Market Review
Reviewing the sensor market
Interview with Dr Josep Montanyà, CEO, Nanusens
What does Nanusens do that is exciting? MEMS (Micro Electro Mechanical Systems) sensors provide the interface between electronic devices and their environment making them aware and smart. One of the first was a sensor to trigger airbags in cars and now most designers are putting them into all sorts of devices to provide a better, smarter user experience. Perhaps the most familiar device is the smartphone with sensors to detect movement, magnetic north etc. And then there are the sensors in medical devices, cars, wearables, etc. As a result, the demand for these sensors is escalating year on year. However, there is a problem. Each sensor design is unique and needs its own bespoke production line, which creates these devices with their microscopic moving parts on a silicon die, so the only way to increase production is to run the line faster or duplicate it. I thought that there had to be a better way to make MEMS sensors so I turned the whole thing on its head. Instead of the way everyone else does it - starting with a MEMS device design and then creating a bespoke production line to make it, Nanusens starts with standard CMOS production methods and then works out how to make MEMS sensors using only these standard techniques.
It sounds simple and logical, so what’s the challenge?
CMOS was never intended to make large solid pieces of metal. These are at the heart of the MEMS sensors and are called the load mass. The movement of this load mass, which is suspended on springs, is what enables the sensors to detect a change in its environment. So, it is critical that they are precisely the right shape that the design requires to function correctly. But, when you build up the load mass using several layers of metal and then etch the supporting dielectric away to release it, the stresses in the structure makes it distort.
How do you solve that? That is what we have been researching and perfecting for a number of years. By understanding in depth what the stresses are, we have been able to design structures that are stable when released. Therein lies our IP and a growing
18 December/January 2020
portfolio of patents that we are filing for these successful structures and variants to ensure that we are the only people that can build MEMS within the CMOS layers. Actually, this MEMS-within-CMOS is really NEMS-within-CMOS as the structures we make are on the nanoscale (Nano Electro Mechanical Systems).
Are these NEMS better than MEMS sensors? We match on performance but it is on size that we offer a major improvement. We make a packaged sensor solution that is a quarter of the size of the packaged sensor that it replaces. MEMS sensors are a two-chip solution: one chip with the MEMS structure and the second with the control electronics together resulting in a package of 4mm3. Because we make our sensor structures using CMOS, they are made on the same chip as the control electronics giving a compact, single-chip solution of only 1mm3. As we can make several different sensors types on the same chip, the space savings then
Components in Electronics
become even greater. For example, a packaged MEMS sensor is 4mm3 so three take up 12mm3. Our multi-sensor equivalent package is only 2mm3 giving a huge space saving of 10mm3.
Where is saving space like that important?
In portable devices, such as smartwatches, smartphones and Bluetooth earbuds, designers want to pack as many features as they can into a small form factor. Adding more sensors without a space penalty therefore appeals as does replacing existing sensors with smaller ones as this frees up space for larger batteries to give a longer operational life. Nowhere is this more important than in the exploding market of earbuds where designers want more sensors and bigger batteries whilst shrinking the form factor. We offer the perfect solutions to these design challenges and are already engaging with the leading players in the supply chain and explaining the unique features of our nanosensors.
Will you be able to cope with the demand if you are designed into many products?
Unlike MEMS that need bespoke production lines, we use standard CMOS production lines. We are working with SMIC and TSMC with almost unlimited production capabilities that we can use to meet the demand for our products. This virtually limitless production capability means that we can unlock the current production bottleneck that is preventing the Internet of Things (IoT) from taking off the way it has been predicted to. The key to IoT is having sensors that are small, inexpensive and available in huge volumes. We tick all three boxes so this is our second target market and predict that we will enable IoT to rapidly grow from the billions of units per year of today to trillions of units.
How would you sum up your company’s mission? To be nanosensors at the heart of a whole next generation of smart products.
nanusens.com
www.cieonline.co.uk
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