Although wide-bandgap semiconductor materials such as silicon carbide (SiC) and gallium nitride (GaN) are facing patents, and cost issues have slowed down the pace of expansion, Shiyi has shifted time, and emerging markets have accelerated their application. New kinetic energy. According to Fuji Keizai, the Japanese market regulator, recently, automotive electronics has become the main driving force for boosting power control chip demand. It is expected that the global power control chip market will expand to 280.7 billion yuan in 2030. In 2017, GaN and SiC were unstoppable. In 2030, the SiC power control chip market will increase to 13.6 billion yuan, which will reach 8.3 times in 2017. GaN is estimated to be 7.8 billion yuan, which will reach 72.2 in 2017. Times.
Japanese companies have significantly expanded their production. Looking at this market trend, Japanese companies that have taken the lead in semiconductor materials have expanded their production.
According to reports, due to the expansion of the electric vehicle (EV) market, Japanese companies such as Toshiba have been attracted to invest in EV semiconductor production. The semiconductors that the Japanese company plans to increase production are power control chips that can save energy for EVs. Toshiba plans to Investing 30 billion yen in the next three years, and expanding power control chip capacity to 1.5 times in 2017 in 2020.
Mitsubishi Electric plans to invest 10 billion yen in the year of 2018. The target is to increase the revenue of the 'power components business' centered on the power control chip to 200 billion yen before the end of 2020.
In addition, Fuji Electric plans to invest 20 billion yen in the year of 2018 to expand its domestic plant capacity, and will invest an additional 30 billion yen in 2020, aiming to increase the power control chip business revenue to 150 billion yen in 2023. , will reach the current 1.5 times.
And Roma plans to invest a total of 60 billion yen before the end of 2024, and expand the power control chip capacity of SiC to 16 times.
Although the SiC single crystal material is too high, Cree's technology monopoly leads to high cost of SiC, and it faces reliability, packaging and other problems at the technical level, but this round of expansion will obviously be SiC.
8 inch GaN factory available
GaN and SiC are the same as the third-generation semiconductor materials, and they are parallel. Some experts believe that SiC is the main high-voltage device, GaN is medium voltage, that is, GaN can be selected from 100W to 1200W, and SiC is used above 1200W.
Although GaN devices are resistant to high voltages, high temperatures and are suitable for high frequency operation, applications such as electric vehicles, laser radar, wireless charging and power amplifiers for 5G base stations can benefit from the efficiency of GaN, but they also face cost. Challenges such as packaging. Recent trends indicate that GaN will start from the previous 6 inches to 8 inches, which is expected to alleviate this 'dysentery'.
At present, international IDM manufacturers are optimistic about the prospects of the electric vehicle industry, and pre-packaging the world's advanced GaN production capacity, next year, the world's advanced GaN output will be rapidly increased, becoming the world's first 8-inch GaN foundry.
As GaN manufacturing processes continue to advance, the cost of GaN will be greatly reduced, further boosting its application and crowding out the previous gallium arsenide (GaAs) market.
Domestic opportunity
Based on SiC, the prospects of GaN power devices are expected to attract many companies to enter this market. Infineon, NXP, ON Semiconductor, ST, Texas Instruments, Roma, TDK, Panasonic, Toshiba, etc. have also joined. In the battle. Among the domestic power management IC manufacturers, there are also including Silicon Lijie, Jingfeng, Silanwei, Xinpengwei, Dongke, BYD and other warriors, but obviously this market is still dominated by Japanese, American and European manufacturers.
In the era of re-running in the future, it should be noted that the growth of SiC and GaN market will provide market opportunities for many different manufacturers such as module manufacturers, material suppliers, testers, manufacturers, etc., and value in this field. Find your position on the chain. This will break the original industry chain and create new reshuffle opportunities for different manufacturers. On the other hand, domestic manufacturers have only mass production in certain devices such as SiC diodes, but they have not been formed. The complete industrial chain still has a big gap compared with the scale of foreign industries. On the occasion of the next trend, how to speed up catching up has become a top priority.
According to the analysis of the industry quadrant, each enterprise needs a dual-engine drive, that is, a mature industry with cash flow and a large investment in incubating future industries. Since the future of SiC and GaN has come, domestic manufacturers are returning to competition for technology and product performance. In the conventional market competition 'orbit', it is also necessary to step up preparations, and continuously invest and overweight in research and development, process, packaging, etc., so as not to miss the opportunity when the wave arrives.
2. MediaTek strategically invests in Jaguar radio waves to jointly develop 5G chips
Set micro-network news (text / Lee), with the improvement of 5G standards, the pace of commercialization of 5G technology is approaching, countries around the world have raised 5G to strategic heights, and they are vying for technical commanding heights. Chuangzhi Technology recently announced the announcement, the company The holding subsidiary Jaguar Radio has signed the Strategic Cooperation Framework Agreement and the Strategic Investment Letter of Intent with MediaTek, a world-renowned communications chip manufacturer.
Chuangzhi Technology said that the company will invest in Jaguar Radio, and the two sides will reach a strategic cooperation, which will have a positive impact on the company's product upgrade and business development. After the cooperation, the 5G industry can be extended from the millimeter wave industry products to the core industry. 5G chip. Both parties will play their respective advantages and jointly develop technologies and products related to 5G and millimeter wave. In the future, with the acceleration of the 5G era, the company will follow the 5GNR standard to develop 5G mobile phones, MediaTek under the accumulation of more than ten years of innovation. The company's shareholding cooperation will further develop the company's first-mover advantage in the field of millimeter wave technology and develop it into chip-level technology. The company's mastery and development of 5G and millimeter wave core technologies will greatly enhance the company's products in the 5G era. Market Competitiveness.
It is reported that Jaguar Radio is one of the earliest companies engaged in 5G millimeter wave technology research. Jaguar Radio has a professional millimeter wave R&D team, in millimeter wave antenna system, intelligent antenna design, millimeter wave RF front end circuit design and system integration design technology. Technology accumulation in interference suppression (InterferenceCancellation) and Interference-Aware mechanism can be applied to the industry's Small Cell millimeter wave backhaul, 5G millimeter wave deployment and other related fields. Proofreading / Lee)
3. The first company to introduce the NB-IoT module is also preparing to research the NB-IoT chip.
Episode News (Text / Xiaobei) u-blox is a company that provides positioning and wireless semiconductors and modules for the automotive, industrial and consumer markets. Headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland. In 2017, Asia Pacific revenue accounted for u-blox The total revenue is about 40%, of which China has played a strong driving role. For u-blox wireless products, the Chinese market has great opportunities. The Chinese market has a large scale, and the operator network is well-established. u-blox can With Chinese customers to explore China and overseas markets. 'We believe that car networking, smart city-type narrowband IoT applications and asset tracking will become the main growth areas of u-blox wireless products in the Chinese market. ' u-blox Wireless Products Division Strategy Mr. Simon Glassman, the head of the partnership, was interviewed by Ji Wei.com during the 2018 MWC Shanghai exhibition, as said.
As the first company to introduce NB-IoT modules in the industry, a major feature of u-blox products is low power consumption. It is reported that u-blox sets the wake-up time period of NB-IoT modules according to the network conditions of operators, and utilizes integrated feature algorithms. Software tools help customers achieve a comprehensive evaluation of the design phase and give reference recommendations, so that products imported into the u-blox NB-IoT module can achieve optimal power performance. Simon Glassman concluded, u-blox NB- The power consumption advantage of the IoT module benefits from close cooperation with operators and customers.
In addition, Mr. Simon Glassman revealed to Jiji.com that in the future, our NB-IoT module will use its own chip. Our positioning module is so powerful because it uses its own positioning chip. I believe that with the introduction of self-developed chips , will definitely make u-box's NB-IoT product line more powerful.
In view of the low power consumption of narrow-band IoT, operators offer special networks different from 4G and 5G. At present, only some countries have completed the construction of narrow-band Internet of Things, and China is one of them. For equipment vendors. , just connect the device to the network and use it. Today, u-blox's NB-IoT module SARA-N201 has passed the AVL certification of China Telecom. This certification is the terminal equipment manufacturer integrating u-blox NB-IoT module. Provides greater flexibility to ensure the best performance of China Telecom's network equipment and fully meets operator requirements. Now, u-blox can provide customers with complete NB-IoT connectivity.
U-blox wireless communication products are divided into multiple series, for different regions, different operators, launch different frequency bands of products. SARA-N series has been certified in Europe and Asia, of which SARA-N201 works in China Telecom's settings Network band. At the same time, for NB-IoT/eMTC global universal module, u-blox uses software to configure the working frequency scheme to realize that customers' products can be applied in different countries and different applications.
Mr. Simon Glassman emphasized that u-blox's wireless communication products adopt a consistent design philosophy to help customers achieve efficient design and flexible use. For Chinese customers, for example, their products are designed to serve not only the Chinese market, but also overseas. In the market, if the frequency conversion can be realized by software, then customers do not need to carry out multiple versions of hardware design. In addition, we find that customers may use positioning, cellular communication, short-range communication solutions during the design phase. This is precisely the three core technologies of u-blox, so we will provide the complete solution based on the above technology to customers. Currently, u-blox R&D team is established in Italy, UK, Pakistan, USA, Ireland, Belgium and other places. China mainly serves as its sales branch and has offices in Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing, Shenzhen, and has local sales staff in Wuhan and Xiamen. Mr. Simon Glassman said that the proportion of sales staff in China and FAE is close. 1:1, to ensure that we serve Chinese customers better. (Proofreading / 叨叨)
4. Codename Bean Canyon Intel's new generation NUC exposure
According to the news, Intel's new generation NUC was exposed. We know that the current generation of products on the market is equipped with Kabylake-G processor HADES CANYON and DA7SON CANYON equipped with i7-8650U. The new generation NUC is codenamed Bean Canyon, a total of five products. .
Interestingly, the new generation of NUCs uses the eighth generation of Core Low Voltage Processors, which are:
NUC8i7BEH (Core i7-8559U)
NUC8i5BEH (Core i5-8259U)
NUC8i5BEK (Core i5-8259U)
NUC8i3BEH (Core i3-8109U)
NUC8i3BEK (Core i3-8109U)
The product has 7 major features, namely:
1, the highest 4 core 8 threads
2, Inris Plus core display
3, Intel 300 series chipset
4, support 802.11ac wave2 Gigabit Wi-Fi
5, native USB 3.1 Gen 2 interface (10Gbps)
6, Intel Proud notebook solution
7, onboard 128MB eDRAM
The so-called NUC is a powerful 4x4 inch mini computer with entertainment, gaming and work functions, a customizable motherboard, support for all kinds of memory, storage devices and operating systems you need. It is integrated through Intel's full set of solutions. A computing platform for users such as HTPC, office, etc. Small size but powerful performance is their biggest feature. TechWeb
5. Newly developed on-screen fingerprint recognition sensor will detect body temperature and improve recognition safety.
The next-generation smartphone fingerprinting module is likely to be embedded in the screen. The new technology needs to be considered for convenience and security. A new article on the famous academic journal Nature Communications was presented on Tuesday, showing Korea. The flexible, transparent fingerprint identification array module developed by the research team can simultaneously detect the pressure and temperature when fingerprint recognition, and ensure the real user to perform fingerprint recognition operation through body temperature detection to improve safety.
The research results are from the Samsung Display of South Korea - a scientist at the UNIS National Science and Technology University (UNIST) R&D Center in South Korea. They explained in the paper that the capacitive fingerprint sensors used in most mobile phones are opaque materials, they need to be fixed by the frame, and Placed under the fingerprint button or under the back button. But the product developed by the team can be embedded in a transparent form, integrating the tactile pressure sensor and the skin temperature sensor function, which can directly realize the screen fingerprint press recognition and meet the FBI safety requirements. cnBeta
6. Yilong Electric Q2 revenue increased by 18%, touch product penetration rate increased
The second quarter of the touch-control chip factory ELAN has seen a month-on-month increase, with a single-season performance of more than 2.1 billion Taiwan dollars (the same below), slightly better than expected. Industry estimates, the third season is expected to meet the peak season, performance will be better.
ELAN announced on June 4 that its revenue in June reached 728 million yuan, a 1.2% increase from the previous year. It was not affected by the mid-year inventory effect, which was 10% higher than the same period of last year and the highest in the past nine months. The accumulated revenue for the first half of this year was 38.83. 100 million yuan, an increase of one percent.
In the second quarter of ELAN, the revenue was 2.104 billion yuan, slightly better than the original estimate of 2 billion to 2.1 billion yuan, a quarterly increase of 18.2%, also slightly better than the original estimate; Presenting a monthly increase.
Elan's second-quarter revenue rose, mainly benefiting from the new US customers' shipments starting in May, plus the effective penetration of existing touch screen and touchpad customers, and pushing up the single-season performance. , fingerprint identification chip shipments are also better than the first quarter level.
Elan Telecom estimates that the gross profit margin in the second quarter will fall from 43.6% to 45.2%, which has the same chance of the previous season, and the operating profit ratio is about 17% to 20%.
Elan believes that the shipment of touch screens will increase to 4 million units in the second quarter, and the touch screen will increase to 16 million units. As two new product lines are shipped and the unit price is higher, Driving the average price of products is the source of revenue growth.
Especially for new customers, the price of the touch screen of ELAN is raised from 2.7 US dollars to 2.8 US dollars, and the touch panel has also grown from 1.9 US dollars to 2 US dollars, which is the kinetic energy of the average price of products.
Looking forward to the third quarter, the industry expects that this season is the traditional operating season for notebooks and other markets, the demand trend is upward, and Elan has obtained new customers this year. The third quarter will be better than the previous season, the fourth season will be Re-enter the traditional off-season. Economic Daily