ISSCC 2011 Review, Part 5

Albert Theuwissen concludes his series of ISSCC reviews. The last part talks about the following presentations:

Albert Wang (Cornell University) "An Angle Sensitive CMOS imager for single-sensor 3D photography"

Robert Johansson (Aptina) "A 1/13-inch 30fps VGA SoC CMOS image sensor with shared reset and transfer gate pixel control"

Sangjoo Lee (Samsung) "A 1/2.33-inch 14.6M 1.4 um pixel backside illuminated CMOS imager sensor with floating diffusion boosting"

Dan Pates (Aptina) "An APS-C format 14b digital CMOS image sensor with a dynamic response pixel"

Takayuki Toyama (Sony) "A 17.7 Mpixel 120 fps CMOS image sensor with 34.8 Gb/s readout" - this is probably the same sensor that Sony talked about last week, so I'll quote Albert's impressions from the presentation:

"The sensor reported was on based on the “classical” Sony concept of column parallel ADCs based on up-down counters. But because of the extremely high bitrate of the overall chip, the 14 counters in the column are split into two parts:

• The lower 5 bit counters, which are driven with 248 columns in parallel, in such a way that the columns do not contain the real counters, but contain memory cells,
• The upper 9 bit counters, which are based on real counters as before.

This hybrid construction allows to maintain the high accuracy of 14 bits with the extremely high speed of 34.8 Gb/s overall. The device runs at 120 fps at 12 bits and 60 fps at 14 bits. The chip is realized in 90 nm technology, 1P4M and consumes a total power of 3W at 120 fps."

ON Semi Completes Acquisition of Cypress Image Sensor Business

Business Wire: ON Semi has completed its acquisition of the CMOS Image Sensor Business Unit (ISBU) from Cypress in an all cash transaction for approximately $31.4M, subject to adjustment under the purchase agreement. The purchase price was approximately 1x annual sales for the division.

ISBU is expected to become an integrated part of ON Semiconductor’s Digital, Military/Aerospace and Image Sensor (DMI) division under the direction of Vince Hopkin, vice president of DMI.

With this acquisition, ON Semiconductor acquires approximately 100 patents and patent applications related exclusively to the business and receives appropriate intellectual property licenses from Cypress Semiconductor in order to continue to conduct and grow the business. As part of the transaction, approximately 70 Cypress Semiconductor ISBU employees join the ON Semiconductor organization. The majority of these employees are located in Mechelen, Belgium.

Toshiba and Sony Execute Manufacturing Transfer Agreement

Business Wire: Toshiba and Sony announced that they have executed definitive agreements based on the non-binding memorandum of understanding signed on December 24, 2010 between Toshiba and Sony for the transfer from Toshiba to Sony of semiconductor fabrication equipment located at Nagasaki Technology Center operated by Nagasaki Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation ("NSM"), a joint venture of Toshiba (owned 60%) and Sony (owned 40%).

The purchase price for this equipment is 53 billion yen. The closing for this transfer is planned for April 1, 2011. Following the execution of the transfer, Toshiba and Sony plan to terminate their NSM joint venture relationship.

Sony's goal is to expand its CMOS image sensor business by utilizing the equipment to be transferred to Sony that is located at Nagasaki Technology Center. The purchase price of 53 billion yen is included in the approximately 100 billion yen CMOS image sensor investment announced by Sony on December 27, 2010.

Nikkei adds that Sony controls about 70% of the market for image sensors for digital cameras. Sony aims to double its image sensor production capacity to 50,000 wafers a month by March 2012, from 25,000 currently.

Sony Talks about Super-Fast 17.7MP/120fps Sensor

Electronista and Crunchgear quote subscription-only Nikkei article saying that Sony has developed a new 17.7MP sensor that can "convert multiple pixels into signals simultaneously", which results in a reduction of the conversion time by up to 75% when compared to existing sensors.

The new sensor boasts a processing speed of 34.8Gbps (that’s up to five times faster than previous Sony sensors) and shoots video with 17.7MP at 120fps. Apparently, Sony also managed to keep power consumption in check by revamping the circuit design in the sensor.

The Nikkei also says that Sony plans to use the new technology in digital cameras and cell phones in the future, without providing information on when exactly this will be the case.

ISSCC Review, Part 4

Part 4 of ISSCC review by Albert Theuwissen covers three presentations:

Prof. Etoh of Kinki University "A 16Mfps 165 kpixel Backside-Illuminated CCD"

Y. Yamashita (Canon) "A 300mm Wafer Size CMOS Image Sensor with In-Pixel Voltage Gain Amplifier and Column-Level Differential Read-out Circuitry"

R. Walker, J. Richardson (University of Edinburgh) "A 128 x 96 Pixel Event-Driven Phase-Domain Delta-Sigma-Based Fully Digital 3D Camera in 0.13 mm CMOS Imaging Technology"

Sony Announces 12MP, 1.55um Pixel BSI Sensor

Sony Cx-News vol 63 has a couple of announcements. The most interesting one a fast 12.4MP BSI CMOS sensor providing 42fps at full resolution and aimed at DSCs, probably the same sensor used in this year crop of compacts. The new 1/2.3-inch IMX078CQK sensor is able to deliver 1080p/60fps video. The IMX078CQK provides two modes for full HD video: mode 1 which strives for picture quality, and mode 9 which suppresses power consumption. It also provides modes that support high-speed imaging: mode 4 (240fps) and mode 7 (1000fps):

Its 10/12b output is delivered via 10-channel Sub-LVDS 576 Mbps serial output. The sensitivity is specified as 1437 digits (typ) at F5.6 lens, 1/30s exposure, green signal. The saturation is stated as 3089 digits (min) and, in terms of numbers of electrons converted per unit area, is said to be an increase of about 10% over current Sony products.

The IMX078CQK is said to use a technology that improves its light collecting efficiency and mixed-color characteristics and, for example, at a wavelength of 550 nm, the red and blue signal levels are improved by about 5 points compared to current Sony products at F2.8:

Another Sony announcement is the two new ISPs from its "Fffio" series aimed at CCD-based security cameras and supporting 650 lines of horisontal resolution, WDR and ATR-EX (adaptive tone reproduction).

This table summarizes the functionality of the newly announced ISPs:

Omnivision Reports Quarterly Results

PR Newswire: Omnivision reported financial results for the fiscal third quarter ended January 31, 2011. Revenues for the quarter were $265.7M, as compared to $239.5M in the previous quarter, and $156.9M in the same quarter a year ago. GAAP net income in the last quarter was $44.7M, as compared to $28.9M the previous quarter, and net income of $5.0M a year ago. The company ended the period with cash, cash equivalents and short-term investments totaling $498.9M, an increase of $102.2M from the previous quarter. "For the second consecutive quarter we achieved record revenues, which exceeded the high point of our guidance," stated Shaw Hong, CEO of Omnivision.

Gross margin was 29.8%, as compared to 28.2% a quarter ago and 24.6% a year ago. The sequential increase gross margin is attributed to the sale of previously written-down inventory combined with a reduction in inventory valuation allowances.

The next quarter revenues are expected be in the range of $240M to $260M.

Forbes: Omnivision's posted revenue of $265.7M is well ahead of the Street expectations at $241.7M. For the April quarter, OmniVision sees revenue of $240M to $260M, ahead of the Street at $217.2M.

Update: EETimes: Doug Freedman, an analyst from Gleacher & Co., said: "Yield Issues? Not really... We are hard-pressed not to believe OVTI share is approaching the mid-30 percent market share level given another record quarter for units... Sony and Samsung emergence would not present a material risk to margins, as capacity is clearly being stretched to accommodate a sensor market that could reach 2.5 billion units in CY11 (we see OVTI units +23 percent year-over-year to 787 million in CY11)."

Hans Mosesmann, an analyst with Raymond James & Associates Inc., said: "Design win activity with 'tier 1' OEMs is strong for next generation BSI-2 with a volume ramp later this summer a dynamic that puts to rest the fears of having lost the Apple business and the concerns over 'yields.'"

Update #2: Seeking Alpha published Omnivision Earnings Call transcript.

Update #3: Barrron's quote Brian Blair with Wedge Partners saying that “Market share loss and yield issue chatter was all garbage,” and that the company is facing “strong volumes in smartphones, ramping units in tablets and continued shipment strength at Apple.”

Tristan Gerra with Baird & Co. insists that "Our Neutral stance on Omnivision remains intact, and is based on our expectation for secular market share loss at Omnivision’s key customer due to execution issues, while we expect Omnivision to lose share at other tier-one PC and smartphone customers this year. Concerns over the performance of Omnivision’s 8mp BSI-2 sensor, uncer tainty about the company’s ability to significantly raise wafer capacity this year, and rising competition all suggest Omnivision’s fundamentals have peaked.”

ISSCC Review, Part 3

Albert Teuwissen continues to publish ISSCC 2011 reviews. The third part covers:

M.W. Seo ( Shizuoka University) "An 80mVrms Temporal Noise 82 dB Dynamic Range CMOS Image Sensor with a 13-to-19b Variable Resolution Column-Parallel Folding-Integration/Cyclic ADC"

C. Lotto (Heliotis) "A Sub-Electron Readout Noise CMOS Image Sensor with Pixel-Level Open-Loop Voltage Amplification"

Baird: Omnivision Lost “Significant” Market Share, Others Disagree

Bloomberg, Forbes quote Robert W. Baird's analyst Tristan Gerra writing in a note to clients "Our field research points to Omnivision having lost significant share in PCs as well as in China late last year due to its focus on Apple, while its new 8 MP sensor may not be ready for the initial iPhone 5 launch, suggesting Sony could win all of initial iPhone 5 procurement orders."

A more detailed digest of Gerra's note in Wall Street Pit also mentions that Samsung is now sampling sensors to Apple for potential future products.

Barron's quotes Hans Mosesmann of Raymond James questioning the logic of Gerra’s report. By Mosesmann’s reckoning, Gerra is suggesting both that Omnivision is capacity constrained in producing the BSI-2, but also that it is loosing market share, which he suggests may be contradictory statements.

“We believe OmniVision is constrained becasue demand is stronger than expected. This is ordinarily a good thing, and, in this instance, we believe a good thing.” While Sony may get some Apple business this year, Mosesmann doesn’t think Apple will give all of it to Sony, as they’re a competitor and it’s not proven Sony can deliver parts Apple needs in volume.

Motley Fool quotes an analyst at FBR issuing a report earlier this week saying the iPhone 5 launch may be delayed until September (versus expectations of July) and that its image sensor is "most likely going to Omnivision exclusively, but with some potential for [Sony] to split that socket."

iSuppli Sensor Market Forercast to 2014

iSuppli published its updated sensor market forecast up to 2014: