sensors

Today’s mobile devices are smaller, more power-efficient, and have more capability than we could have imagined just a decade ago. Offering ever-increasing levels of user functionality, mobile devices are now ubiquitous, and are rapidly becoming the primary mechanisms through which we interact with the digital world, our physical environment, and one another. An unintended side effect of our dependence on the current crop of mobile devices is that they are driving us to distraction.A major industry dynamic will shake things up for the better. Sensors are getting smaller and more efficient, and they’re offering attractive new functionality, giving us the ability to monitor our air and water quality, assess potential toxins in our food sources, and analyze personal health conditions, to name a few use cases. At the same time, the realization of flexible hybrid electronics (FHE) through new materials and production processes, better integration with other electronic components, more efficient energy production and consumption, and pervasive wireless connectivity are fueling the next generation of devices and experiences. What can we expect from tomorrow’s mobile devices — and how can we manage them, instead of having them manage us?SEMI’s Nishita Rao caught up with Mike Wiemer, Ph.D., VP of Engineering, CTO and co-founder, Mojo Vision, to preview his February 25 keynote, The Art of the Possible, at FLEX|MEMS Sensors Technical Congress (MSTC) 2020, February 24-27 at the DoubleTree by Hilton in San Jose, California.Join us at FLEX|MSTC to meet Mike and other industry influencers advancing innovation in FHE and MEMS sensors. Register now to connect with him at FLEX|MSTC or visit him on LinkedIn.SEMI: Mojo Vision has conducted its own research on human interaction with mobile devices. Why is this important?Wiemer: Our mobile devices have given us access to the information we need and want, improving many aspects of our lives. But our devices have also influenced our relationships and attention to our environment in negative ways. We believe that the next mobile computing platform must improve this situation. Instead of pulling us away from the moment, our devices need to embrace more human-centric engagement while still letting us access information that improves our quality of life. Mojo Vision has worked to understand this problem through our own studies and research so we can better develop an approach to address it. SEMI: How are key technical trends driving size, efficiency and capability advancements in mobile devices?Wiemer: Tiny low-power sensors are enabling ever-smaller feature-rich mobile devices that run longer on a battery charge. Smartwatches are a good example. Just a few years ago, smartwatches were not that much more than small screens on our wrists. Today, we have GPS, EKG/health monitoring, and cellular wireless interfaces all inside the same form factor.As this trend continues, we at Mojo Vision predict that our devices will continue to shrink and become even more personal: They’ll be more continuously worn and matched to our own needs and behaviors. This trend towards invisible personal devices is something we’re trying to accomplish with our solutions at Mojo Vision.SEMI: What is Mojo Vision’s concept of “Invisible Computing?” Wiemer: Our vision of Invisible Computing is based on the idea that our wearable devices should be invisible to those around us, encouraging more human interactions. These wearables should be invisible and unobtrusive to users themselves. Our Mojo Lens, which contains a full display and sensors housed inside a contact lens platform, exemplifies this vision. Using proprietary microelectronics and the world’s densest microdisplay to layer digital images and information seamlessly, Mojo Lens is redefining augmented reality. Our mobile devices today continue to increase the quantity and magnitude of interruptions. We think that shouldn’t happen. As a socially invisible device that delivers contextual, relevant content, the Mojo Lens lets us go about our daily lives, naturally interacting with other people while simultaneously enjoying the benefits of augmented reality. We think Invisible Computing can change our relationship with our devices, as well as seemingly give us superpowers. For more information, download the Mojo Vision report, Device Distraction: Understanding the Problem, Re-Thinking the Solution.SEMI: Can you tell us more about Mojo Lens?Wiemer: At its foundation, Mojo Lens is a nanoLED display, radio and sensor platform, integrated using flex technologies, and placed on your eye to provide important information. Mojo Lens can elevate or suppress this information to decrease reliance on your other devices.Unlike your smartwatch or smartphone, which react to you in a binary manner because they don’t have enough information to make autonomous decisions, Mojo Lens understands the context of your experience. That’s because it’s based on our Invisible Computing platform, which can understand your activity. Mojo Lens recognizes if you’re engaged in a conversation, driving or having a coffee, and it reacts with information accordingly.Mojo Lens could act like a real-time interpreter, for example. When someone speaks to me in a language I don’t understand, I should see “subtitles.” Or if I’m having a conversation with someone, Mojo Lens wouldn’t interrupt me with a notification at that moment. For the 92% of Americans who are interrupted by their devices during conversations every day, this prioritization can boost productivity. More importantly, it can improve the quality of our connections with the people around us.Mojo Vision’s microLED platform offers a world-record pixel pitch of over 14,000ppi and pixel density of over 200Mppi², making it the smallest, densest display for dynamic — or moving — content. SEMI: What would you like FLEX|MSTC attendees to take away from your presentation?Wiemer: It feels like the speed at which people are defining important problems and tackling them is increasing every year. And there are so many important problems to solve: space travel, autonomous driving, electric vehicles, alternative energy, quantum computing, lifespan extension, increased food production, brain-computer interfaces, AR/VR. All these problems seem impossible and “crazy,” until some group of people comes along to put a framework in place that can address them. Interestingly, these frameworks aren’t necessarily new. Rather, they build upon existing technologies and capabilities.MEMS sensors and FHE are good examples. From smart textiles, flexible displays and biological sensors to miniature radars, MEMS sensors and FHE technologies are essential building blocks. Many of the big problems we can imagine today will be solved by stacking today’s MEMs and FHE technologies in imaginative new ways. So what do we do next? I’d like to encourage FLEX|MSTC attendees to first define the problem to solve and then define the technology — rather than starting with the technology solution. Mike Weimer is a serial entrepreneur and proven science and technology leader in complex systems development and integration. Before co-founding Mojo Vision as CTO, Weimer co-founded and served as president at Solar Junction, a high-efficiency solar cell company (acquired) where he and his team set two world records for the highest-efficiency solar cells ever made by humans.After Solar Junction, Wiemer joined New Enterprise Associates (NEA) as an Entrepreneur in Residence where he sourced new investments and helped portfolio companies to develop their business and funding strategies. He is a board director at Stratio Corporation and an advisor at Stanford’s StartX Accelerator. He holds a B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University.For more information, visit Mojo Vision.Interested in engaging with the MEMS sensors supply chain? MEMS Sensors Industry Group is a SEMI technology community that enables professionals in the MEMS and sensors industry to accelerate business results by addressing common challenges and opportunities.Nishita Rao is marketing manager for technology communities at SEMI.

Part 2 of 2-part series on MSEC 2019 highlights. Read Part 1. Neural Networks on ChipTo be sure, low power is king when bringing machine learning to the sensor edge. Battery-powered, always-on sensing devices require it since frequent recharging is the death knell of any electronic product. That’s why semiconductor companies are offering new ways to conserve power.“MEMS sensor suppliers have made significant strides in the power, size and performance of their devices,” said Aspinity CEO Tom Doyle. “Yet these gains deliver only incremental power improvements to the system.”Doyle advocates a new architectural model that uses an analog neuromorphic processor to analyze all sensor data at the start of the signal chain instead of sending it downstream so power-hungry chips such as DSPs can digitize it before analysis.“The technology industry wants to take advantage of the many benefits of always-on sensing applications,” said Doyle. “Before we can reach mass proliferation, however, we need to resolve the power issues that are deal-breakers for some applications. We believe the answer to this challenge is architectural. All the data gathered by always-on sensing systems is analog in nature, yet as soon as it’s captured, it’s digitized immediately for analysis. Determining which data is important up front eliminates the digitization and processing of irrelevant data so that voice-first devices such as smart speakers and wearables/hearables can run for long periods of time without requiring battery recharge.”Syntiant CTO Jeremy Holleman agreed that on-device intelligence is the future.“Did you just fall? Is your heartrate a bit off? Deep learning provides a toolset that yields vastly superior decisions,” said Holleman. “The problem is that deep learning is computationally intensive. The answer is a neural network that performs on-device edge inferencing.”Holleman added that Syntiant’s neural decision processor was recently certified as Amazon Voice Service (AVS)-compliant for wake-word detection, making it easier to design voice control in battery-powered devices such as earbuds and wearables.MSEC Technology Showcase WinnerWith the groundswell of interest in intelligence at the edge, it was no surprise that Cartesiam won top honors among all competitors in the MSEC Technology Showcase for its NanoEdge AI, software that brings AI to the edge of the signal chain, making it easier for designers to create intelligent objects that can learn and understand.“Unlike other AI algorithmic technologies for sensing devices, NanoEdge enables both learning and inference at the edge, providing accurate and adaptive intelligence,” said Cartesiam Managing Director and Co-founder Marc Dupaquier, who accepted the award. “It’s also the only tool of its kind that does not require data scientists on board for implementation, which saves a tremendous amount of money. Our clients can build a machine learning library and embed it into their own code within weeks to realize the same caliber of unsupervised neural network that was once the exclusive domain of AI cloud vendors.”MSIG 2019 Hall of FameAt this year’s conference, MSIG Director Carmelo Sansone recognized two longtime contributors to the commercialization of MEMS and sensors: Peter G. Hartwell, Ph.D., chief technology officer at InvenSense, a TDK group company; and Thomas Kenny, professor and senior associate dean of engineering at Stanford University.Hartwell leads technology strategy and the InvenSense advanced technology research group. He has more than 25 years’ experience commercializing silicon MEMS products, including advanced sensors and actuators, and developing MEMS testing techniques.Kenny’s academic accomplishments include authoring or co-authoring more than 250 scientific papers and holding 50 issued patents. He has also advised more than 50 graduated Ph.D. students from Stanford.MSEC 2020Mark your calendar for next year’s MSEC, October 12-14, at Coronado Island Marriott Resort Spa in Coronado, Calif. Get updates from MSIG on MSEC and other upcoming events including MSTC 2020.Stay in Touch with MSIGMEMS Sensors Industry Group (MSIG), a SEMI Strategic Association Partner, is the industry association representing the global MEMS and sensors supply chain. To learn how MSIG enables professionals in the MEMS and sensors industry to innovate, address common challenges and accelerate business results, visit us today.Connect with MSIG on Twitter and LinkedIn. Subscribe to SEMI Blog: Technology and Trends.Maria Vetrano is a public relations consultant at SEMI.

Part of 1 of 2-part series on MSEC 2019 highlights. Read Part 2. MEMS and sensors are proliferating across consumer, automotive, biomedical/healthcare, robotics, industrial and agriculture applications to harvest sensory data in a hyper-connected world and meet demand from consumers and organizations alike as they clamor for more intelligence in electronics.Take the ubiquitous iPhone. Shipped in 2007, Apple’s first iPhone sported five sensors. By contrast, the most feature-packed smartphones will embed up to 20 sensors by 2021, according to Yole Développement’s Jérôme Azémar. He estimates that the devices will feature four MEMS microphones, four CMOS image sensors (CIS), a RGB color sensor, a laser rangefinder, an infrared sensor, a gas sensor, a heart rate monitor and a fingerprint sensor, not to mention the MEMS inertial sensors that device users have come to know and trust.The MEMS market is expected to reach $18.5 billion in 2024 [1], up a whopping 60 percent from $11.6 billion in 2018, according to Azémar, who presented at MEMS Sensors Industry Group’s 15th annual MEMS Sensors Executive Congress (MSEC) in late October in Coronado, Calif. Add other types of sensors to the mix – CIS, environmental sensors, LiDARs, radars, ultrasonics, and fingerprint sensors – and the market will mushroom to $93 billion by 2024, said Azémar.Since MEMS Sensors Industry Group (MSIG) joined SEMI as a Strategic Association Partner three years ago, SEMI has expanded its MEMS and sensors programs to Europe and Asia while continuing to grow its U.S. conferences. “SEMI is continually investing in MEMS and sensors innovation across the supply chain,” said Dave Anderson, president of SEMI Americas and host of MSEC. “For example, MSIG is contributing to the development of the Heterogeneous Integration Roadmap, an initiative designed to drive heterogeneous integration technology development and accelerate electronics innovation. The roadmap spans device design, test and fabrication, ecosystem development, R D, equipment and materials. “At MSEC, executives and other speakers explored how AI and blockchain are remaking the food supply chain, air transportation and other sectors as MEMS and sensors improve the quality of our lives,” said Anderson.Sensing at the EdgeThe concept of artificial intelligence (AI), that a machine can harness intelligence that rivals or outperforms humans – and act without human intervention – has been a feature of the human imagination since at least the 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey. MEMS and sensors facilitate intelligence in a wide range of electronics such as smartphones, healthcare wearables, robots, industrial predictive maintenance systems, and cars. AI is sure to augment that functionality.MEMS and sensors are now in their third wave of evolution, a focus on edge AI, Bosch Sensortec CEO and General Manager Stefan Finkbeiner told MSEC attendees. For its part, Bosch is working to add AI to MEMS devices. The first wave integrated software with MEMS sensors, and the second, sensor fusion, enabled designers to allocate performance and power strategically to tune MEMS for resource-constrained devices. The third wave is “an active-learning phase in which MEMS facilitates real-time learning at the edge to promote greater personalization, environmental feedback, privacy of user data and improved battery life,” said Finkbeiner.Small sensor nodes with edge AI exemplify third-wave applications. Integrating low-power environmental sensors (e.g., gas, temperature, pressure, humidity and air-flow sensors), the nodes could be deployed in fire-prone forests to assess fire risk and support early detection. Access to this real-time environmental information could prove invaluable to residents and public-safety personnel alike.Google takes another tack, applying machine learning to resource-constrained devices, said Nick Kreeger, a senior software engineer at the Internet giant. The company’s Google Brain creates machine learning models that can run on inexpensive, low-power microcontrollers using Google’s TensorFlow Lite, an open-source machine learning tool that’s been deployed on a multitude of mobile devices. Inferencing is done at the device’s edge, rather than transmitted to the cloud.Meeting the power constraints of battery-powered sensing devices is another matter that starts with minimizing energy and data waste. “Deep learning is compute-bound and runs well on existing microcontrollers,” Kreeger said. “Because it’s all arithmetic, it’s low-power compared to storage access.”Already Google has worked with Plant Village, a research unit at Penn State University, and the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) to help farmers improve food production by using machine learning and cheap sensors to spot and manage planet diseases in developing countries. And that production chain is in dire need of a boost, according to Rajendra Rao, general manager of IBM Food Trust, an enterprise-class blockchain solution.“We are on the cusp of complete failure of the food system,” Rao said. “One out of 10 people gets sick each year from foodborne illness, 420,000 die from this annually, 80 percent of companies in the food supply chain have not digitized, one-third of all fresh food in the US is thrown away, and one in five seafood samples worldwide is mislabeled.”IBM Food Trust’s work with Sucafina, which manages a global green coffee supply chain, shows how sensors can trace food from the farm to the processing plant to the consumer. With the IBM Food Trust platform, Sucafina can track the origin of the beans used in a cup of coffee – a competitive differentiator to coffee drinkers eager to support fair-trade coffee roasters.ripe.io, one of Forbes’ 25 most innovative AgTech startups, is also tackling the challenges and complexities of the food supply chain.“Our secure blockchain platform creates a digital twin of food items, transparently aggregating foods’ journey in real-time, to provide a harmonized trustworthy platform for multiple stakeholders,” said Rachel Gabato, the company’s COO. The ripe.io blockchain-based platform collects data from various sensors – temperature, pressure, light, humidity and inertial MEMS sensors. Growers, distributors and end customers including sweetgreen – a U.S. restaurant chain that depends on fresh produce – use the information to trace the origin and quality of food.MSEC 2020Mark your calendar for next year’s MSEC, October 12-14, at Coronado Island Marriott Resort Spa in Coronado, Calif. Get updates from MSIG on MSEC and other upcoming events including MSTC 2020.Stay in Touch with MSIGMEMS Sensors Industry Group (MSIG), a SEMI Strategic Association Partner, is the industry association representing the global MEMS and sensors supply chain. To learn how MSIG enables professionals in the MEMS and sensors industry to innovate, address common challenges and accelerate business results, visit us today.Connect with MSIG on Twitter and LinkedIn. Subscribe to SEMI Blog: Technology and Trends.[1] Source: Status of the MEMS Industry report, Yole Développement, 2019Maria Vetrano is a public relations consultant at SEMI.

Most of today’s blockbuster MEMS products – from pressure sensors and resonators to accelerometers and microphones – originated from academic research, a trend that Alissa M. Fitzgerald, Founder Managing Member, A.M. Fitzgerald Associates, expects to continue. While many of these potentially game-changing new technologies will require many more years of intensive development and up to $100 million in investment to reach full commercialization, Fitzgerald sees their potential for generating new waves of activity and opportunity in the MEMS and sensors industry.SEMI’s Maria Vetrano caught up with Fitzgerald to preview her October 23 presentation, Emerging MEMS Sensors Technologies to Watch as We Enter a New Decade, at MEMS Sensors Executive Congress, October 22-24, 2019, at the Coronado Island Marriott Resort Spa in Coronado, California.Join us at MEMS Sensors Executive Congress (MSEC) to meet Alissa Fitzgerald and other industry influencers driving innovation in the MEMS and sensors industry. Register now to connect with her at MSEC or visit her on LinkedIn.SEMI: What are your top three emerging MEMS and sensors technologies with the greatest promise?Fitzgerald: Let’s start by defining emerging. In researching this topic for MSEC, I reviewed a year’s worth of academic papers to search for compelling technologies that will emerge five to 10 years from now. While these applications are not yet commercially ready, they bear a distinct presence in academic literature, and some have even reached the proof-of-concept phase. They all have the potential to advance user functionality derived from MEMS and sensors in very meaningful ways.Next-Generation MicromirrorsI’ve noticed renewed interest in micromirrors, driven by interest in LiDAR for autonomous vehicles, in fiberoptic networking, and in VR/AR glasses and headsets as well.Newer generations of micromirrors will use piezoelectric films to enhance optical performance. Piezoelectric actuation can pivot the mirror to a much larger angle than older-generation electrostatically actuated micromirrors. This is important for wider-angle scanning for LiDAR – as well as for other applications – as it enables the creation of a larger picture image.Piezoelectric films can also be used to change the shape of the mirror surface to enable a variable-focus mirror. This is useful on two fronts: It supports depth-of-field adjustments and it alleviates the need for extreme precision in packaging of optical devices, improving both cost and yield.Event-driven sensors/zero-power/ultra-low power sensorsSensors that draw no power, or that draw just small amounts, by activating only upon a triggering stimulus, are enormously exciting. Their extremely low power consumption addresses one of the most significant obstacles to creating large-area sensor networks: the problem of too-frequent battery changes.In addition, while most sensor nodes today broadcast a large stream of data back to the mother ship by radio, these event-driven or zero-power sensors consume only a small amount of power because they activate the radio only to transmit essential data.Resolving the power-consumption problem with sensors will allow deployment of large-area sensor networks in remote or inaccessible locations, highly useful for applications such as monitoring infrastructure.Bacterial sensorsSensors that can detect the presence of bacteria, as well as the type, have widespread applicability beyond medical uses. They would be particularly useful in food-safety applications as they can identify particular strains of bacteria, such as E. coli, before the beef leaves the processing plant or the spinach ships from the warehouse. This could offer dramatic improvements in food safety over the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA’s) food safety program, which only flags foodborne illness when a cluster of people are seriously ill.Researchers are also designing bacterial sensors for rapid point-of-care (POC) diagnostics to detect, for example, sepsis early, potentially saving lives.SEMI: You’ve said that some future MEMS and sensors will use alternatives to silicon. When might we see MEMS and sensors printed on paper or other flexible materials – and for which applications are they suited?Fitzgerald: We’re seeing an enormous amount of development of sensors made on paper, plastics and even textiles, materials that are readily available, inexpensive and flexible.What’s gating our progress right now is manufacturing infrastructure. At present, researchers are using inkjet printers, 3D printers, etc. to manufacture prototype sensors, but in most cases, they would need to move to roll-to-roll printing to scale up. I think that we’re looking at a decade before we see these sensor technologies reach the mass market.When they do arrive, we’ll see sensors that we can easily affix to any kind of carton, wrapper or packaging used with food or other disposable items. Traceability and status of perishable items in particular will allow consumers to track food from the farm or factory to the warehouse, store and, finally, to the home.Implementing these kinds of sensors would also help the environment. According to the Natural Resources Defense Council, in the United States alone up to 40 percent of our food is wasted annually, in part because we fear it’s gone bad. If consumers feel assured that their food is safe, they will waste less. And wasting less means that we can grow less food to feed the same number of people. We’ll also reduce the volume of food waste that goes to landfills.SEMI: What can the MEMS industry do to promote the use of more environmentally friendly materials in its products?Fitzgerald: Some of this is already underway. More companies in our industry are adopting Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) standards to get rid of heavy metals, such as lead, cadmium or other hazardous materials, in their electronics.We could also produce disposable sensors on paper or on biodegradable plastics, which would decompose within a few months, and we could use safer metals, such as gold, magnesium or zinc, to reduce hazardous metals’ contamination in landfills. While it’s not feasible to make all sensors biodegradable, the market for such sensors could be massive.As companies (and individuals), we should also work hard to design electronics that consume less power, because this ultimately translates to fewer disposable batteries in landfills.SEMI: What would you like MSEC attendees to take away from your presentation?Fitzgerald: I’d like to make two main points. First, the trend to use other non-silicon materials to make MEMS and sensors is real and inevitable. It’s a matter of when. Anyone building a gas or chemical sensor on silicon should look at how to do it on paper or plastic because there are great future applications incorporating flexible, disposable sensors in packaging of all types. That’s the low-hanging fruit.Second, to support this technology development trend, we must look seriously at manufacturing infrastructure because we will need completely different sets of equipment, environments and consumable materials to manufacture MEMS and sensors on paper or plastic. Sensor manufacturers could prepare for this future expansion by beginning to collaborate today with companies that already produce paper and plastic goods. Alissa Fitzgerald, Ph.D., founded A.M. Fitzgerald Associates, LLC (AMFitzgerald), a MEMS and sensors solutions company, in 2003. She has over 20 years of engineering experience in MEMS design, fabrication and product development.Prior to founding AMFitzgerald, Fitzgerald worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Orbital Sciences Corporation, Sigpro, and Sensant Corporation, now part of Siemens. She received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from MIT and her doctorate from Stanford University, in Aeronautics and Astronautics. Fitzgerald has numerous journal publications and holds eight patents. She served on the Governing Council of MEMS Industry Group from 2008-2014 and was inducted into the MIG Hall of Fame in 2013. Fitzgerald serves on the Board of Directors of both Rigetti Computing and the Transducer Research Foundation.For more information, please visit AMFitzgerald.MEMS Sensors Industry Group (MSIG), the industry association representing the global MEMS and sensors supply chain, hosts the annual MEMS Sensors Executive Congress. To learn how MSIG enables professionals in the MEMS and sensors industry to innovate, address common challenges and accelerate business results, visit us today.Maria Vetrano is a PR consultant for MSIG, a SEMI Strategic Association Partner.

Smart cities of the digital future will employ systems enabled by MEMS and sensors in wide-ranging ways. From wearable sensors that monitor personal health and wellness and environmental sensors that assess air quality to autonomous micro-transit systems that are efficient and environmentally sustainable, MEMS and sensors are critically important to living in smart societies.SEMI’s Nishita Rao spoke with Albert P. Pisano, Professor and Dean at UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering ahead of his October 24 closing keynote presentation, MEMS and Systems in the Digital Future, at MEMS Sensors Executive Congress, October 22-24, 2019, at Coronado Island Marriott Resort Spa in Coronado, Calif.Join us at MSEC to meet Albert Pisano and other industry influencers driving MEMS and sensors innovations. Registration is open.SEMI: What are some of the most important large-scale system needs of the digital future – and why is MEMS so important in meeting these needs?Pisano: My vision of the digital future is an optimistic one, in which technology is used to assist people in their pursuit of health and happiness. In that digital future, I expect disruption in several key industries that depend on large-scale systems enabled by MEMS – healthcare, retail, transportation and education.Driving these disruptive forces across all four industries is the demand for more relevant real-time information, collected via inconspicuous technologies. Small in size and weight and low in power consumption, what technology other than MEMS delivers these combined attributes?SEMI: How do you envision MEMS in smart cities? What applications and devices will change the human experience in cities?Pisano: Smart cities, by my definition, are cities in which the four basic industries – healthcare, retail, transportation, and education – are implemented in their disrupted form.Take healthcare, for example. The adoption of MEMS chemical sensors in a wearable format will revolutionize human health monitoring. These sensors will not only improve individual health but also mitigate the spread of disease.In transportation, the coming of semi- or fully autonomous vehicles (as well as the general upgrading of all mass-transit vehicles) will give commuters additional time to pursue their interests while en route. A coming revolution of data connectivity to all vehicles will spur the rise of work, study and entertainment options available to people in transit. MEMS in the communication channels as well as in the vehicles will play an essential role in streaming personal data to travelers.SEMI: Could you help us visualize a disruptive application in one of these industries, say healthcare? Pisano: Healthcare is a particularly compelling area because MEMS offers life-enhancing, even life-saving, functionality that will significantly improve the quality of life of some people. MEMS allows us to design consumable wearable sensors that allow individuals to unobtrusively and non-invasively obtain biochemical data, such as potassium, sodium and sugar levels in the body fluid, as well as metabolic indicators such as lactic acid. Further, MEMS-based devices can perform EKG and EEG functions as well as monitor blood pressure in deep body veins in non-medical settings. This higher level of medical-grade data (not just casual data such as an approximate number of steps taken) will allow departments of public health to identify the early onset of individual disease.SEMI: What new forms of wireless communications will affect MEMS-enabled systems in the digital future?Pisano: Most visions of a digital future include wireless communication, but as the spectrum becomes ever more crowded, and as the need for unregulated, negotiated spectrum access increases, we will experience greater pressure to consider other forms of communication, such as inductive, optical and sonic. MEMS sensors are the only technical alternative to these other forms of communication in that they provide acceptable SWAP (size, weight and power). This will spawn battery-powered solutions with significant operational time. A good example is wireless telemetry of human physiological data from the skin. Only MEMS technology can reduce sensor-consumed power to below one microwatt. At this low level, energy harvest from the skin itself is sufficient to power the sensor!SEMI: How is the UCSD campus a living laboratory for intelligent sensing devices and systems?Pisano: Progressive universities, such as the University of California San Diego, understand that they are microcosms of small cities. They have populations during the day of approximately 65,000 people, a myriad of vehicles and a concentrated group of people.Many functions on campus mirror that of a small city. Lecture halls are similar to movie theatres. Student stores and centers are similar to shopping malls. Student residence halls are similar to apartment houses. Many campuses have medical centers, with their own emergency health services and hospitals. As a microcosm of a small city, it is only natural to think of the university as a wonderful living laboratory that allows us to test out new technologies at scale.Clearly, autonomous transit and wearable sensors have potential for uptake in this community. And that’s just scratching the surface. Package delivery (dinner to a dorm room, perhaps?), parking-spot location assistance, and even location-independent data streaming for classroom lectures are just a few possible examples of applications that we can test in a university environment.SEMI: How can the MEMS and sensors industry help researchers and innovators realize the digital future?Pisano: As a MEMS practitioner for almost 30 years, I fully understand the need to focus at the device level to ensure that the MEMS design meets SWAP and other requirements. But I truly believe that MEMS designers must learn to think more about subsystem and system issues, since the future of MEMS will be won by those who cannot only design the device right, but who can design the right device. By taking a much more market- and system-oriented approach to MEMS design thinking, companies in this industry will realize greater success.Register now to connect with Albert Pisano at MSEC and visit his UCSD page for more information.Albert P. Pisano, Ph.D., began his service as Dean of the Jacobs School of Engineering in 2013. He holds the Walter J. Zable Chair in Engineering and serves on the faculty of the departments of mechanical and aerospace engineering and of electrical and computer engineering. Pisano is an elected member of the National Academy of Engineering for contributions to the design, fabrication, commercialization, and educational aspects of MEMS, and is a Fellow of the ASME.Prior to his appointment at UCSD, Pisano served on the UC Berkeley faculty for 30 years, where he held the FANUC Endowed Chair of Mechanical Systems. Pisano was the senior co-director of the Berkeley Sensor Actuator Center (an NSF Industry-University Cooperative Research Center), director of the Electronics Research Laboratory (UC Berkeley’s largest organized research unit), and faculty head of the Program Office for Operational Excellence, among other leadership positions. From 1997 to 1999, Pisano was a program manager for the MEMS Program at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). Pisano held several research positions prior to joining academia.Pisano is a co-inventor listed on more than 36 patents in MEMS and has co-authored more than 400 archival publications. Pisano also is a co-founder of 10 startup companies in the areas of transdermal drug delivery, transvascular drug delivery, sensorized catheters, MEMS manufacturing equipment, MEMS RF devices and MEMS motion sensors. Visit his faculty page to learn more about his research interests.MEMS Sensors Industry Group, a SEMI technology community representing the global MEMS and sensors supply chain, hosts the annual MEMS Sensors Executive Congress. To learn how MSIG enables professionals in the MEMS and sensors industry to innovate, address common challenges and accelerate business results, visit us today.Nishita Rao is marketing manager for technology communities at SEMI.

Software for sensors has evolved from simply reading out and evaluating sensor data to making intelligent decisions based on that data, a transformation enabled by new software synthesis and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies. Together, they make consumer devices smarter, dramatically improving the user experience through greater interactivity and higher levels of automated personalization.SEMI’s Nishita Rao spoke with Stefan Finkbeiner, CEO and General Manager at Bosch Sensortec, who will explore the topic in his October 23 keynote, How Software Makes MEMS Sensors into Smart Systems, at MEMS Sensors Executive Congress (MSEC), October 22-24, 2019, at the Coronado Island Marriott Resort Spa in Coronado, Calif.Join us at MSEC to meet Bosch Sensortec and other industry influencers driving MEMS and sensors innovations. Registration is open.SEMI: What is the relationship between MEMS sensors suppliers and specialized software synthesis providers?Finkbeiner: Collaboration is a key driver for innovation in sensor software. There are already several fruitful collaborations between MEMS sensors suppliers and specialized software providers, which are mostly startups. Collaborations with providers of simulation and evaluation tools as well as with well-known universities in the field of AI are starting to show positive results.Domain expertise is also critical for developing smart sensor software, making it essential to future sensing solutions.SEMI: How does software synthesis relate to sensor fusion?Finkbeiner: Put simply, software synthesis refers to ways of automatically generating code based on domain knowledge and given constraints for specific product versions. Sensor fusion combines sensor data from different kinds of sources in order to improve the results.Software synthesis techniques enable a level of automation that creates new opportunities for more complex sensor fusion, which was formerly out of reach when using traditional approaches that involved, for example, big data and a large number of potential data sources.The traditional sensor fusion toolset can now be further extended by machine learning techniques that help to determine which sources are more reliable than others and how to combine data streams. This topic and others are still active areas of research. A wearable device with motion detection is a case in point. With unsupervised learning, the device could identify short versus long cyclically repeating motions and treat them differently from other types of motion. SEMI: How is the new software synthesis-AI approach different from previous approaches? To what degree will the new approach open up new applications?Finkbeiner: Traditionally, technology companies have used cloud computing for data storage and machine learning on aggregated user data. In that model, MEMS sensors generate large amounts of data that power-hungry hardware (such as digital signal processors) must process. In addition, machine learning generally requires lots of power-hungry cloud nodes with GPUs. This model, however, is not the best option for many users. Just think for a moment about all the scenarios in battery-powered devices where frequent battery charging frustrates users.Leveraging both software synthesis and AI techniques in MEMS sensors is therefore a very promising approach because it supports improved recognition and learning inside the sensor. This means that user-specific data isn’t transferred to the cloud. Instead, it remains private inside the sensor. This improves existing applications that learn all the time and opens up new opportunities for applications such as smart clothing, predicting a product’s lifespan, detecting whether a window or door is open or closed – all without server connectivity.SEMI: How will such software adapt to the individual user?Finkbeiner: Devices will offer much more personalized information to users. For example, optimizing a step counter to match the height, age or Body Mass Index (BMI) of a user – or to adapt to a user’s environment (is the person running on a beach, hiking up a mountain or strolling in a park?) – will provide more accurate information on calories burned. Not every step is created equal, and both pre-loaded personal data as well as real-world environmental data will prove that some steps consume a lot more energy than others.SEMI: What would you like MSEC attendees to take away from your presentation?Finkbeiner: I want to introduce the journey of software development by illustrating specific use case examples. I would also like to offer my outlook on the role of software and AI in MEMS sensors to help increase their adoption in current and new applications. Ultimately, I think it’s important to raise awareness in our industry on why we should embrace the use of software and AI.Connect with Stefan Finkbeiner at MSEC or via LinkedIn. Get more information on Bosch Sensortec products and solutions online.Stefan Finkbeiner, Ph.D., CEO and General Manager, Bosch Sensortec, was appointed CEO of Bosch Sensortec in 2012. He joined the Robert Bosch GmbH in 1995 and has been working in different positions related to the research, development, manufacturing, and marketing of sensors for more than 20 years. His senior positions at Bosch have included director of marketing for sensors, director of corporate research in microsystems technology, and vice president of engineering for sensors.Finkbeiner received his Diploma in Physics from the University of Karlsruhe in 1992 before studying at the Max-Planck-Institute in Stuttgart, where he earned his Ph.D. in Physics in 1995. In 2015, Finkbeiner received the prestigious lifetime achievement award from the MEMS Sensors Industry Group (MSIG), a SEMI technology community.Bosch Sensortec is a member of MEMS Sensors Industry Group, the industry association representing the global MEMS and sensors supply chain. To learn more about how MSIG enables professionals in the MEMS and sensors industry to innovate, address common challenges and accelerate business results, visit us today.Nishita Rao is marketing manager for technology communities at SEMI.

The evolution of industrial and non-industrial automation, smart manufacturing, and Industry 4.0 technologies have increased demand for vision systems that support robust, reliable imaging industrial applications. What factors are driving growth in the machine vision market today?SEMI spoke with Frederic Laune, Business Manager, European Technology, Corning, about how Corning® Varioptic® Lenses are vital to advancing the speed, efficiency, and integration of products using computer imaging. Laune shared his views ahead of his presentation at SEMI MEMS Imaging Sensors Summit, 25-27 September, 2019, at the WTC in Grenoble, France. Join us at the event to meet Corning and many other key industry influencing players. Registration is open.SEMI: Corning's markets include optical communications, mobile consumer electronics, display technology, automotive, and life sciences vessels. Back in June 2019, Corning Incorporated announced that it had delivered its 2 millionth Corning® Varioptic® Lens for industrial applications. What drove this great milestone?Laune: This milestone was met thanks to the fact that Corning Varioptic’s solution solves several problems generated by classical motorized solutions used in industrial applications: limited number of actuation cycles, poor vibration and shock resistance, size (meaning bulky), and high-power consumption. Before Varioptic, there was no variable focus solution that worked well.In addition, the explosion of the CMOS sensor technology helped drive down the cost of imaging solutions for industrial devices, increasing the number of applications and shipping volumes.SEMI: What inspired Corning Varioptic Lenses?Laune: Varioptic was started in 2002 by Dr. Bruno Berge, a French physicist turned entrepreneur. Inspired by the work of Gabriel Lippmann, the 1908 Nobel Prize winner for the invention of color photography, Dr. Berge explored the shape-altering effects of an electric charge when applied to two liquids, a phenomenon referred to as electrowetting. His research ultimately led to the creation of liquid lenses.Fast forward to 2017, when Varioptic became a part of Corning through an acquisition that included Varioptic and Invenios technologies. We believe the synergies from this acquisition will lead to exciting new liquid lens application opportunities that align with Corning’s growth strategy and core capabilities. Corning is one of the world’s leading innovators in materials science. For more than 165 years, Corning has applied its unparalleled expertise in glass science, ceramic science, and optical physics to develop products that transform industries and enhance people’s lives.SEMI: What differentiates traditional camera systems from adjustable lens solutions?Laune: Traditional industrial cameras are usually fixed focus, meaning that the image is sharp only in a limited distance range. Unlike consumer camera applications, there were no good solutions for variable or auto focus cameras in the industrial space. This is due to the intrinsic limitations of motorized technologies.Therefore, customers were using, for example, several cameras to focus at several distances. This compromises the optical quality by closing the objective in order to increase the depth of field, therefore limiting resolution and leading to a need for more light.The cameras using Corning Varioptic’s technology offer more functionality with their ability to focus, whatever the distance, in a fast, reliable, and accurate fashion, and with lower power consumption than traditional mechanical solutions. The upshot is that the product that can withstand heat, vibration, mechanical shocks, and high numbers of focus cycles in tough industrial environments. SEMI: And how is electrowetting enabling industrial devices to capture images and process information quickly and clearly? Laune: In two words: fast and accurate.Electrowetting has unique features – with our two-liquid solution, we combine fast focus with high vibration and shock resistance, and the added benefit of low power consumption.What’s more, our programmable lens can be reconfigured on demand. The lens adapts rapidly and continuously from diverging to converging and can be modeled to support demanding variable focus applications. Our lenses can change their focus in milliseconds, similar to the human eye, and capture fast-moving objects at varying distances. The use of liquid, over mechanical solutions, allows us to create a small form factor, saving precious space and reducing power consumption.SEMI: What industrial applications are taking advantage of this technology? Can you name one example?Laune: 2D barcode readers and industrial vision are our main markets. There is also a strong adoption of our technology in medical applications.SEMI: What does the rise of machine vision mean for manufacturers? Give us one prediction about the opportunities offered by advanced imaging applications.Laune: A great example is the use of 2D barcode readers and liquid lenses to track your ecommerce order, point to point. Another example is full product traceability by implementing a 2D barcode on every component of a given product globally to improve product quality. The varying and adjustable focus abilities of our liquid lens technology make it possible for barcode scanners to track products of different heights, allowing manufactures to improve their processes and logistics.Beyond these examples, tracking and analyzing are booming, thanks to the combination of low-cost CMOS sensor technology, increasing processing power, innovative algorithms (deep learning, AI, neuromorphic processors, etc.), and better image quality due to the progress of lens technology, Varioptic being one.We see an opportunity to improve people’s lives, such as enabling better analysis of medical images and improving the use of cameras in biomedical technologies.SEMI: Quality inspection and automation, adoption of Industrial 4.0 technologies, government initiatives. If you were to choose one, what main factor will drive growth in the machine vision market?Laune: It is difficult to pick just one. I believe that full traceability (monitoring individual parts throughout the production process) has interesting implications as compliance and regulatory efforts ramp up and stronger security of goods becomes more important, particularly as consumers become engaged in food safety and tracing products throughout the supply chain.SEMI: What are your expectations for the SEMI MEMS Imaging Sensors Summit and why would you invite your peers to attend? Laune: I strongly believe in the power of human interactions in technology and science! Ideas come from discussions and physical interactions. The SEMI MEMS Imaging Sensors Summit is a great place to network, meet people, and think about the future! Frederic Laune is the business manager leading the Corning® Varioptic® Lenses business. Laune joined Varioptic as an R D engineer in 2003 after spending the first eight years of his career developing novel active components for the optical telecom industry. At the time, Varioptic was a newly created start-up aiming to develop liquid lens technology for industrial applications. After designing the first two Varioptic commercial products, the Arctic 320 and Artic 416, Laune stepped up as head of Varioptic’s R D department to focus on product and performance improvements. In 2010, he was appointed sales and marketing lead for the company. Varioptic was acquired by Corning Incorporated in early 2017. Laune received a master’s degree in physics and optics from University Pierre and Marie Curie (Paris) in 1995.Serena Brischetto is a marketing and communications manager at SEMI Europe.

John Smee, VP Engineering, Qualcomm Technologies Inc., will share insights on 5G – which is evolving to enable more reliable connectivity with higher performance in and beyond the era of Internet of Things (IoT) – in his keynote at MEMS Sensors Executive Congress, October 22-24, 2019, in Coronado, Calif.SEMI’s Maria Vetrano caught up with John to give MSEC attendees a preview of his talk.SEMI: Why should MEMS and sensors suppliers stand up and take note of the evolution in 5G, particularly 5G NR?Smee: 5G is the unifying fabric that will connect virtually everything around us. 5G New Radio (NR) is the global standard for a unified, more capable 5G wireless air interface. It will deliver significantly faster and more responsive mobile broadband experiences to users. It will also extend mobile technology to connect and redefine a multitude of new industries, including the IoT.As tens of millions of MEMS and sensors are the core components providing intelligence and interactivity to IoT devices, suppliers need to understand the capabilities and efficiencies that 5G will bring to connect the wide range of MEMS and sensors.We should also recognize that we are at the beginning of the 5G era, and 5G technologies will continue to evolve and expand in the coming years to connect new types of devices in increasingly efficient ways.SEMI: What’s special about the upcoming release of 5G NR, 3GPP Rel-16?Smee: While the first 5G NR release, 3GPP Rel-15, focused primarily on enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB), it also established a solid technology foundation for continued evolution in Rel-16 and beyond.With Rel-16, we are seeing 5G NR’s expansion beyond eMBB to address new tiers of IoT services such as industrial IoT (e.g., automation) with ultra-reliable, low-latency communication (URLLC) and cellular vehicle-to-everything (C-V2X) for more advanced use cases, such as autonomous driving. MEMS and sensors are critically important to both types of use cases as they collect the raw information of the physical world, and 5G is the connectivity of these sensors to the network. This makes the technologies inextricably linked.MEMS and sensors are equally integral to the development of more efficient low-complexity massive IoT devices (MIoT) with in-band 5G NR deployments of enhanced machine-type communication (eMTC)/narrowband Internet of Things (NB-IoT) and the use of the new 5G Core Network. In practical terms, devices that enable smart city use cases – such as smart utility monitoring, connected parking meters, and smart street lighting solutions that support 3GPP Rel-16 – are MIoT devices that will delight city administrators and dwellers with their improved coverage and efficiency. SEMI: In addition to low-complexity MIoT devices, what other markets will benefit most from the evolution in 5G NR?Smee: We continue to enhance 5G NR to support the high-performance IoT, including URLLC.URLLC is one of the many new 5G capabilities that wasn’t possible with the previous generation of cellular technologies, such as LTE. Because it delivers services at very high reliability (i.e., 99.9999%) and ultra-low latency (i.e., sub-1ms), URLLC literally opens up new use cases that that only wired communication could serve in the past. Industrial IoT applications that require a mix of high reliability and low latency, such as robotic arm command and control, are foremost among these new URLLC use cases.Another example of IoT taking advantage of URLLC is smart grid, where faults in the electricity distribution network require immediate protection and control to ensure safety and avoid equipment damage.SEMI: How is Qualcomm building on the eMTC/NB-IoT for low-power wide-area IoT (LPWA) – and how will this influence IoT connectivity?Smee: We continue to evolve eMTC/NB-IoT beyond its initial 3GPP release in Rel-13, making these foundational LPWA IoT technologies more capable and efficient as they become the basis for 5G massive IoT.The most significant updates to eMTC/NB-IoT include multi-cast and positioning support in Rel-14 and improved spectral/power efficiencies in Rel-15. Multi-cast can help service providers to deliver firmware updates over the air with greater efficiency, which speeds deployment of new features. Positioning can create new values, which can inform end users where their assets/packages are located, potentially safeguarding assets in transit. Improving spectral/power efficiencies offers more power-efficient transmissions, which takes less toll on battery-operated devices.With Rel-16, we have further optimized eMTC/NB-IoT, which is supported by the new 5G Core Network and is also deployable in 5G spectrum in-band with other 5G NR services.The evolutionary path ahead for eMTC/NB-IoT enables support for an even wider range of 5G massive IoT devices. New enhancements in the pipeline, such as grant-free uplink and multi-hop mesh, will boost efficiency and coverage area that much more.SEMI: Where do mobile broadband devices such as ultra-high-definition (UHD) security cameras fall within Qualcomm’s realization of 5G-NR?Smee: Mobile broadband is at the core of 5G NR. We see it both powering the new generation of 5G smartphones and expanding beyond traditional devices (including always-connected PCs and tablets) to address the needs of high-performance IoT devices such as UHD security cameras.It’s actually an important part of our vision for 5G to have an industrial network that requires all types of 5G connectivity for devices spanning eMBB (e.g., cameras, laptops), URLLC (e.g., machines) and MIoT (e.g., sensors).SEMI: What can the MEMS and sensors industry do to prepare for the 5G wave?Smee: Because 5G can evolve to deliver even better performance and efficiency for connecting sensors in the 5G world, we will see even more widespread adoption of MEMS and sensors into larger numbers of connected applications. MEMS and sensors suppliers, therefore, need to get ready for the 5G wave by preparing to support 5G connectivity in their devices, which will ultimately help to realize the 5G vision of connecting virtually everything in the world around us.John Smee, Ph.D., is vice president of engineering at Qualcomm Technologies Inc., where he is the 5G R D lead responsible for overseeing all 5G research projects, including end-end systems design and advanced RF/HW/SW prototype implementations in Qualcomm’s wireless research and development group. He joined Qualcomm in 2000, holds over 100 U.S. Patents, and has been involved in the design, innovation, and productization of wireless communications systems such as 5G NR, 4G LTE, 3G CDMA, and IEEE 802.11. He also leads Qualcomm’s companywide academic collaboration program across technologies including wireless, semiconductor, multimedia, security and machine learning. John was chosen to participate in the National Academy of Engineering Frontiers of Engineering program and received his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Princeton University and also holds an M.A. from Princeton and an M.Sc. and B.Sc. from Queen’s University.Smee will present Evolving 5G NR to Connect the Internet of Things on Wednesday, October 23, 2019, at MEMS Sensors Executive Congress, Coronado Island Marriott Resort Spa in Coronado, Calif.Register today to learn how 5G NR will transform the user experience with MEMS- and sensors-enabled devices in IoT, automation and beyond.Interested in engaging with the MEMS and sensors supply chain? MEMS Sensors Industry Group is a SEMI technology community that enables the MEMS and sensors industry to innovate, address common challenges and accelerate business results.Maria Vetrano is a public relations consultant for SEMI.

As a top semiconductor manufacturing hub, Korea is poised to lead the world in fab construction spending in 2019 and 2020, accounting for 27 percent of the total market. Little wonder that Korea’s prowess in the semiconductor industry has meant steady membership growth for SEMI Korea, with HD Cho, president of SEMI Korea, putting the average annual jump at about 7 percent.But HD Cho’s focus as he returned to COEX in Seoul, home to SEMICON Korea, in late August was not on membership growth over the years but the future. Cho hosted about 400 SEMI members gathered at SEMI Korea Members Day for insights into the state of the world economy, semiconductor industry outlooks, and perspectives on how South Korean and European microelectronics companies can form stronger ties. Setting the stage with look at macroeconomics, Byung-yeon Kim, team manager of NH Investment and Securities, predicted that, as the global economy continues to falter, 25 of the 58 major countries this year will cut interest rates in a bid to boost prospects for growth. Historically, the global composite leading indicator (CLI), a bellwether for turning points in the economy, has rebounded after 20 months of decline, he said. While the CLI downtrend is now past the 20-month mark, Kim struck a bullish note, predicting that the global economy will bounce back before long.Soo-kyoum Kim, vice president at IDC, referring to the semiconductor industry’s own soft patch, said that total revenue is expected to drop from $475 billion in 2018 to $440 billion this year but should rebound to a new high of $500 billion in 2023. The memory market will be especially hard-hit, dropping more than 29 percent in 2019 and another 14 percent next year before bottoming and then staging a recovery in the second half of 2020. The strength of the rebound will hinge on server market demand, he added.Next year will also see rebounds in semiconductor equipment and materials revenue, with growth of 12 percent and 3 percent, respectively, said Clark Tseng, director of Industry Research and Statistics at SEMI. The increases will follow a 2019 equipment market drop of 18 percent to $53 billion from the previous year while materials this year is expected to remain flat at $52 billion. The semiconductor industry will expand at a modest 2.4 percent this year, jumping to 7.6 percent in 2020, Tseng reported, citing the average growth rate based on data from Gartner, WSTC, IC Insights, VLSI Research and other industry analyst firms. Despite current weak market demand and the ongoing trade war, the long-term outlook for the semiconductor industry remains upbeat, he added.In Europe, semiconductor industry growth continues on the strength of the region’s high strategic importance in the global electronics supply chain, said Laith Altimime, president of SEMI Europe. Fab construction spending in Europe continued to grow in 2018, reaching $300 million, and is expected to hit $1.2 billion in 2019 and $1.6 billion in 2020, with equipment, parts and components driving the surges.To help build stronger ties between European and Korean chip industries, Altimime introduced the SEMI Korea members to SEMI Europe business platforms including SEMICON Europe, the 3D System Summit, ISS Europe, and the MEMS Imaging Sensor Summit. He also encouraged the formation of more business partnerships between companies in the two regions by familiarizing SEMI Korea members with European players in areas such as foundry, MEMS, sensors and wafer manufacturing.And it will be MEMS and sensors that help drive the 4th Industrial Revolution, said Sung-hyuk Kim, a team leader at LG Electronics' Sensor Solution Research Institute. In his presentation Architecting Sensor Solutions for the Next Revolution, he noted that sensors are finding their way into devices where they have never been used before. In household refrigerators, gas sensors help deodorize the inside while distance sensors detect the approach of people. Air conditioners equipped with a camera sensor can pinpoint the location of humans and steer the airflow in their direction. Of course, all these smarts will come in form of data-devouring artificial intelligence (AI), and that data will be generated in massive amounts by MEMS and sensors – placing them at the epicenter of the 4th Industrial Revolution.Jaegwan Shim is a marketing specialist at SEMI Korea.

SEMI spoke with Dr. Mikko Söderlund, sales director for Beneq’s semiconductor business, about trends in Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) applications. Söderlund shared his views ahead of his presentation at SEMI MEMS Imaging Sensors Summit, 25-27 September, 2019, at the WTC in Grenoble, France. Join us at the event to meet Beneq and other key industry influencers. Registration is open.SEMI: The Backside Illuminated (BSI) CMOS Image Sensors (CIS) market continues to experience steady growth. Which applications are currently driving market growth?Söderlund: BSI CMOS Image Sensor market continues to be driven by mobile, security, automotive and Internet of Things (IoT) applications – so there seems to be plenty of opportunities for BSI CIS market to grow further.SEMI: What is critical for advanced thin-film deposition methods to extract best electrical performance?Söderlund: It is critical to control the material properties of the deposited layer (such as charge density, resistivity or barrier property) and of course, film uniformity and conformality. Furthermore, controlling material interfaces is also important, especially for sensitive III-V materials. {% video_player "embed_player" overrideable=False, type='scriptV4', hide_playlist=True, viral_sharing=False, embed_button=False, width='350', height='197', player_id='12721134435', style='margin: 0px auto; display: block; float: right; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; width: 350px;' %} Coatings and material features based on existing standard techniques can be very expensive, or not feasible at all. What does Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD), as a thin film coating method, offer in particular?Söderlund: ALD offers dense, highly conformal and pinhole-free best-in-class functional layers for dielectrics, passivation, encapsulation and much more. As a gentle and precise layer-by-layer method, ALD is extremely well-suited for deposition of such performance critical layers over large surface areas such as a cassette of wafers.SEMI: Please describe the Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) coating process. Söderlund: ALD is based on a self-limiting surface reaction controlled thin film deposition. During coating, two or more chemical vapors or gaseous precursors react sequentially on the substrate surface, producing a solid thin film (see schematic below). Most ALD coating systems use a flow-through traveling wave setup, where an inert carrier gas flows through the system and precursors are injected as very short pulses into this carrier flow. The carrier gas flow takes the precursor pulses as sequential waves through the reaction chamber, followed by a pumping line, filtering systems and, eventually, a vacuum pump.SEMI: What are the two leading edge ALD applications?Söderlund: Today’s leading-edge ALD applications are in logic (high-k/metal gate, multiple patterning) and memory (DRAM capacitor, 3D NAND). Within the More-than-Moore (MtM) markets, CIS and MEMS (actuators and sensors, RF) have been early adopters of ALD, and we also see ALD being introduced in GaN Power and RF, as well as photonics.SEMI: Give us one prediction about the opportunities offered by advanced imaging applications.Söderlund: The large diversity of imaging applications will continue to drive growth and innovation. For example, machine vision is expected to transform the imaging landscape. We see this as a big opportunity for advanced thin-film deposition methods such as ALD, provided that the tools are versatile enough to address the diverse manufacturing requirements.SEMI: What are your expectations for SEMI MEMS Imaging Sensors Summit and why do you invite your peers to attend? Söderlund: The summit brings together all key RF stakeholders in the MEMS and imaging sensors industry, and we are looking forward to a great event. It’s a special event for us as we are officially launching a new ALD cluster tool product specifically engineered for the MtM applications – so this brings great excitement that we want to share with the attendees.Dr. Mikko Söderlund is Sales Director for Beneq’s semiconductor business. He has more than 20 years of experience in product development, product management, technical sales and business development across the photonics, OLED, and semiconductor industries. Mikko received his Ph.D. in Micro- and Nanotechnology from the Helsinki University of Technology. Serena Brischetto is a marketing and communications manager at SEMI Europe.