"We are filling up depreciated 8-inch wafer lines with CMOS sensors,” said Hisayuki Suzuki, senior director of marketing for Micron's Imaging Group. The fab conversions make sense, Suzuki said, since “memories are now produced on advanced, 90-nm or 65-nm processes, but sensors are using the 130-nm process at present and are about to migrate to 110 nm.”

Micron, which currently produces CMOS sensors in Boise, Idaho, and Avezzano, Italy, is converting another Boise plant and one in Nishiwaki, Japan, to sensor production. Each of the four fabs has a production capacity of 50,000 8-inch wafers a month.

The Japanese fab will begin test production this month. "Micron can produce CMOS sensors anywhere in the world, but we expect that production at the Nishiwaki fab will bring better service for customers in Japan," said Suzuki.

The production expansion is based on Micron's bullish expectations for CMOS sensor market growth. The company predicts the market will expand from 800 million units this year to 1 billion in 2007 and 1.7 billion in 2010. It claims its shipments have accounted for 36 percent of the total volume shipped this year to date.

Micron has been focusing on camera phone sensors and claims to have accounted for 33 percent of the total market for those devices in 2005. Now the company is bidding for higher presence in the sensor market for digital still cameras.

Micron recently announced an 8-Mpixel imager in the 1/2.5-inch optical format—an approach favored for use in digital cameras—that was achieved by scaling down the pixel pitch to 1.75 micron. The company intends to promote the device as its mainstream product next year. It also reported the development of a 1.4-micron-pixel-pitch sensor prototype.

"CCD sensors achieved a 1.8-micron pixel pitch this year,” Suzuki said, so “in terms of technology, the CMOS sensor has surpassed the CCD sensor. CMOS sensors now can offer higher performance, with low cost and ample applications.”

By: DocMemory
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