Analyst is skeptical about Cypress image sensor business

American Technology Research analyst Doug Friedman gave a thumbs-up to Cypress for its solar power unit Sun Power, but was skeptical about the company’s image sensor business, even though camera phone market continues to thrive (EETimes).

Magnachip focus and goals for 2006

MagnaChip aims to grab 40% share of the CMOS image sensor market and 10% of small to medium size panel LCD driver IC market in 2006. The company stated that its 2.1-megapixel CMOS image sensor has start shipping to US-based first-tier handset vendors. The company also stated that it is in talks with Taiwan and China customers (DigiTimes)
In a related note MagnaChip sells its 8-bit and 32-bit microcontroller, SmartCard controller, microperipheral IC and linear IC product lines to GreenChips. Youm Huh, president and CEO of MagnaChip, said: "After this deal, we plan to focus further on our three core businesses -- display solutions, imaging solutions and our semiconductor manufacturing services,” (EETimes).

Tessera completes aquisition of Shellcase assets

Tessera completes $33M acquisition of certain assets of Shellcase Ltd. Tessera has hired a majority of Shellcase's employees and created a Wafer-Level Packaging Center of Excellence working on CSP image sensor packages (link).

PixelPlus files IPO of $36M

Another image sensor company becomes public (link). Now we get indications about image sensor market from PixelPlus quarterly reports under sticker PXPL. Half of the company would be publicly traded which puts the company valuation at $72M.

Pixelplus released a list of their customers here:

BYD Co., Ltd.,
China TechFaith Wireless Communication Technology Ltd., or China TechFaith,
DART Express Incorporated,
DK Semicon,
Ningbo Bird Co., Ltd.,
Pantech Co., Ltd.,
ROHM Co., Ltd.,
Seiko Precision Inc.,
Sharp Corporation

Quite an impressive list. Sharp is by far the major PXPL's customer:
"In 2004, we shipped approximately 10.8 million CMOS image sensors worldwide, of which 7.7 million CMOS image sensors were sold through DongbuAnam Semiconductor Inc., or DongbuAnam, to Sharp under our services arrangements with DongbuAnam, and during the first nine months of 2005, we shipped approximately 14.8 million CMOS image sensors and camera modules worldwide, of which 5.6 million CMOS image sensors were sold through DongbuAnam to Sharp."

Jed Hurwitz left ST to found Gigle Semiconductor

Jed Hurwitz used to be the leading ST Imaging system and sensor architect. He's one of creators of ST-Nokia SMIA standard. About half a year ago he left ST and founded Gigle Semiconductor, a startup and a consultancy in photo-sensing, imaging and semiconductors. Recently he was also involved in microdisplay works.

Interview with Micron's VP of Imaging

Interview with Bob Gove, Micron's VP of Imaging is published here.
A few quotes:
"That's one reason why Micron has concentrated on delivering very high quality image sensors that can readily operate in the great variety of situations where the amateur's going to want to capture an image without having to think about it. This is particularly acute in low-light environments, and we do have a saying that if your cameraphone still works under a table, then it's a Micron image sensor! We put a lot of effort into ensuring that things like colour sensitivity and accuracy get taken for granted by the end user, without them having to negotiate complex image processing software to get a decent, fit-for-purpose picture or video."

"From almost a standing start three years ago, 20 per cent of our revenues now come from imaging and supporting specialist memory – a proportion certain to increase in coming years as users move from transmitting just their voices and thoughts to include images of the world around them."

Magnachip announced 3.2MP sensor for camera-phones

Magnachip came with it later than its main competitors (link). Also, its pixel size of 2.57um is much bigger than 2.2-2.25um of Omnivision, Samsung and Micron. Too late, too big - not a good sign for Magnachip.

Avago 1.3MP Sensor Customers

The latest ADCC-3000 1.3MP sensor is designed in Corvallis, OR design center (link). It's used in cellular phones by Motorola, Siemens and Sony-Ericsson.

Cypress sensors are outsourced to Grace

In an interesting twist of its strategy Cypress outsources image sensors manufacturing to Grace Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (Shanghai, China). (Business Wire, more information about Grace is in EETimes). It is not clear if all image sensor products are outsourced, or only legacy ones from Fillfactory and Smalcamera.

Altasens is using UMC as a foundry

Or it looks so from this article.