB86S29 lets module makers implement these functions without replacing their application processors.

Recently, it is common to find cameras in smartphones or other mobile devices that are configured with application processors (AP) equipped with built-in image signal processor (ISP) functionalities. These APs can directly process output from image sensors, and help reduce the footprint and cost of camera modules. The MB86S29 supports this trend as a “Camera Front Engine” that replaces conventional ISPs. Connected in between an image sensor and an AP, it is specialized for Bayer data processing, so users can configure their APs with the same interface directory connected to image sensors, and to make full use of phase detect auto focus (AF) or high dynamic range (HDR).

The MB86S29 has 4 lanes each of 2.1Gbps MIPI Rx / Tx. It can process 16M pixel images at 30 frame per second (fps). It is also applicable for noise reduction, shading correction, and 3A (AE / AF / AWB) detection. It is available in the smallest package of any member of the Milbeaut series, at 4mm x 4mm.

Since its first release in 2000, the Milbeaut series of image processors has established a track record in applications from digital SLR cameras for prosumers to commodities like smartphones, or industrial equipment like security cameras. Socionext will continue to deliver a broad range of imaging solutions, based on its technological expertise and a long history of providing services to its customers.

The MB86S29 has been designed to utilize “Hybrid AF”, which combines the accuracy of contrast AF and the speed of phase detect AF, enabling maximum 4x faster AF, in comparison with the previous Milbeaut products.

The MB86S29 also supports Sensor HDR. Conventional HDR imaging, which generates a picture from multiple frames taken with different exposures, has disadvantages, such as images blurs caused by the difference between the frames, and time needed to take those multiple frames. The MB86S29 can process data with different exposure settings within one image so it can process the HDR images with higher visibility in 16M pixel, at the speed of 30 fps.

□ MB86S29 Specifications
・ 16M Pixel at 30fps, Bayer Output
・ Compatible with phase detect AF Sensors
・ Compatible with Sensor HDR
・ Defective Pixel Correction (including pixels for phase detect AF)
・ Shading Correction
・ Package: 4mm x 4mm
・ MIPI-Rx: 4 lanes (2.1Gbps) + 2 lanes (1.5Gbps)
・ MIPI-Tx: 4 lans (2.1Gbps)
・ Dual ARM processor Core

TheMB86S29 costs $3 when purchased in volume quantities of 5 Million pieces or more.

david manners

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Paving the way to self-driving cars with advanced driver assistance systems

Sponsored by: Texas Instruments

The excitement about self-driving cars can make it easy to overlook numerous short-term developments by automotive manufacturers that are equally important in transforming the act of driving. Collectively known as Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS), these developments are designed to make cars safer, and their gradual introduction is already improving road safety.

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Advancing the smart factory through technology innovation

Sponsored by: Texas Instruments

Advancements in intelligent electronic sensing, control and communication are enabling new levels of factory automation for greater efficiency and lower operational costs – and ultimately delivering better products to customers. The transition promises a number of benefits, including greater efficiency, flexibility, quality and safety, as well as improved maintenance, energy savings and lower production costs.

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Overcoming Circuit Protection Challenges in Lithium Ion-based Portable Electronics

Solving High Performance Circuit Protection Needs in Space-constrained, High Density Electronics

PoE Design Surge Protection per IEC 61000-4-5

Electronic Design’s Products of the Week (9/20-9/26)

Here we've rounded up some of the latest products to optimize your applications, devices, and systems.

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New EU Directives Have No Transition Period

Unlike previous Directives that had transition periods, The RED, LVD, and EMC Directives have hard cutoffs. You'll have to deal with them.

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Social Networks for Engineers

Do you have a useful social network? I don't mean a Facebook or an Instagram. I mean more of an AirBnB.

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Self-Driving Cars Rev CPUs

Self driving cars are steering toward a 2022 market, fueling an emerging class of visual processors, said an analyst on the eve of an annual conference.

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New head of Digi-Key talks to Electronics Weekly

Dave Doherty, the new president and chief operating officer of online distributor Digi-Key talks to Electronics Weekly about how the internet is changing the way engineers source components and the hype around IoT.

Q: What do you see as the biggest challenges facing the electronics distribution sector?

Dave Doherty

Dave Doherty : Adapting to the reality of a global economy. This is far different from having companies incorporating around the globe but operating regionally. To date, customers are moving faster with their supply chain needs and suppliers are struggling to keep pace with their regional legal entity structures operating autonomously. In addition, there are dynamic currency fluctuations in play in this global economy.

Q: How have you seen the customer landscape evolve in the past five years? Where do you see it going in the next few years?

Dave Doherty : Customers are looking for instantaneous access to information and they are more than willing to self-serve, in fact many prefer it. Our B2B customers’ response time to their end customers continues to shrink, requiring us to offer solution based products and not just parts. There are still the mega-volume consumer aimed products such as mobile devices but there is an even larger proliferation of high-mix/low volume requirements in areas like industrial, medical, IoT, etc.

Q: How do you see the evolution of technology (IoT, 3D Printing, Big Data, etc.) impacting the demand from the customer?

Dave Doherty: Our industry loves hype and attributing the latest and greatest buzz words to trends. The hottest of late, IoT, is not a recent phenomenon. Sensor activity has been accelerating for some time, as has a movement towards connectivity and a lowering price point for microcontrollers all the while accelerating a movement towards mechatronics.

Our industry (consumers, suppliers, distributors) has been very respectful of our social and environmental responsibilities (i.e. RoHS, NoPB). These trends will only contribute as we balance the need to push and develop cost effective technologies in a socially responsible way. Our industry in an example of global ingenuity at its finest. From a cost/performance perspective, I’m hard pressed to think of another industry that could keep pace.

Q: How are customer demands for design help changing and evolving? What are your key market segments? How is that evolving?

Dave Doherty: The need for 24/7 technical and customer service support is profound. The desire for web chat activities instead of traditional tech support calls. We are seeing more activity for kits, development boards, modules, reference designs and other solution oriented products.

We don’t necessarily see a change in direction for the supply chain, but rather an acceleration of our response to our customers. You will see more electronic data interchange connecting our systems through legacy means such as EDI and emerging alternatives such as APIs.

Q: What are your greatest concerns from a supply chain perspective for the remainder of the year?

Dave Doherty: We are in the segment of the supply/demand cycle in which product is generally available with low lead times. This tends to drive lower customer volumes offset with increased frequency to minimise their inventory carrying costs. These cycles tend to flip fairly quickly, through either a real or perceived disruption to the supply chain, inevitably accentuated by an emotional over-reaction that stretches lead-time and increases supply chain disruptions. We cannot become complacent or lose sight of our role in the process.

Richard Wilson

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Optical memory chip

A team of Anglo-German researchers have produced an optical memory IC.

“We have demonstrated a robust, non-volatile, all-photonic memory based on phase-change materials,” say the researchers, “by using optical near-field effects, we realize bit storage of up to eight levels in a single device that readily switches between intermediate states.”

The chip’s memory cells feature single-shot readout and switching energies as low as 13.4 pJ at speeds approaching 1 GHz. Individual memory elements can be addressed using a wavelength multiplexing scheme.

“Our multi-level, multi-bit devices provide a pathway towards eliminating the von Neumann bottleneck and portend a new paradigm in all-photonic memory and non-conventional computing,” say the team.

david manners

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Singapore PC market growth driven by mobile PCs in 1H15, says Gartner

PC shipments in Singapore totaled 588,300 units in the first half of 2015, a 12% increase over the same period last year, according to Gartner.

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SPIL to seek shareholders approval for stock-swap deal with Foxconn

Siliconware Precision Industries (SPIL) will hold a shareholders meeting on October 15, seeking approval for an increase in the company's authorized share capital and its planned share-swap agreement with Foxconn Electronics (Hon Hai Precision Industry), according to the semiconductor assembly and test services company.

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Acer encouraging staff to transfer to BYOC business

Acer has been encouraging its staff to transfer to the Build Your Own Cloud (BYOC) business and is planning to adjust its performance evaluation program to boost workers' willingness to transfer.

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Everlight Electronics expects significant growth in 2015 LED lighting revenues

LED packaging service provider Everlight Electronics expects revenues from LED lighting devices in 2015 to increase by over 10% on year, according to company chairman Robert Yeh.

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Healthcare providers in India to spend US$1.2 billion on IT in 2015

Health care providers in India are expected to spend US$1.2 billion on IT products and services in 2015, an increase of 7% over 2014, according to Gartner. This forecast includes spending by healthcare providers (includes hospitals, as well as ambulatory service and physicians practices) on internal services, software, IT services, data center, devices and telecom services.

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Epistar, MLS to set up joint-venture in India

LED epitaxial wafer and chip maker Epistar and China-based LED packaging service provider MLS will establish an LED lighting joint-venture in New Delhi, India, to tap the large local market, according to industry sources.

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Notebook gearing up to push new 2-in-1s in 4Q15

Notebook brand vendors including Asustek Computer, Acer, Lenovo, Hewlett-Packard (HP) and Dell are preparing to launch their new Skylake-based 2-in-1 devices starting October and expect these devices to attract consumer demand to help boost their performance in 2015, according to sources from the upstream supply chain.

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iPhone 6s supply chain makers bracing for strong sales in 4Q15, say sources

Taiwan-based makers in Apple's iPhone 6s device supply chain, including Foxconn Electronics, Pegatron Technology, Largan Precision and Catcher Technology, are set for strong performance in the fourth quarter of 2015, buoyed by robust sales of the new devices, according to industry sources.

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Motech China subsidiary obtains capacity through strategic investment

Solar cell maker Motech Industries has had its China subsidiary Motech (Suzhou) Renewable Energy issue 17.828 million new shares for subscription by China-based solar cell and PV module maker Jiangsu Aide Solar Energy Technology in return for Aide's annual solar cell production capacity of nearly 300MWp.

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M&A activity continues through uncertain business climate, says IC Insights

In July 2015, IC Insights examined the huge surge of M&A activity in the IC industry during the first six months of 2015. In just the first half of 2015, announced semiconductor acquisition agreements had a combined total value of US$72.6 billion, which was nearly 6x the annual average for M&A deals struck during the five previous years (2010-2014). With Dialog Semiconductor's announced plan to acquire Atmel, the total M&A value has now reached nearly US$77.0 billion, according to IC Insights.

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Commentary: The implications of Google-Huawei tie-up for Nexus phones

Google is rolling out two new Nexus phones: the Nexus 6P in cooperation with Huawei and the Nexus 5X with LG Electronics. While the market position of the Nexus phones has ebbed, Google's tie-up with Huawei, for the first time, to produce Nexus phones still has strong implications.

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EEVblog #802 – Mailbag

More Mailbag
Forum HERE

SPOLIERS:
Fluke 8060A Multimeter
Precision Digital Adjustable DC Voltage Reference
Vacuum desoldering pump teardown.
Adelaide Hackerspace
Apple Macintosh Powerbook 165c
Turkish Delight
Altronics Swag – a spinning magnet levitating thingo

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2015年9月28日星期一

Watson-Type Machine Learning Affordable for Small Business

Dato Inc. is shedding its big-guys-only shell and appealing to mid-sized and even small companies who want to build machine-learning intelligence into their application by offering graphical user interface (GUI) toolkits and Coursera training.

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PCs, Not Profits, Drive Chip Companies

Although the PC market is declining, two public companies are continuing to innovate at a rapid clip. Even short-term success in a flat market is preferable to long-term innovation that won't immediately pay off.

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MotionEngine Wear Debuts

Hillcrest specifically targets wearables with a special version of its MotionEngine called Wear, which accommodates always-on functions from battery-powered devices without running them down typical wearables including accurate activity tracking, advanced sleep monitoring, context awareness, intuitive gesture controls, precise compass heading and orientation.

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Berkeley Lab Unveils 2D Atomic-Thin Semiconductor

Researchers at the Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have managed to grow atomically thin 2D sheets of organic-inorganic hybrid perovskites from a solution. The ultrathin sheets are claimed to be of high quality, large in area, and are square-shaped.

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Building a 40G MACsec FPGA IP core

The deliverables for an encryption core are unlike other IP cores in some important respects.

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India Could Tap Tesla for Solar Battery Solution

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will make a visit to Tesla Motors to seek a viable solution to power storage problems that have been hounding solar electricity planners in the country.

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Report: Cypress Preps Bid to Snatch Atmel from Dialog

Cypress Semiconductor Corp. is preparing an offer in an attempt to outbid Dialog Semiconductor plc for Atmel Corp., according to a Reuters report that referenced unnamed sources.

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After VW's Dieselgate: 5 Questions for Carmakers

Since the Volkswagen scandal first broke, we know a lot more about how Dieselgate started to unravel. We made a list of five automotive issues the recent scandal has exposed.

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18 Years Till Next Full Blood Supermoon

The next full blood supermoon won't occur until 2033, which means Max will have to wait 18 years to feast his orbs on this astronomical delight.

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Maker Faire NY 2015: Flames and Creativity

Flaming instruments, giant robots, Tesla coils-See what fun designs we found at World Maker Faire 2015.

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Scalable Transistors in High-Voltage CMOS at ams

The Full Service Foundry division of ams AG is expanding its 0.35mum High-Voltage CMOS specialty process platform by adding a set of truly voltage scalable transistors to its advanced "H35" process.

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Solar Cells Made Obsolete

Georgia Institute of Technology researchers aim to obsolete conventional solar panels with optical rectennas made from carbon nanotubes with integrated metal-to-metal tunneling diode.

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Optical Phase-Change Memory Can Increase Bandwidth

A research team from the universities of Oxford and Muenster has developed a phase-change, non-volatile memory that is programmed and read using light and which could be interfaced to conventional electronic processor for higher bandwidth.

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Wearable PCB Designs Require Attention to Fundamentals

In the absence of printed circuit board standards in wearable IoT electronics, hardware developers need to pay close attention to fundamentals.

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LTE-U, Wi-Fi Play Nice in Test

Qualcomm wants to convince non-believers that LTE-Unlicensed (LTE-U) will be a good neighbor to Wi-Fi for next generation communications. Following debate about the realities of sharing spectrum, the chip giant discussed coexistence tests conducted at its San Diego lab.

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AMS extends foundry business with scalable process

AMS continues to invest in and extend its analogue foundry business.

AMS Fab B, top right

Last month the Austrian semiconductor maker announced a government partnership in the US to build a new 8-inch fab in New York.

The company has now added to its foundry offering in Europe with an enhancement of its 0.35µm high voltage CMOS process which will offer more dies per wafer.

Called its H35 process, it makes use of voltage scalable NMOS and PMOS transistors to lower on-resistance and so reduce die area per device.

According to AMS:

“Using an optimized 30V NMOS transistor in power management applications instead of a fixed 50V transistor results in an area saving of approx. 50%.

“A 60V optimised NMOS device results in 22% less area when compared to a standard 120V NMOS transistor.”

Typical devices fabbed in this process include MEMS drivers, motor drivers, switches and power management ICs.

The foundry is automotive (ISO/TS 16949) and medical (ISO 13485) certified.

According to Markus Wuchse, general manager of ams’ Full Service Foundry division, the company ios one of the first foundry’s to offer scalable HV transistors.

“Our process design kit as well as our high voltage (HV) process expertise enable our partners to optimise their HV integrated circuits towards area and on-resistance, which immediately results in more dies per wafer,” said Wuchse.

The set of voltage scalable transistors including device layout generator (PCells), simulation models, verification rule decks for Calibre and Assura as well as documentation such as Design Rules and Process Parameters documents can be downloaded by registered users from the company’s secure foundry support server.

Richard Wilson

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CTIA Super Mobility Week 2015: 3 Key Themes

5G, spectrum, and IoT top the list of trends at Super Mobility Week 2015 in Las Vegas.

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Capacitor lifetimes can be improved with the right materials

Although not all applications are safety critical or mission critical, reliability is still a vital consideration for many electronic products. Making informed choices at the component selection stage can help ensure the product will perform correctly over its intended lifetime, writes James Lewis.

When choosing capacitors, properties such as volumetric efficiency, frequency stability, temperature rating or equivalent series resistance are often the primary factors that govern technology selection. In these cases, understanding factors affecting lifetime can help engineers ensure the product will deliver the required reliability.
On the other hand, a long operational lifetime may be a key requirement of the end product and ultimately may determine device selection.

Capacitor manufacturing processes such as screening, or processes to control the purity of materials or components, can provide a higher assurance of reliability that allows engineers to reduce the number of capacitors in-circuit and hence reduce solution size and cost without compromising reliability.

Capacitor Properties

Capacitors made with metallised polyester or polypropylene film, for example, are known to have a long operational life. High-voltage or high-temperature properties make these devices ideal for applications such as automotive electronics or lamp ballasts, while self-healing helps to overcome the effects of small impurities in the dielectric that can lead to short-circuit failures.
On the other hand, as these weaknesses heal the total available capacitance begins to drop and the equivalent series resistance (ESR) starts to rise. This ultimately governs the lifetime of the device. Using high-quality materials and dielectric-manufacturing processes can minimise defects leading to a slower rate of self-healing.

In alternative-energy applications, where low ESR is particularly desirable to minimise energy losses, it is possible to verify operational lifetimes of several decades, even when capacitors are operated at temperatures of 70°C or above.

Aluminium capacitors cover a number of different types of construction, each of which has very different lifetime performance. Wet-electrolyte capacitors, for example, have a well-defined and understood wearout mechanism. The electrolyte is mildly acidic, and will therefore degrade the dielectric over time.

On the other hand, the electrolyte also provides the oxygen necessary to re-grow the dielectric. This is why it is important to consider the “shelf-life” of a wet aluminium electrolytic capacitor that has not been powered—whether on a shelf or on a board.

Figure 1: X5R and X7R MLCCs combine nickel-based BME and doped barium titanate dielectric.

An interesting fact is that aluminium capacitors with a diameter of 30mm or more tend to have a more neutral electrolytic, rather than acidic, and so can have shelf-lives of two to four years at relatively moderate conditions. These figures, of course, vary by electrolyte used in each product family.

Solid “aluminium polymer” or “organic polymer” capacitors, on the other hand, have very different lifetime characteristics.
These devices have no electrolyte in the finished product. Instead the cathode is a solid conductive polymer material. This results in exceptionally long operational lifetime under rated conditions, which can be close to that of other solid capacitors.

Some datasheets describe the endurance of these types of devices in terms of properties such as capacitance change, ESR and appearance after 1,000 hours of operation.

It is important to note that the 1000 hours does not represent the capacitor’s operational life. Rather, this endurance testing is similar to the types of accelerated life testing that is typically used to qualify passive components.

As far as commercial-grade ceramic capacitors are concerned, the typical electrode system is a base metal electrode (BME) system, see figure 1, that primarily utilises nickel.

Compared to the earlier precious metal electrode (PME) systems, BME allows higher voltage stress capability. Popular X7R and X5R type dielectrics today are based on barium titanate, with additives such as manganese dioxide that coexist with the BME chemistry and prevent reduction of the dielectric by the firing processes applied to the capacitor during manufacture.

Improvements in dielectric composition have greatly increased the reliability and life of ceramics.

Tantalum Capacitor Reliability

Capacitors made with a tantalum dielectric have an exceptionally long operational life. Being a completely solid device, there is virtually no wear-out mechanism.

The most common failures for tantalum-based devices are so-called “turn on” failure. This can occur where a step-voltage is applied and the capacitor is able to draw a large initial current. This can activate a defect in the dielectric, which may cause device failure in the event that the dielectric cannot heal.

Polymer-tantalum devices benefit from a pronounced self-healing capability, and are known to be robust against this type of failure. Studies have shown that the lifetime of the capacitive elements may be in the hundreds or even thousands of years. This is likely to be considerably longer than the lifetime of other materials used in capacitor construction, such as epoxies.

Capacitor manufacturers tend to screen tantalum capacitors to identify potentially weaker devices, by applying tests such as voltage and current surge tests in a controlled sequence.

However, it is worth noting that the capacitors can be weakened by stresses introduced due to coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) mismatches between constituent materials: hence reflow soldering conditions and the number of reflow cycles the capacitor is subjected to during final product assembly can affect the susceptibility to device failures.

On the other hand, the voltage rating of the device, relative to the applied voltage, can significantly influence capacitor lifetimes generally.

For this reason, recent development of polymer-tantalum capacitors has focused on realising higher voltage ratings such as 63V and higher for use with commonly used supply voltages such as 24V or the 28V avionics rail.

James C. Lewis is technical marketing director, Kemet.

Richard Wilson

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More on: Making MEMS on 300mm wafers

French research fab CEA-Leti has begun manufacturing accelerometers on 300mm wafers, thought to be a first for the MEMS industry.

“This demonstration that our 200mm MEMS platform is now compatible with 300mm wafer fabrication shows a significant opportunity to cut MEMS production costs,” said Leti CEO Marie Semeria. “This will be especially important with the expansion of the Internet of things and growing demand for MEMS in mobile devices.”

Leti has a 30 year history in making MEMS, spinning out MEMS companies, and selling MEMS processes to chip firms. It currently has a team of 200 people working on MEMS.

The transferred process is its ‘M&NEMS’ technology – micro and nano MEMS, which came out of a programme to make many types of micro-mechanical structures using a single straightforward process.

What emerged a way to make any mixture of the following sensors on the same chip: accelerometers (x, y and z axis), gyroscopes (x, y and z axis), magnetometers (x, y and z axis), pressure transducers and microphones.

Capacitive (electrostatic) sensing has been avoided. Instead, for simplicity, all sensing is piezoresitive (piezo: Greek for squeeze).

“Piezoresistor sensing is robust, and importantly it is compact. We have miniature sensors, half the size of other peoples,” Jean-Rene Lequepeys, head of the Si component division at Leti, told Electronics Weekly.

Not to be confused with piezoelectric sensing, detection is through measuring the change in resistance of silicon nano-wires (220x220nm2 cross-section) as the tension in them changes. This is the ‘NEMS’ part of the process name. In lithography terms, 220nm wire geometry means relaxed constraints on available lithography.

These wires are just visible close to the substrate in the photo, which is of the measurement end of a single axis accelerometer. The ‘proof mass’ whose movement is measured, and extends far to the right of the photo (see accelerometer diagram) is hewn from 20µm-thick epitaxial silicon – the ‘M’icro part of the process.

As an aside, the two blade-like struts in the photo are the entire support structure for the proof mass – the rest of it is (see diagram below) cantilevered and free to move. Accelerometers for all three axis are constructed in the same plane

Construction starts with a Si-on-insulator wafer, prepared with a 220nm silicon top layer – which will yield the piezoresistors and the foundations of other structures. “We can develop the same technology on bulk silicon, but it is easier on SoI,” said Lequepeys.

Piezoresistors are patterned and etched from this 200nm layer, then protected by a temporary oxide covering.

Following this, 5-25µm of silicon is grown on top, from which masses and other MEMS structures are then etched – the buried oxide layer acting as an etch-stop.

NEMS and MEMS components are finally released by removing the oxide, including SoI wafer oxide, from around the piezoresistors and masses.

All the sensors mentioned earlier have been designed to be made from the same basic parts – a 220nm thick layer for piezoresitive gauges and the full later-grown thickness for masses and other parts.

Magnetometers, for example (which are sensitive enough to be used as compasses), are moving structures with a ferromagnetic layer deposited on top.

“For the magnetometer we use a balanced design to be not sensitive to the acceleration. It means that we have a symmetric design in order to have the centre of inertia that coincides with the rotation axis of the structure,” said Lequepeys.

The firm has transferred its technology Tronics Microsystems, which is making three accelerometers and three gyros within a <4mm2 footprint.

According to Lequepeys, while Leti can put triple accelerometers alongside triple gyros and triple magnetometers, competitors have to put the magnetometers on separate silicon. Type pressure monitors are a target for the process, as they need to combine an accelerometer and a pressure sensor.

300mm

According to Lequepeys, there are 97 process steps in M&NEMS, and a recipe for each has been adapted for 300mm production.

Moving the M&NEMS process to 300mm equipment is all about reducing the cost of MEMS production for consumer and automotive markets – at which M&NEMS is aimed. Ex-fab device costs are 30% cheaper in 300mm compared with 200mm, said Lequepeys.

300mm is also better for larger MEMS. “Auto-focus mechanisms are quite big devices, and so are digital loudspeakers and image-based sensors – for example for ultrasonic or micro-bolometer imaging,” he said.

Another reason for moving to 300mm is CMOS.

M&NEMS always uses a separate read-out chip to carry associated signal processing circuits. “We do MEMS and CMOS on the same wafer for other MEMS processes, but not M&NEMS,” said Lequepeys. “There are no major obstacles, but we would need to see an advantage in terms of cost.”

Both 200mm and 300mm processes at Leti offer 3d operations such as through-silicon vias (TSV), wafer thinning, wafer stacking and copper pillars which allow M&NEMS chips to be stacked with read-out chips, but while the 200mm process offers 130nm CMOS, 300mm opens the doors to 65, 45 and 28nm read-out processing.

NEMS

Starting in a similar way, with an SoI wafer with thin top silicon, Leti has developed another process called ‘NEMS’.

Aimed at biological and chemical sensing, it runs only on Leti’s 200mm line. “The size of market not large enough to justify 300mm today,” said Lequepeys.

Sensing is once again though piezo-resistors, but there is no thick epitaxial layer. Instead, sensing structures are thin cantilevers made from the SoI wafer silicon (see photo right).

These cantilevers, which each have two piezoresistors, are vibrated by an oscillating electric field from a nearby electrode. The frequency at which they resonate is dependent on the mass of the cantilever and any mass on its surface.

NEMS has been used to develop a gas chromatograph in conjunction Caltech – the design of which is being exploited by a joint spin-out called Apix.

A sample of gas fed into it passes through a long micro-machined channel (see photo right).

During the journey different molecules in the gas travel at different speeds, and by the time they reach the vibrating cantilever they can be sensed separately. Heating cleans out the sensor for repeated use.

Parts per million of many vapours can be can be detected, and sensitivity reaches parts per billion with heavy molecule like ethylbenzene.

Details of M&NEMS were presented at the European MEMS Summit earlier this month.

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2015年9月27日星期日

Bad Q3 for Taiwan foundries

Q3, traditionally the industry’s strongest quarter, will not be a good quarter for the Big Three Taiwanese foundries, reports Digitimes Research.

The combined revenues of TSMC, UMC and VIS (Vanguard International Semiconductor) will be 0.8% down q-o-q and 3.7% down y-o-y.

Q3 revenues are expected to be $8.03 billion compared to Q2’s $8.09 billion snd the $8.33 billion of Q3 2014.

The turndown would have been worse were it not for a rise in ASPs due to an increase in the proportion of advanced (sub45nm) processes in the the mix.

Digitimes notes that TSMC started to record 16nm revenues for the first time in Q3.

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IEEE GLOBECOM'15 Explores Breakthroughs in Next Gen Communications Dec 6-10, San Diego

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2015年9月26日星期六

7 Robots...At Your Service

Service robots may be the next big thing according to entrepreneurs who showed their designs targeting a range of consumer and commercial uses.

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NASA Orion Team: More Show & Tell

On July 7, 2015 I was privileged to have the opportunity to tour the NASA Orion Deep Space program and meet some key team members at Johnson Space Center in Houston.

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2015年9月25日星期五

Monolithic 3D Ready to Give IoT its Own Scaling Path

Using a new technique, a substrate could be prepared enabling any fab to simply integrate a monolithic 3D device without the need to change the current frontline fab process.

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Using a Tiny Mixed-Signal FPGA to Implement a Multi-Peripheral Controller

Offloading the host MCU, saving GPIOs, and simplifying PCB layout by implementing a sophisticated multi-peripheral controller using a GPAK4 from Silego.

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VW Emissions Debacle Reminds Us to Do Sanity Check on Results

The deliberate deceit that VW employed for their diesel vehicles is part of a larger concern: how do we know that our sophisticated, complex data-analysis programs actually yield legitimate results?

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European Industry Shifts To Spotlight 12:00 PM

The dramatic shift from the trend for increasingly advanced technology to a vast array and volume of application-based devices presents Europe with a huge opportunity. Europe is a world leader in several major market segments - think automotive and healthcare as two examples - and many more are developing and growing at a rapid rate.

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Startup Goes Multi-Die to Customize MCUs

A startup company from Southern California has made use of the increased availability and lower cost of multi-die packaging to offer custom microcontrollers. The company reckons this approach and the advent of IoT could make the world its oyster.

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Chinese Handset OEMs Start to Drive Sensor Demand

Chinese handset OEMs are starting to take over from Apple and Samsung as the drivers of sensor volumes for smartphones, according to IHS Inc.

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Egypt's Semiconductor Cluster Stronger Than Reported

The semiconductor cluster in Egypt runs to more than half-a-dozen startups that are operating as fabless chips companies, as IP licensors and design teams for hire, in the domains of analog, mixed-signal, RF and power.

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Paving the way to self-driving cars with advanced driver assistance systems

Sponsored by: Texas Instruments

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Advancing the smart factory through technology innovation

Sponsored by: Texas Instruments

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MCU Vendors Add DSP for Consumer Wireless Apps

The target of chip vendors with new DSP-enhanced MCU and SoC designs is the next generation of wireless, wearable IoTs and a range of video and audio related consumer designs.

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Sensor Biz Booms Under Fab-Lite Model, ams AG

ams AG CEO Kirk Laney talks candidly about the company's future. The fab lite company recorded about 170 million euros of revenues during Q2 2015, a 60% increase over the same quarter last year, with gross margins in the 54% region (including acquisition-related costs).

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VW's Woes Could be Solved by Tailpipe Add-on

Transient Plasma Systems already has the solution to VWs woes with a retrofit for the tailpipe that is has already demonstrated to the company.

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Research cools solar cells for efficiency boost

Solar cells work more efficiently when they are cooled, but sitting the the sun all day, it is not always easy to achieve this.

Stanford School of engineering graduate students Linxiano Zhu, Shanhui Fan, a Professor of Electrical Engineering and grad student Aaswath Raman on Friday, October 10, 2014. ( Norbert von der Groeben )

Researchers at Stanford University in the US have come up with a transparent overlay material that increases efficiency by cooling the cells even in full sunlight.

The material works by radiating heat away from the solar cells.

The researchers used a patterned silica material laid on top of a traditional solar cell. The material is transparent to the visible sunlight that powers solar cells, but captures and emits thermal radiation, or heat, as infrared rays.

According to Shanhui Fan, a professor of electrical engineering at Stanford: “Our thermal overlay allows sunlight to pass through, preserving or even enhancing sunlight absorption, but it also cools the cell by radiating the heat out and improving the cell efficiency.”

When it was tested on a custom-made solar absorber, a device that mimics the properties of a solar cell without producing electricity, it cooled the underlying absorber by as much as 23 degrees Fahrenheit.

“For a typical crystalline silicon solar cell with an efficiency of 20%, 23 deg F of cooling would improve absolute cell efficiency by over 1%, a figure that represents a significant gain in energy production,” said the researchers.

The same technology could be applied to other systems that need to be cool but also exposed to the visible spectrum of sunlight.

“Say you have a car that is bright red,” said Linxiao Zhu, co-first-author of the paper. “You really like that colour, but you’d also like to take advantage of anything that could aid in cooling your vehicle during hot days. Thermal overlays can help with passive cooling, but it’s a problem if they’re not fully transparent.”

That’s because the perception of color requires objects to reflect visible light, so any overlay would need to be transparent, or else tuned such that it would absorb only light outside the visible spectrum.

“Our photonic crystal thermal overlay optimises use of the thermal portions of the electromagnetic spectrum without affecting visible light,” Zhu said, “so you can radiate heat efficiently without affecting colour.”

The work by Shanhui Fan, a professor of electrical engineering at Stanford, research associate Aaswath P. Raman and doctoral candidate Linxiao Zhu is described in the current issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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Installed energy storage enabling technology revenues expected to reach US$21.5 billion annually by 2024, says firm

With battery prices continuing to decrease, increased attention is being given to other areas of the stationary energy storage value chain, including energy storage system (ESS) integration. Energy storage systems integrators (ESSIs) are responsible for ensuring that ESSs meet the needs of the end user, and the scaling of the overall market will depend on how these companies approach the market. According to a recent report from Navigant Research, installed energy storage enabling technology revenues are expected to reach US$21.5 billion annually by 2024.

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Taiwan market: NCC to auction 2,600MHz spectrum in 4Q15

Taiwan's National Communications Commission (NCC) has delayed the auction of the 2,600MHz spectrum from the third quarter to the fourth. The bidding will be conducted online.

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Acer projector market share reaches record high in 2Q15

According to the latest data from PMA, for the second quarter of 2015 Acer has reached a record high market share of 8% worldwide and 17.8% in EMEA, positioning the company as the third largest projector brand worldwide and number one DLP brand in EMEA. In regards to shipments in the quarter, Acer is the highest growing projector brand among the top five worldwide players with 11% growth on quarter.

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Integrated infrastructure and platform market sees 1.7% on-year growth in 2Q15, says IDC

According to the IDC Worldwide Quarterly Integrated Infrastructure and Platforms Tracker, the worldwide integrated infrastructure and platforms market saw revenues increased by 1.7% on year to US$2.4 billion during the second quarter of 2015. The market shipped 1,210 petabytes of new storage capacity during the quarter, which was up 44.8% compared to the same period a year ago.

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Taiwan drone regulations pending parliament approval

The Taiwan government has passed draft amendments to the Civil Aviation Act to regulate drones, pending parliamentary approval. Local governments will be responsible for regulating drones up to 15kg and those above the weight level will be governed by the Civil Aeronautics Administration (CAA).

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Tablet vendors competing for Bay Trail ahead of Intel discount cancellation

Intel, in order to promote the latest CPU platform Cherry Trail, will cancel price discounts for Bay Trail in October and as a result, tablet vendors have been keen to procure Bay Trail processors, according to Taiwan-based tablet supply chain makers.

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Equipment vendors launch cost-saving programs for clients looking to migrate to 10nm

Semiconductor equipment companies including Applied Materials, ASML and Lam Research have launched refurbish and spare parts programs to help their clients save manufacturing costs while migrating to 10nm process technology, according to industry sources.

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China makers to bump up 43-inch TV panel production

LG Display and AU Optronics (AUO) have dominated the 43-inch TV panel segment but may face challenges as BOE and China Star Optoelectronics Technology (CSOT) as well as Samsung Display push forward developments to ship the size.

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Infineon OPTIGA certified to TPM 2.0

The German Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) has certified Infineon’s OPTIGA technology to TPM (Trusted Device Module) 2.0 standard

TPM 2.0 is the most recent version of the TPM standard which addresses the security requirements of a growing number of IoT devices.

Trusted computing based on TPM root of trust hardware provides protection for such devices as gateways and routers used in smart homes, mobile devices as well as connected industrial and automotive systems.

OPTIGA offers security from basic authentication products to advanced implementations for protecting integrity, authenticity and confidentiality of information.

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2015年9月24日星期四

Digitimes Research: Taiwan 3Q15 top foundries combined revenues to fall

Taiwan's top-three IC foundries are experiencing a particularly weak third quarter with their combined revenues set to decrease 0.8% sequentially and 3.7% on year, according to Digitimes Research.

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GlobalWafers listed on OTC

Semiconductor-grade silicon wafer maker GlobalWafers started trading on Taiwan's over-the-counter (OTC) stock market at an initial price of NT$61.5 (US$1.88) per share on September 25.

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Asustek takes 40% share in global gaming notebook shipments in 1H15

Asustek Computer was the largest gaming notebook vendor in the first half of 2015 and acquired a share of around 40% in shipments of gaming notebooks featuring Nvidia GeForce GTX 950M, 960M, 970M and 980M graphics cards, according to sources from the supply chain.

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IC backend houses to stay cautious as TSMC warns of sales drop in 4Q15

With Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) forecasting a sequential decline in fourth-quarter revenues, Advanced Semiconductor Engineering (ASE) and other backend companies are likely to stay cautious about their business outlook through the first quarter of 2016, according to industry sources.

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Asia and Americas to push global PV demand up to 58GW in 2016, says report

Major regional markets (i.e. China, the US and Japan) and other emerging markets continue to drive demand growth of 2015's photovoltaic (PV) market. According to EnergyTrend, the five largest regional markets for the first half of 2015, as listed in order, were China, Japan, the US, the UK and Germany. India has also caught the attention of the PV sector as its demand growth is quickly catching up with the major markets. However, India is currently outside of the top five because it is behind in market development. EnergyTrend's PV installation capacity forecast for the second half of 2015 finds that growth will flatten for the UK and Germany, while China and the US will be entering their peak periods. Overall, demand will stay strong.

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