An interesting note on passive components. It questions the future of capacitors and resistors. I thought this worth reading since a large portion of ESI sales is for these devices. I wonder what ESI thinks about it an where they see their future development? I don't think we have anything to fear, but the future holds changes.
Regards,
Mark
From Page One of Electronic News:November 3, 1997 Issue
Feature: Passive Components
Integrated Devices Roil Passives Market
By Bernard Levine
The marketplace for passive components is turning into a battle ground. Growing demand for integrated passive componentry--built with semiconductor-like, highly miniaturized construction--is sparking more new entries from traditional capacitor, resistor and other passive component firms anxious to defend their turf, as well as additional contestants from the worlds of contract manufacturing and elsewhere.
Some of the newest integrated passives now being sampled or still in R&D reportedly address electrostatic discharge and other problems which have vexed earlier models. Some new integrated passives are also showing up in leading-edge chip-scale packages, while others stick with more traditional packaging.
Integrated passives will be a major attention getter at this week's Wescon show in San Jose and Santa Clara, Calif. Makers of cell phones and other space-crammed or very high speed products are especially anxious to see what's available. Offerings so far have been limited, with integrated passive suppliers and wannabe's exploring various substrate options, including thick and thin film, as well as array and network configurations.
With portable electronic and high-speed applications demanding ever smaller componentry to fit on precious board space, California Micro Devices, a semiconductor firm which pioneered integrated passives several years ago, will review its latest integrated passive termination products at a Wescon technical workshop. A host of other firms are expected to show off their latest integrated passives efforts at the Wescon exhibits and technical sessions, with Bourns slating a Wescon press conference to highlight coming efforts.
What Size Market?
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Opinions vary on how big a share of the future passives market might be grabbed by integrated models. In interviews and contributed articles for this special Passive Components feature section of Electronic News, traditional passive component industry leaders such as Vishay and AVX emphasize the continuing and expected ongoing leading importance of surface mount chips and other classic discretes, despite growing interest in integrated passives--which they are gearing up to serve as well.
Other firms agree traditional passives will keep the majority of applications in coming years, but suggest the integration move may have a bigger impact than some expect.
"It's important to contradict the notion that discrete capacitors, resistors and magnetic components are going to disappear into silicon ICs," said Felix Zandman, chairman/CEO of Vishay Intertechnology. "This was a 'concern' even when we formed Vishay 33 years ago. But in spite of it, the use of discrete passives is steadily increasing, and I believe it will continue to do so well into the next century."
But Dr. Zandman is hedging his bets. "This is not to discount changes in the technology of passives, such as the development of integrated passive components (IPCs), which are certain to gain increased attention over the next several years," he adds. "These are resistor or capacitor chip arrays, resistor/capacitor (R/C) SMD networks, resistor/capacitor/inductor (RCL) SMD networks and like combinations. We are supporting these developments with both production facilities and continuing research."
At the same time, Vishay is not letting these new types of devices overshadow its priority for helping customers use discrete components to provide speed and cost-efficiency in reducing time-to-market. Dr. Zandman points out that discrete passives provide considerable value as a flexible design tool for reconfiguring microprocessor-controlled circuits.
Claiming growing importance of all passives to the latest systems, Dr. Zandman says "A benchmark I frequently use to chart this growth goes back to the early '90s. Then a typical PC application for Intel's 486 microprocessor was supported by 124 resistors, capacitors and magnetic components. A few years ago a similar Pentium microprocessor board used 252 passives while the newest version of the Pentium requires even more passives. It's logical to ask why these applications aren't integrating passive functions instead of using an increasing number of discretes. To start, power components and high-precision components cannot be integrated. Lack of time is another reason. The cost of frequent obsolescence is, however, the main reason. The demand to continually introduce new products combined with a continually-shrinking design-time window makes it cheaper and faster to reconfigure passives to support existing ICs rather than to create new ones."
In a recent Breakfast on Park interview with EN editors (EN, Oct. 20), AVX chairman/CEO Dick Rosen predicted integrated passives could grow to 10 to 15 percent of the capacitor market in coming years, even though it is now "a very small part" of it. "The number is more than doubling every year now, but it's small," Mr. Rosen said. "A customer has to redesign its board so it has to be part of the evolution of the next device that one of our customers would make. It's not just a drop-in replacement."
Still, some other firms with less of a stake in traditional discrete passive parts suggest growth of integrated passives could be quicker. California Micro Devices claims integrated passives usage could sharply ramp up if compatible semiconductor flip chip technologies take off in coming years. "If the industry moves to flip chip technology, I would predict people will use integrated flip chip passives in these applications," said John Nemec, California Micro Devices director of applications. "Between now and when flip chip is universally adopted, there will be modest growth in integrated passives, but when flip chip becomes ubiquitous, the integrated passive technology will be a natural solution with the other chips that are flip chipped and usage of integrated passives will rise sharply," he added.
He also claimed customers with higher speed applications will heavily adopt the integrated passives approach, and noted in bigger systems, "I see everything moving to higher speed."
Protection Against Electrostatic Discharge
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CMD is now sampling an electrostatic discharge protection diode array that addresses earlier ESD problems, he said. "It has less channels, only six, compared to 17 before, and it is in a smaller package. It addresses some of these problems and also has improved characteristics. It can protect against higher ESD voltage than its predecessor. The voltage that the protected device sees is much lower than previously." The firm is also sampling a new low cost Schottky diode network, he said.
"With a lot of competitors" now entering the integrated passives market, "it gives us credibility as a pioneer," he said, "and people recognize there will be a move from non-integrated discrete passives to integrated passives."
An AVX spokesman claimed last week that his firm is already a dominant supplier of commercial capacitor arrays.
Also hoping to cash in on the integrated passives trend, it was recently learned that contract manufacturer Flextronics International will soon spin off an independent company to produce integrated passives (EN, Sept. 15). The yet to be named spinoff will consist of elements of the nChip operation acquired by Flextronics several years ago.
Contacted last week, Stan Drobac, VP and GM of Flextronics' passive and wireless products, said "We are getting real close to finalizing it," although the spinoff hasn't happened yet. "It will be in November," he said.
Meanwhile, Bourns expanded its thin film on silicon line of integrated passives earlier this year with resistor/capacitor networks that provide ESD protection up to 3500 V. The firm "is on the threshold of announcing resistor/capacitor/diode entries," according to Larry Eslinger, VP of marketing, Bourns Microelectronics division, "that can increase the ESD protection up to 15,000 V." Diode models addressing ESD worries will sample this month, he said.
Bourns also now has "in development and testing, a variety of thin film magnetic components, including inductors and transformers. We hope to have products for formal launch by the third quarter of '98." He also said Bourns is developing integrated passives in chip-scale packages and "will have samples available in February. Until now, we have used plastic surface mount packages." The firm is working with ChipScale Inc. of San Jose, Calif. on the chip-scale package thrust, he said.
He added: "The major driver in nearly every electronics market is miniaturization. For products ranging from the new personal communication phone to wireless interconnect, size and weight have become the key features."
The demands for various miniaturization ploys being made on makers of all types of passive parts and interconnections was noted by Ken Fleck of Fleck Research, which sponsors the annual Fleck Connection Congress. "Over the past 20 years there have been three transformations within the electronics industry: migration from analog to digital in the late '70s; shift to SMT in the '80s; and a multitude of dramatic changes in the '90s--including demand for greater bandwidth; convergence of TV, telecom and computer networks; development of portable, faster, lighter and smaller products with increased functionality; higher density advanced packaging technologies; high-speed digital signals approaching 1GHz; and numerous others, such as wireless--multimedia--optics."
Fleck points out that the rate of technology advance in recent years is staggering--and there is no let-up in sight. And if this were not enough to concern the connector CEO, Fleck predicts the probability of digital signals at 2GHz, pitches of 0.25mm, I/Os approaching 3,000, chips becoming systems and the coming of an all-optical network.
Leading passive and connector houses are gearing up to meet those demands. AMP president/CEO William Hudson promises his firm is "absolutely intent on being the technology leader. In 1996 we received 220 U.S. patents, ranking 20th among all U.S. companies. AMP has 15,000 patents issued or pending around the world, and we are continuously bringing new products to market."
Wherever the future passives market is headed, some goals may remain constant. Kemet president Terry Weaver notes, "We believe that the most important attribute of a passive component is that it arrives on time, with absolutely no problems, complications, or defects in administrative process."
Meanwhile, integrated passives will gain increasing attention, according to many capacitor and resistor makers. T.G. Reynolds, director of technology, Murata Electronics North America, Inc., said "The growth of the communications (wireless) and computer industry has resulted in increased requirements for miniaturized components operating at high frequencies and lower voltages. Initially this demand has been met by miniaturization of discrete components; for example, the downward evolution of ceramic capacitors from 1206 size (0.120x0.060) to 0402 (0.040x0.020) and subsequent size reductions of other components (e.g., ceramic dielectric resonator filters). However, the continued size reduction of discrete components faces barriers in handling and surface mounting.
"There are several technological approaches which are being developed throughout the industry to address integration of passive components: LTCC and thin film. In the Low Temperature Ceramic Cofire (LTCC) approach, the challenge is to incorporate passive components into functional blocks or modules in a ceramic "substrate." This technology is capable of embedding resistors, capacitors, strip line resonators and inductors cofired inside a fired block of ceramic with thermal vias and interconnects for handling power, signal and thermal loads. Current designs employ glass ceramic materials and copper metallization in a low temperature cofire ceramic (LTCC) system. Integrated circuits can either be mounted directly as bare chip (wire bond or flip chip) or surface mounted along with higher value and trimmable components. Selective electrode patterns are used for the formation of capacitors and a combination of flat spirals interconnected by vias allows inductors to be constructed. In addition, because of the multilayer nature of the ceramic "substrate" it is possible to provide shielding and power and ground planes within the structure."
Scott Brown, quality control manager, and Brian Piscitelli, quality product engineer, KOA Speer Electronics, said "KOA's integrated passive components are available in two different forms, chip resistor arrays and silicon-based networks in a molded package." KOA's Integrated Passive Components are available is QSOP, TSSOP, Narrow SOIC, Wide SOIC, DIP, SOT-23 and chip-scale packaging. |
