Archives for November 2017

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Photoneo white paper "Parameters​ ​of​ ​3D​ ​sensing​ ​techniques​ ​in​ ​a​ ​nutshell" compares various 3D camera approaches:

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Somy publishes a Youtube video on its 5MP IMX335 for security cameras:



...and global shutter sensors for MV applications:



...and ITS applications:



Sony also publishes its vision for future GS sensors:

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PRNewswire: EV Group (EVG) and CEA-Leti present the world's first successful 300-mm wafer-to-wafer direct hybrid bonding with pitch dimension connections as small as 1µm. This breakthrough also achieved copper pads as small as 500nm using EVG's fully automated GEMINI FB XT fusion wafer bonding system. The system achieved overlay alignment accuracy to within 195nm (3-sigma) overall, with mean alignment results well centered below 15nm. Post-bake acoustic microscopy scans of the full 300-mm bonded wafer stack as well as specific dies confirmed a defect-free bonding interface for pitches ranging from 1µm to 4µm with optimum copper density.

"To our knowledge, this is the first reported demonstration of sub-1.5µm pitch copper hybrid bonding feasibility," said Frank Fournel, head of bonding process engineering at Leti. "This latest demonstration represents a real breakthrough and important step forward in enabling the achievement and eventual commercialization of high-density 3D chip stacking."

GEMINI FB XT fusion bonding system from EV Group with SmartView NT aligner (sub-200nm, 3-sigma accuracy).

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EETimes publishes its "Silicon 60: 60 Emerging Companies to Watch" with just two image sensor related companies:

Chronocam AS (Paris, France) is a startup company founded in 2014 that develops machine vision sensors and systems based on asynchronous pixel sensor technology. The novel architecture creates an image sensor that is close to a biological model and a method of reporting image changes reduces off-chip bandwidth requirements and system power consumption. Chronocam has received seed investment from Robert Bosch Venture Capital and CEA Investissement.

Unispectral Ltd. (Ramat Gan, Israel) is developing a hyperspectral image sensor that can not only be used for spectrometric analysis of materials such as food stuffs but can also capture images in low-light. The sensor is applicable to a wide range of applications such as wearables, digital health, medical imaging, Internet of Things, industrial and agricultural applications. The company is reported to already be in negotiations with smartphone manufacturers for the inclusion of its sensor on next-generation phones. The company was founded in 2016.

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Kieler Nachtrichten reports that Raytrix receives a $18M-large "five-year order from the world's largest processor manufacturer, whose name may not be named for contractual reasons." For the company that has annual sales of 2.5M euros in 2017, this is quite big leap forward.




Thanks to JB for the pointer!

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Sensors Magazine publishes ST article "Three Sensor Types Drive Autonomous Vehicles" by Gert Rudolph and Uwe Voelzke:

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We used to think about electronics as being much faster than mechanics, but some of the world's fastest cameras are still relying on rotating mirrors or galvos, as shown in this Youtube video:

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Omnivision patent application US20170310890 "Ultra-Small Camera Module With Wide Field Of View, And Associate Lens Systems And Methods" by Tsung Wei Wan, Ting-yu Cheng, Wei-ping Chen, and Chuen-yi Yin, sheds some light on wafer level optics design of a miniature endoscopic camera, possibly the single-chip camera and optics version of this one:

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BusinessWire: IHS Market tears down iPhone X and analyses the cost of its components. The company says about the Face ID depth camera:

TrueDepth sensing: lots of components, many suppliers

“Apple’s Face ID system is very similar in basic functionality to the old Microsoft Kinect system of sensing, which used a flood illuminator, dot projector and infrared camera,” said Jérémie Bouchaud, senior director for MEMS and sensors at IHS Markit. “It’s a complex assembly that uses components from many suppliers.”

The teardown of the iPhone X revealed that its IR camera is supplied by Sony/Foxconn while the silicon is provided by ST Microelectronics. The flood illuminator is an IR emitter from Texas Instruments that’s assembled on top of an application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) and single-photon avalanche diode (SPAD) detector from ST Microelectronics. Finisar and Philips manufacture the dot projector. IHS Markit puts the rollup BOM cost for the TrueDepth sensor cluster at $16.70.

“The assembly and testing of the TrueDepth system and its individual components is challenging and likely a factor in the production delays,” Bouchaud said. “For instance, the assemblage and test of the Texas Instruments and ST Microelectronics subsystem for the flood illuminator is far from trivial and requires a high number of test equipment pieces.”

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SonyAlphaRumors notices Sony page presenting its medium format sensor announcements:


Sony also unveils a IMX533 square image sensor for 360-deg view cameras:

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In the days since iPhone X release, many people are exploring the limits of its Face ID recognition accuracy. It looks like Apple is well prepared to the obvious ways to attack the Face ID:

Wall Street Journal:



TechnoBuffalo:



iJustine:



However, in some cases, the Face ID can be successfully fooled, such as here, here, and here.

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SEMI and Yole Développement publish a joint presentation "Smart Automotive – Latest Trends in LiDAR and Sensors." Few slides on the market trends and forecasts:

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BusinessWire: Samsung 0.9um ISOCELL pixel with Tetracell and remosaic technology has been recognized as CES 2018 Innovation Awards Honoree:

"Samsung ISOCELL Slim 2X7 is a 24 megapixel image sensor with 0.9μm pixels, the smallest pixel in the industry, plus Tetracell and remosaic technology to simulate bigger pixel performance. The small 0.9μm pixel size enables a 24Mp image sensor to be fitted in a thinner camera module, allowing premium smartphones to offer high resolution cameras in a very slim and elegant design."

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Techcrunch receives what it believes is Apple's confirmation of acquisition of Invisage:

An Apple spokesperson has confirmed the acquisition to us with its customary statement:“Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans.”

Techcrunch also found other evidences of the acquisition:

• There are a handful of InVisage employees that are already noting on LinkedIn that they work for Apple. We were able to determine that several more who have not updated their LinkedIn profiles are also working there. Meanwhile, InVisage erased the section of its web site that detailed some of its senior staff (but you can still find those pages through web archiving services).
• InVisage itself went radio silent on social media and other communications channels in November of last year - this one is incorrect as Invisage has presented its progress at IISW 2017 in June.
• The legal firm representing InVisage changed in September. It’s now using the same firm that Apple uses for all its patent work.
• Several people we contacted connected to the company told us they were not at liberty to discuss the acquisition, but in doing so also inadvertently confirmed that it took place.
• More public evidence of a sale (but not to whom) is that multiple InVisage VC backers now list the company as exited on their web sites.

Few figures from Invisage paper presented at IISW 2017 in Hiroshima, Japan in June 2017:

R53: A QuantumFilm Based QuadVGA 1.5µm Pixel Image Sensor with Over 40% QE at 940 nm for Actively Illuminated Applications.
Lionel Barrow, Nikolai Bock, Aurelien Bouvier, Dario Clocchiatti, Jian Feng, Naveen Kolli, Andras Pattantyus, Vitanshu Sharma, Tzi-Hsiung Shu, Emanuele Mandelli. InVisage Technologies, USA


Thanks to JH and AD for the pointer!

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TechInsights updates its Apple iPhone X teardown report to include Face ID cameras. The IR camera responsible for taking structured light image of the face is confirmed to be made by ST:


The ToF proximity sensor comes from ST too, naturally:


Thanks to GM for the pointer!

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Velodyne publishes Frost and Sullivan white paper "LiDAR: Driving the Future of Autonomous Navigation" comparing automotive vision technologies:

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BusinessWire, PRNewswire: SMIC and Invensas, a subsidiary of Xperi, announce the establishment of Invensas’ Direct Bond Interconnect (DBI) at SMIC’s Avezzano facility (former LFoundry).

“Invensas’ DBI technology enables SMIC to manufacture the high performance image sensors required in mobile, automotive, and consumer electronics applications,” said Sunny Hui, SVP of marketing at SMIC. “With this technology in place, SMIC is prepared to further expand this capability into volume manufacturing around the globe, both at 200mm and 300mm.”

“SMIC’s talented manufacturing team has done an excellent job integrating our DBI process into their high-volume manufacturing environment,” said Craig Mitchell, president of Invensas. “We are thrilled to announce that SMIC is ready to engage commercial customers and support the demand for high volume production of BSI image sensors with DBI.”

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Few more updates on Corephotonics vs Apple lawsuit:

Corephotonics technology has been licensed and is used by Samsung and Oppo, so far.

The full text of the legal document that was filed in the court on November 6, 2017 is available here. There are few interesting quotes about the dual camera underlying technology:

"In Corephotonics’ dual-aperture camera, the second camera with telephoto lens provides much higher optical resolution than the wide angle camera. Images from both of these cameras can be fused together using computational algorithms to create a continuous zoom that is a combination of digital and optical zoom.

16. For video, which captures thirty or more frames per second, Corephotonics discovered that implementing image fusion for each frame demands higher than normal processing resources and battery drain. At the same time, the beneficial pixel finesse achieved by image fusion is less observable at the rapid frame rate of HD video due to human perception limits. In the Corephotonics dual-aperture camera, therefore, image fusion is only used when taking still pictures, but not for video. In video, when zooming in, digital zoom is used first on the image from the wide angle camera only and then switched to the image from the telephoto camera only. When zooming back out, a similar transition happens from using the telephoto camera only, switching back to the wide angle camera only. This approach minimizes resources and power. Because the two lenses are different and necessarily view the subject from different points of view, Corephotonics developed special techniques to ensure that the transition from the wide lens to the telephoto lens and back would be smooth. Corephotonics filed for and received patents on its dual-aperture camera and the related computational optics, including the ’291 and ’152 patents.

18. As one of its first acts as a company, Corephotonics reached out to Apple in the hopes of establishing a strategic partnership. Corephotonics received many encouraging reports and positive feedback from Apple about its technology, but the parties never concluded a license to the Corephotonics technology. In fact, after one failed effort to negotiate a license, Apple’s lead negotiator expressed contempt for Corephotonics’ patents, telling Dr. Mendlovic and others that even if Apple infringed, it would take years and millions of dollars in litigation before Apple might have to pay something.

19. In January 2016, Corephotonics learned that among the new iPhones Apple would introduce later that year was an iPhone 7 Plus with a dual-aperture camera—precisely the technology Corephotonics claimed in its patents."

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SeekingAlpha: TowerJazz Q3 2017 earnings call updates on the new technology developments in the company: 2.5um global shutter pixel, 100dB shutter efficiency, BSI and stacked sensors with stitching, engagement with a leading DSLR maker, and more.

"In the CMOS image sensor market we are investing today in technology for three main directions; next-generation global shutter technology for the industrial sensor market; Backside Illumination and stack wafers for the high-end photography market; and special pixel technology for the automotive market.

In the industrial sensor market we are working with several leading customers on the development of the 2.5 micron state-of-the-art global shutter pixel on the 65 nanometer 300 millimeter wafer size platform.

As you may recall, we previously announced the availability of our 2.8 micron global shutter pixel and 110 nanometer platforms, the smallest global shutter pixel in the world. This is still the case and our 2.5 micron pixel on the 65 nanometer 300 millimeter platform will continue our leadership in this area, providing an even smaller pixel and being then again lowest pixel size in the world and thus allowing higher sensor resolution for any given sensor size. The first tape out in this new platform is expected to happen by the end of this year.

One of the most important parameters or figures of merit of global shutter pixels is the shutter efficiency. Our shutter efficiency gets to 100 DB, which is several orders of magnitude higher than the competing 3 micron pixel in the market. This combined with our stitching technology allows us to take a large portion of the high industrial market, as well as even use this technology for high end photography, especially for video applications.

We believe that our current generation of global shutter technology on both 180 nanometer and 110 nanometer will continually grow, but will gradually be augmented and eventually replaced by this next-generation 300 millimeter technology enabling us to maintain our market edge for many years to come.

In the digital SLR market we engage with one of the leaders in the world in the development of their next-generation sensors. And in parallel on track with our 300 millimeter Backside Illumination stack wafer technology development with outstanding pixel performance.

Our first silicon runs of full stack wafer flow for the circuits on the bottom, CMOS wafer and the pixels are on the top CIS wafer show improvements of more than 2x and quantum efficiency with only slight increase of dark current in the 2.4 micron pixels.

We expect to bring the dark current to the same outstanding level we already show in front side illumination about 10 electrons per second at 60 degree Celsius in the next silicon run. This technology will be ready for customer tape out in Q1 next year so customer designs are going to start very soon on this platform.

Lastly in the automotive area, we have developed both SPAD Single Photon Avalanche Diodes state-of-the-art technology, as well as ultrafast global shutter pixels for automotive solid-state light hour based on time-of-flight principal.

Our SPAD show very large dark -- very low dark signals at the same level as discrete SPAD devices, but with the advantage of full integration with CMOS circuits, allowing low-cost, low power consumption and system on chip capabilities.

We have engaged with several companies among them one of the most promising in this area in the development of automotive light hour and expect to be a major player in this market in the future.

In autonomous vehicle we will require multiple sensors or if you will sensor fusion, combining the capabilities of radar light hour and standard albeit advanced CMOS image sensors to accurately identify and enable real-time classification of all images within the field of view of interest. Our expertise in these three areas puts us in the strong position to take advantage of this anticipated high growth market.

In addition, we recently announced a partnership with Yuanchen Microelectronics, a manufacturer for advanced CMOS image sensor backside elimination process for manufacturing in Changchun, China.

This partnership allows us to provide our customers with advanced BSI technology in mass production for high end CMOS image sensors starting in mid-2018. This is the first time BSI will be offered by a foundry to the high end photography market, including large formats requiring stitching.

The new BSI technology will be utilized for high end photography automotive, augmented and virtual reality sensors, as well as other growing CIS markets. We are excited with the potential from this partnership, which further enhances our leading CIS offerings."

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MacRumors: Corephotonics has filed a lawsuit against Apple alleging that the iPhone 7 Plus and iPhone 8 Plus infringe upon four of its patents: US 9,402,032, US 9,568,712, US 9,185,291, and US 9,538,152.

The two iPhones are accused in using patented telephoto lens design, optical zoom method, and a method for fusing images from the wide-angle and telephoto lenses. From the lawsuit:

"As one of its first acts as a company, Corephotonics reached out to Apple in the hopes of establishing a strategic partnership. Corephotonics received many encouraging reports and positive feedback from Apple about its technology, but the parties never concluded a license to the Corephotonics technology.

In fact, after one failed effort to negotiate a license, Apple's lead negotiator expressed contempt for Corephotonics’ patents, telling Dr. Mendlovic and others that even if Apple infringed, it would take years and millions of dollars in litigation before Apple might have to pay something."

Meanwhile, Corephotonics site publishes a comparison of its newer folded optical zoom camera images with ones of iPhone 7+ and other popular smartphones:

Corephotonics Hummingbird reference design

Corephotonics Hawkeye folded optics zoom reference design

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Image Sensors Europe to be held on March 14-15, 2018 in London, UK unveiled its preliminary agenda with many interesting presentations:

• Understanding the future of the image sensors market
  Ronald Mueller, Associate Consultant and CEO, Vision Markets of Smithers Apex
• Intel RealSense camera technology
  Roi Zeiss, Intel RealSense Group Marketing Leader, Intel (Invited - TBC)
• 3D machine vision platform and trend
  Luke Liu, President & CEO of LIPS Corporation
• 3D ToF SPAD imaging – performance and system designs; a look under the hood
  Carl Jackson, CTO and Founder and Wade Appelman, VP of Sales and Marketing, SensL Technologies
• 3D sensing modules for applications in consumer devices
  Mathias Schulz, Design Engineering Manager of Jabil Optics Germany
• Achieving mass commercialisation: what will it take for autonomous driving to go mainstream?
  Oren Rosenzweig, Chief Business Officer & Co-Founder of Innoviz Technologies
• Designing ultra-high resolution/high-speed image sensors for 8K slow-motion system
  Toshio Yasue, Research Engineer of NHK (Japan Broadcasting Corporation)
• Space imaging
  Dirk Viehmann, Airbus Defence and Space of Detector Engineering & System Engineering
• Time-of-flight (TOF) range image sensors for VR/AR applications
  Shoji Kawahito, Professor, Research Institute of Electronics, Shizuoka University and CTO of Brookman Technology
• Global shuttering for industrial application
  Xinyang Wang, Founder and CEO of GPixel
• Why hybrid imagers have a hard time beating monolithic CMOS image sensors
  Albert Theuwissen, Founder of Harvest Imaging
• Multispectral time delay integration line scan imagers using CCD-in-CMOS technology
  Piet De Moor, Senior Business Development Manager Imagers of IMEC
• Single photons: imaging beyond imagination
  Matteo Perenzoni, Head of IRIS Research Unit of Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK)
• Accelerated image sensor production using machine learning and data analytics
  Daniel Van Blerkom, CTO & Co-Founder of Forza Silicon
• Efficient vision systems thanks to event-based sensors
  Raphael Berner, Co-Founder and Head of Chip Design of Insightness
• Polarization imaging
  Harald Neubauer, Head of Department Integrated Sensorsystems of Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits

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BusinessWire: ON Semi introduces a 1/4-inch, 1MP (1280H x 800V) CMOS sensor featuring innovative global shutter pixel with high shutter efficiency and SNR and minimal ghosting and noise effects. The 3.0 μm pixel AR0144 is available in monochrome and color. Bar code scanners, drones and 3D camera for AR/VR and named among the possible applications for the new sensor.

Gianluca Colli, VP and GM of Consumer Imaging Solutions at ON Semiconductor, says: "The need for vision-based sensing and control is increasing with many new and diverse applications emerging and rapid growth in areas such as surveillance. The novel global shutter and class-leading performance of the AR0144 achieved in a very small package represent an enabling technology that will help designers bring compelling new products to market that are able to work in the most challenging operating environments.”

Mordor Intelligence forecasts that the global image sensors market will increase to $12.67 billion by 2018 with a CAGR of 7.69% over the period 2014-2020. The AR0144 is available now in 5.6 mm x 5.6 mm 69-ball CSP packaging and also as a bare die. The AR0144 monochrome device is in production now, with the color version available later this year.

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TechInsights compares Huawei Mate 10, Apple iPhone 8 and Samsung Galaxy S8 smartphones costs. It appears that Huawei invests most in cameras - 12% of the total cost, while iPhone 8 is 7% and Galaxy S8 is 8%:

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SeekingAlpha publishes ON Semi Q3 2017 earnings call transcript. Few quotes:

"As we announced last quarter, we have monetized our mobile CMOS image sensor IP, and another announcement related to divestiture of another business should come out shortly.

Third quarter communications revenue was negatively impacted by our exit from the mobile image sensor market in the second quarter of 2017.

We are seeing strong growth for our PYTHON line of image sensors for machine vision applications."

Then, in the Q&A session:

Vivek Arya - Bank of America Merrill Lynch:

...in terms of the competitive landscape, we have heard more noise coming out of Sony in terms of their intention to compete in the automotive image sensor market. I understand these relationships with customers tend to be long-term, so there's probably no change in the near-term. But just longer term, how do you see your technology position in the automotive image sensor market versus Sony or any other competitor?

Keith D. Jackson - CEO, ON Semi:

Yes. We continue to drive technologies specific to automotive that we think are a competitive advantage across the board. We also have many years of experience in automotive reliability and quality, along with cyber security and functional security. So, we think we've got a lead there that we can maintain with continued investments specific to the automotive industry.

Vivek Arya - Bank of America Merrill Lynch:

And the same question from a cost perspective, how do you think your cost basis compares with some of your competitors who might have higher volumes just because they are engaged in the smartphone industry?

Keith D. Jackson - CEO, ON Semi:

Yes. We believe we continue to be cost-competitive there, having driven like we do in all of our product lines, very good supply chains, and very good manufacturing efficiencies.

Shawn M. Harrison - Longbow Research LLC:

How much of just walking away from mobile image sensor business did that cost you into the September quarter?

Keith D. Jackson - CEO, ON Semi:

...the direct revenue quarter-on-quarter between two and three was a $12 million reduction that we saw in that. From a year earlier, it was much higher but quarter-on-quarter about $12 million.

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MediSens conference to be held on February 26-27, 2018 in London, UK, publishes its agenda. While most of the presentations are coming from clinicians and radiologists, some talk about image sensor technology:

- CMOS-based mammography detector by Inge Peters, Dalsa
- Be inspired by optical technologies for new X-ray imaging modalities by Peter Seitz, Hamamatsu:

• Time-of-flight X-ray imaging enabled by carbon-nanotube based cold-cathode X-ray sources
• Direct X-ray photon detection with high energy resolution through semiconductors and perovskites
• Dark-field X-ray imaging based on phase contrast techniques
• X-ray spectroscopy for element-sensitive X-ray radiography and CT imaging
• Triboluminescence for X-ray photon generation

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Dongbu CIS wafer foundry changes its name to DB Hitek:

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Yole Developpement report "Camera Module Industry Market and Technology Trends 2017" has quite a lot of observations and forecasts:

Mobile rear photography camera is still the main driver of the camera module industry that reached $23.4 Billion in 2016 and that will reach $46.8 Billion by 2022.

• VCM players producing the autofocus (AF) and optical image stabilization (OIS) mechanisms have had to adapt to the huge production volume and low cost requested by the smartphone industry. This led to a huge restructuring effort that resulted in a move from Japan and Korea to China and Vietnam. Companies like New Shiko and TDK were the big winners, but this activity’s attractiveness has since declined.
• For image-sensor makers and lens-set makers, the situation is reversed. In these sub-markets, leaders Sony and Largan have enjoyed quasi-monopolies. This situation is ending though, since the competition is now catching up in terms of technology.
• Camera module makers have thrived, but are hugely dependent on customer loyalty. For example, LG Innotek reclaimed its crown this year, but feared a collapse when it lost Apple orders.
• One last trend in the ecosystem is illumination modules’ emergence. Since some of the new camera modules now require active illumination, they must be combined with an LED or structured light emitter. This is a new technology set for acquisition by camera module makers.

The average cost for a mobile camera module has remained relatively constant, but complexity has risen dramatically, with high-end VCMs and active alignment now mandatory on the latest modules. Currently, total camera module value per phone is almost proportional to the number of cameras; two cameras is $16, three cameras is around $24, and the cost for four cameras exceeds $30 per handset.

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