Archives for January 2022

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JW Insights reports that Rongxin Semiconductor acquired through an auction the bankrupt HiDM (Huaian Imaging Device manufacturing Corporation) in Huaian, Jiangsu province. Rongxin Semiconductor was founded in April 2021 in Ningbo, Jiangsu province. Rongxin paid RMB1.666 billion ($262.1 million) for HiDM assets.

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Stanley Chan from Purdue University publishes slides for his 2022 Electronic Imaging short course "Signal Processing for Photon-Limited Imaging." Few slides out of 81:

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Actlight CEO Serguei Okhonin presented at Photonics Spectra Conference held on-line last week "Dynamic Photodiodes: Unique Light-Sensing Technology with Tunable Sensitivity." The conference registration registration is free of charge. Few slides from the presentation:

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Harvard University, KIST, Pusan University, and Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology publish a pre-print paper "In-sensor optoelectronic computing using electrostatically doped silicon" by Houk Jang, Henry Hinton, Woo-Bin Jung, Min-Hyun Lee, Changhyun Kim, Min Park, Seoung-Ki Lee, Seongjun Park, and Donhee Ham.

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Eric Fossum presented a keynote at Phototics Spectra Conference last week (free registration) "Quanta Image Sensors: Every Photon Counts, Even in a Smartphone." Few slides:

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TrendForce analysis shows that 4 camera modules in smartphones become less popular:

"The trend towards multiple cameras started to shift in 2H21 after a few years of positive growth. The previous spike in the penetration rate of four camera modules was primarily incited by mid-range smart phone models in 2H20 when mobile phone brands sought to market their products through promoting more and more cameras. However, as consumers realized that the macro and depth camera usually featured on the third and fourth cameras were used less frequently and improvements in overall photo quality limited, the demand for four camera modules gradually subsided and mobile phone brands returned to fulfilling the actual needs of consumers.

Overall, TrendForce believes that the number of camera modules mounted on smartphones will no longer be the main focus of mobile phone brands, as focus will return to the real needs of consumers. Therefore, triple camera modules will remain the mainstream design for the next 2~3 years.

Although camera shipment growth has slowed, camera resolution continues to improve. Taking primary cameras as an example, the current mainstream design is 13-48 million pixels, accounting for more than 50% of cameras in 2021. In second place are products featuring 49-64 million pixels which accounted for more than 20% of cameras last year with penetration rate expected to increase to 23% in 2022. The third highest portion is 12 million pixel products, currently dominated by the iPhone and Samsung's flagship series."

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De Gruyter Nanophotonics publishes a paper "Compact meta-spectral image sensor for mobile applications" by Jaesoong Lee, Yeonsang Park, Hyochul Kim, Young-Zoon Yoon, Woong Ko, Kideock Bae, Jeong-Yub Lee, Hyuck Choo, and Young-Geun Roh from Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology and Chungnam National University.

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 Terabee publishes "An introduction to Time-of-Flight sensing" webinar:

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Emberion, a developer of SWIR image sensors using nanomaterials, has raised €6M in funding from Nidoco AB, Tesi (Finnish Industry Investment Ltd) and Verso Capital.

“We are disrupting multiple imaging markets by extending the wavelength range at a significantly more affordable cost. Our revolutionary sensor is designed to meet the needs of even the most challenging machine vision applications, such as plastic sorting. We look forward to helping customers access new information at infrared wavelengths, thereby critically enhancing their applications beyond today’s capabilities,” said Jyrki Rosenberg, CEO, Emberion.

”We have created a new generation of image sensors using nanomaterials. Our high-performance industrial cameras can increase efficiency and reduce the loss of resources in many industrial processes. We innovate at all levels of camera design: nanomaterials, integrated circuit design, electronics, photonics and software. We are now stepping forward to expand our capacity to manufacture,” commented Tapani Ryhänen, CTO.

“We are appreciative of the high interest and trust towards our technology from investors and customers. With this funding, our next step is to increase our production capacity to be able to serve our customers’ needs. We will also intensify our efforts to further develop mid-wave infrared (MWIR) and broadband solutions to expand our offerings and to enhance the capabilities of our current VIS-SWIR product line,” added Rosenberg.

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Photonics Spectra conference held on-line this week (with free registration) features IDTechEx analyst Matthew Dyson presentation "Emerging Short-Wavelength Infrared Sensors." Few slides from the presentation:

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Phys.org: Nature publishes Eindhoven University's of Technology paper "Integrated near-infrared spectral sensing" by Kaylee D. Hakkel, Maurangelo Petruzzella, Fang Ou, Anne van Klinken, Francesco Pagliano, Tianran Liu, Rene P. J. van Veldhoven & Andrea Fiore.

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Infiray presents its "new breakthrough on Automotive Night Vision:"

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It appears that integration of vision processor with image sensor is becoming a trend. First, Himax and Sony did it, now - Pixart.

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EPFL, Globalfoundries, and KIST publish an Arxiv.org paper "On Analog Silicon Photomultipliers in Standard 55-nm BCD Technology for LiDAR Applications" by Jiuxuan Zhao, Tommaso Milanese, Francesco Gramuglia, Pouyan Keshavarzian, Shyue Seng Tan, Michelle Tng, Louis Lim, Vinit Dhulla, Elgin Quek, Myung-Jae Lee, and Edoardo Charbon.

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Sony publishes an extended "Airpeak S1 developer interview: 2nd Sensing Edition." Few quotes:

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ST presents its 4.6um iToF sensor at ESSCIRC 2021 that appears to be quite close to production, judging by the large team size: "4.6μm Low Power Indirect Time-of-Flight Pixel Achieving 88.5% Demodulation Contrast at 200MHz for 0.54MPix Depth Camera" by Cédric Tubert, Pascal Mellot, Yann Desprez, Celine Mas, Arnaud Authié, Laurent Simony, Grégory Bochet, Stephane Drouard, Jeremie Teyssier, Damien Miclo, Jean-Raphael Bezal, Thibault Augey, Franck Hingant, Thomas Bouchet, Blandine Roig, Aurélien Mazard, Raoul Vergara, Gabriel Mugny, Arnaud Tournier, Frédéric Lalanne, François Roy, Boris Rodrigues Goncalves, Matteo Vignetti, Pascal Fonteneau, Vincent Farys, François Agut, Joao Migue Melo Santos, David Hadden, Kevin Channon, Christopher Townsend, Bruce Rae, and Sara Pellegrini.

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ISSCIRC 2021 paper and presentation "Advancements in Indirect Time of Flight Image Sensors in Front Side Illuminated CMOS" by M. Dielacher, M. Flatscher, R. Gabl, R. Gaggl, D. Offenberg, and J. Prima is available on-line. Few interesting slides:

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Hong Kong Polytechnic University publishes a video explaining its Optoelectronic Resistive Memory-based vision sensor with image recognition capabilities:

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PRNewswire: Lidar-on-a-chip startup Voyant Photonics raises $15.4M in Series A. Voyant's LiDAR system, containing thousands of optical components fabricated on a single semiconductor chip, enables its customers to integrate an effective and exponentially more scalable LiDAR system than possible to date.
PRNewswire:  The new Innoviz360 HD LiDAR is claimed to be a breakthrough that leapfrogs traditional, standard-resolution spinner solutions that are performance limited, expensive, big and unreliable. Unlike traditional spinner solutions that are performance limited with only up to 128 scanning lines, the new, lightweight, Innoviz360 LiDAR allows multiple scanning software configurations with up to 1280 scanning lines (10x) at a cost-effective and durable solution than traditional 360 LiDARs.

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Science publishes a paper "Visible and infrared dual-band imaging via Ge/MoS2 van der Waals heterostructure" by Aujin Hwang, Minseong Park, Youngseo Park, Yeongseok Shim, Sukhyeong Youn, Chan-Ho Lee, Han Beom Jeong, Hu Young Jeong, Jiwon Chang, Kyusang Lee, Geonwook Yoo, Junseok Heo from Ajou University, Yonsei University, Soongsil University, KAIST, UNIST (Korea), and University of Virginia (USA).

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Hong Kong University publishes its video poster on modeling of Current-Assisted Photonic Demodulator (CAPD) for iToF sensors:

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Hong Kong University publishes its video poster on modeling of Current-Assisted Photonic Demodulator (CAPD) for iToF sensors:

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Sohu: Suzhou Keyang Semiconductor Co., Ltd. (Keyang Semiconductor) receives a strategic investment of more than 100M yuan. After the completion of this round of investment, Keyang Semiconductor will accelerate the upgrade of the CIS production line.

Li Yongzhi, Director and CEO of Keyun Semiconductor, says: "In the face of new opportunities, Keyang Semiconductor will continue to dig deeper in the field of advanced semiconductor packaging, and is committed to becoming the world's leading through-silicon via (TSV) and wafer-level packaging (WLP) solution provider!"

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GlobeNewswire: Ambarella announces an Artificial Intelligence Image Signal Processor (AISP). The new AISP will become available across Ambarella’s entire CVflow SoC portfolio at resolutions up to 4K. The applications of this technology encompass all of the company’s target markets, where low-light and HDR processing are critical. This includes security and automotive cameras, where full-color night vision is a key operating point, and where better low-light and HDR enable reductions in external illumination, the use of lower cost sensors, and cleaner video for both human viewing and analytics processing.

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Dartmouth publishes "Q&A with engineering professor and Technology and Engineering Emmy winner Eric Fossum." Few quotes:

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BusinessWire: Omnivision announces the latest addition to its Nyxel NIR family―the OX05B1S is the automotive industry’s first 5MP RGB-IR BSI global shutter sensor for in-cabin monitoring systems (IMS) with a pixel size of just 2.2µm with improves 940nm NIR sensitivity. Additionally, it is the first RGB-IR sensor for in-cabin monitoring to feature integrated cybersecurity.

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BusinessWire: Omnivision launches the OX03D, a 3MP SoC for automotive surround-view systems (SVS), rearview systems (RVS) and e-mirrors. The new SoC provides a path for automotive OEMs to upgrade from 1MP to 3MP while retaining a 1/4-inch optical format. The OX03D4C has a fully integrated ISP, is capable of 140dB HDR and includes the tone-mapping algorithm along with the LED flicker mitigation (LFM).

It features 105dB motion-free HDR with a total range of 140dB, and provides HDR and LFM simultaneously. The OX03D supports a number of CFA patterns, and can output both YUV and RAW process streams at the same time. The OX03D4C provides four on-screen display overlay layers for driver guidelines, as well as distortion correction to straighten any curved edges from lenses with a wide viewing angle. The OX03D4C consumes less than 500 mW power, enabling the use of a plastic case for lighter weight and lower cost.

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