Focus on the Sensor Technology Market

At the recent IMAPS Device Packaging Conference, March 5-7, 2019 in Fountain Hills AZ, Benedetto Vigna, president of the ST Micro Analog, MEMS and Sensors Group, discussed the company’s presence in the sensor technology market.

The vast assortment of sensor and actuator functions have recently been defined by Yole Developpement as shown in Figure 1.

The variety of sensor technology and actuators on the market is vast. — Figure 1: The variety of sensors and actuators on the market is vast. (Courtesy of Yole Developpement)

2018 IHS market data shows >50% of the sensors market remains in the personal electronics market segment and that optical sensors control a majority of market share.

Sensor technology revenue forecasts broken down by application category and sensor type. — Figure 2: Sensor technology market revenue forecasts broken down by application category and sensor type. (Courtesy of IHS Markit)

While the widespread use of automotive airbag sensors started in 1989, the broad use of sensor technology has really been an event of the 2000s with the adoption of the CMOS Image Sensor ( CIS ) and the silicon microphone.

In Figure 3, Vigna lists the emerging industrial applications driven by sensors.

Figure 3: Industrial applications for sensor technology. (Courtesy of ST Micro)

The use of sensor technology will be prevalent during the complete cycle of shipment, installation, and operation as shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4: An industrial use-case for sensor technology. (Courtesy of ST Micro)

Of course, we all are aware of the pervasiveness of sensors in the recent plethora of smart driving applications (Figure 5).

This diagram demonstrates the pervasiveness of sensor technology in automotive applications. (Courtesy of ST Micro). — Figure 5: This diagram demonstrates the pervasiveness of sensor technology needed for autonomous vehicles. (Courtesy of ST Micro).

And health monitoring will become a sensor-driven business (Figure 6).

medical sensor technology — Figure 6: an example of a medical sensor patch that gathers vital sign data. (Courtesy of ST Micro)

Sensor Packaging

I think we would all agree that the sensor business will be a high growth business in the future and thus we should stay aware of sensor packaging trends in the future. Certainly, IFTLE has been following image sensor packaging technology since it became the early adopter of 3D IC technology in 2008.

It is also clear that many of today’s advanced sensors, taking the lead from the CIS segment, are being manufactured using wafer level packaging technology as shown in Figure 7. IFTLE certainly thinks that advanced sensor technologies will be a major growth area and advanced packaging will be one of the technologies enabling its adoption into the applications of the future.