The MEMS foundry marketplace has been experiencing more changes in the past few years and the competitive dynamics have been shifting. Micralyne, which has been in the MEMS foundry business for more than 30 years, was acquired by FTC Technologies in January 2015 and has since been actively expanding its management and engineering team. In this exclusive interview, we recently spoke with Ian Roane, who was announced as Micralyne's new President and CEO a few weeks ago. Ian provides detailed comments about MEMS fabrication trends, Micralyne’s new strategy and service development roadmap, as well competitive pressures and latest industry developments.
MEMS Journal: What are the main differentiating factors for Micralyne? What's unique in your offering compared to the other MEMS foundries?
Ian Roane: Our strategy is to focus on three main areas -- biomedical, optical, and sensors. Additionally, unlike many of the other MEMS foundries, we have expanded our capabilities to do more back-end packaging and testing than only front-end foundry manufacturing. With both front-end and back-end capabilities, our goal is to provide turnkey manufacturing to simplify the supply chain and process flow for customers. Also, unlike some of the other MEMS foundries, we are continuing with pure-play model. We also have solid backing from the new company owners and everyone here has a strong sense of optimism for the existing and future opportunities.
MEMS Journal: What's on Micralyne's roadmap for this and next year? Which new types of services and what kinds of new equipment will you be bringing online?
Ian Roane: We have recently invested heavily in test systems, in-line metrology, and automated inspection as part of an expanded set of services to support a complete manufacturing service to customers. A growing number of our customers are looking for us to deliver directly to their end customers and we see this as an important piece of our service. This is an evolving capability that will not get fully implemented in a year. We see us making additional investments in this area over the next several years.
In terms of new technologies, we have a strong nanotech ecosystem here in Edmonton of which we are a key participant. Much of our focus currently is to enable unique structures and processes for medical and biomedical sensing applications. To name a few of our new capabilities, glancing angle deposition (GLAD) and ultrasonic transducers (CMUTs) are key technologies that have been collaborative efforts resulting from the Edmonton nanotech ecosystem. We also have been further developing our engineered dielectrics that have unique etch selectivity and perform well in various biomedical devices.
MEMS Journal: What are the process platforms which you currently have available? Will you be introducing new process modules this or next year and, if so, which ones?
Ian Roane: We’ve developed a variety of standard and specialty processes over the years, and we currently offer two standardized process platforms that highlight our microfabrication expertise -- MicraSilQ™ and MicraGEM-Si™. MicraSilQ is our go-to process for MEMS based accelerometers and gyros. This platform is a full wafer level packaged (WLP) process that incorporates TSV, solder ball grid array, as well as a high vacuum enclosure with getter capabilities. We launched the MicraSilQ design kit in June 2015, based on our existing manufacturing processes that had a lot of statistical data collected to that point. Our MicraGEM-Si platform is a standard process platform originally developed for silicon micro-mirrors. This process features two layers of SOI silicon, multiple depth deep etching, and precise layer alignment to achieve horizontal and vertical comb-drive actuators or sensors.
We will also continue to advance our microfluidic device offerings by developing a wider set of glass and silicon capabilities during the course of this year.
MEMS Journal: Some MEMS foundries and equipment vendors are starting to talk about 300mm capabilities. Do you think that there is a big need for larger substrates or not yet?
Ian Roane: It is clear that there are some markets which require the capacity associated with 200mm and 300mm wafers. High-volume sensors for consumer smartphone applications can get a lot of leverage on a larger wafer format. However, the markets we are addressing are often better served by 150mm wafers because the development costs are far lower and the production run rates are more modest. The knee of the curve that would shift a customer up to 200mm is probably greater than 10,000 wafers per year. There is an enormous MEMS market that currently falls below that level, including some exciting biomedical and optical applications, and that is Micralyne’s market.
MEMS Journal: From a geographic perspective, how has your customer mix shifted in the past few years?
Ian Roane: Our geographic customer mix is strongly influenced by our predominance of work experience in high-end industrial sensors, lab and clinical analysis and drug delivery, and most of these companies are based in North America and Europe. We have recently brought on our first individual based in Europe to expand our coverage there. We continue to see the strongest opportunities and best fit for our services in the markets that are well funded for R&D and advanced technologies. We have some customers in other parts of the world though, so we are not exclusive to North America and Europe.
MEMS Journal: What's your opinion on the MEMS foundry marketplace in China?
Ian Roane: China has been investing very heavily in MEMS fabs for the last several years and is the fastest growing geographical area for MEMS fab capability. Much of this investment focus seems to be in preparation to address the country’s internal needs which has a demand emphasis on high volume, consumer oriented sensors. We have a handful of active customers in China currently. Realistically, for Micralyne to be successful there in a substantive way, we would probably need to approach that market through a joint venture. Nothing like that is currently in the works.
MEMS Journal: What's different about the MEMS foundry business today compared to five years ago?
Ian Roane: From our perspective, there has been significant growth in consumer markets, creating subsequent demand for high-volume manufacturing. Capacity at 8-inch and beyond has grown. As the supply side of the market has stretched in terms of wafer formats, and each company has narrowed their focus on what they do well, it has become less crowded for us in some respects. There has been consolidation and some attrition. Fewer companies are pure-play foundries with strong process development and integration capabilities.
Our segment of the MEMS market has more modest volume requirements and often requires customized process flows or specialty materials for performance. Our customers typically are more sophisticated now: most have MEMS design experience, and more have past fabrication experience. They are more attuned with “design for manufacturability” concepts, and better understand what it takes for a MEMS foundry to progress from a design drawing to a stable, well controlled manufacturing program.
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Copyright 2016 MEMS Journal, Inc.
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