How semiconductor manufacturers should nugget medical electronics market

According to market research firm Espicom, the global medical device market will exceed 200 billion US dollars in 2010, of which medical electronics will account for 45%, reaching 90 billion US dollars. The huge market prospects and stable returns have attracted the input of many manufacturers. From semiconductor manufacturers to EMS and OEM companies, they are expecting to extract gold mines from the medical electronics market. So, what is the reason for the rapid development of the medical electronics market? What is the reason for portable medical electronic devices to become the largest application market for medical semiconductors? In the face of small-volume, high-quality supply requirements in the medical electronics market, how do the world's leading semiconductor manufacturers respond?

Multiple factors boost medical electronics

For the medical electronics market, multiple factors such as technological advancement, health demand, price decline and stable returns have driven the market to move forward. As more and more semiconductor manufacturers join in, the medical semiconductor market is also higher than the global market. The average growth rate of the semiconductor market.

The growth in health demand and the development of technology are mutually reinforcing. As Steve Kennelly, senior strategy and product marketing manager at Microchip's Medical Products Division, said in an interview with China Electronics News: "Now, the medical electronics market is experiencing unprecedented rapid growth. Among them, two aspects of technological innovation have become a driving force that cannot be ignored. On the one hand, biomedical research has made great progress in human physiology deciphering, and confirmed potential new therapeutic diagnostic instruments; on the other hand, the development of electronic technology has helped These new devices have been successfully manufactured. As a result, medical applications have become one of the fastest growing segments of the semiconductor market."

Technological advances in the semiconductor industry have become an important factor driving the rapid development of the medical electronics industry. Xu Yong, chief analyst of market research firm Gartner Asia Pacific Semiconductor Research Group, told the China Electronics News that semiconductor technology has developed rapidly in the past 10 years. The development of diversified products such as standard integrated circuits and programmable logic devices and their application in medical electronics have pushed the medical electronics industry to a semi-mature stage. There are two trends in the arrival of this stage. One is that the decline in the price of medical electronic products makes the people affordable; the second is that the developing countries have mastered the manufacturing technology of medical electronic products and further promoted the decline in the prices of medical electronic products.

At the same time, the medical electronics market places high demands on safety. Xu Yong said that the cycle from product development to certification is very long. Unlike toys and consumer electronics, if there is a problem, it will take a lot of responsibility. Therefore, the medical electronics market is a stable market. It is not as easy to form a bubble as consumer electronics products and is rapidly bursting. Although the industry has a long payback period, it may provide participants with more stability than other business areas. More lasting rewards. After completing the sale of the semiconductor business, Ke Cilei, President and CEO of Philips Group, said: "With the completion of this transaction, we have actually completed the transition to a more economically viable business. The volatility of revenue generated by cyclical industries such as components and semiconductors has completed our journey from 2002. The company will focus on becoming a company centered on healthcare and lifestyle."

Portable medical products become popular

According to Databeans, factors such as the aging of the global population, rising living standards and increased demand for medical services in remote areas are driving the transformation of traditional medical methods. Mobility and portability are gradually becoming the key to the medical electronics industry. On the other hand, the development of semiconductor technology has pushed the pace of medical innovation forward at an unprecedented speed. With the rapid processing of computing, high-precision analog-to-digital conversion and advances in wireless network technology, medical electronic products have become portable and miniaturized. .

Currently, the portable medical electronic device market is currently growing at double-digit rates, and this trend will continue in the future. Portable medical electronic devices are mainly divided into four major applications: diagnostic equipment, drug delivery equipment, personal care products and imaging systems, including cholesterol, blood conditions, blood pressure testing, glucose meter, pulse oximeter, AED, insulin injection pen, Digital hearing aids, CT scanners, and X-ray detectors. Among them, the family diagnosis market is expected to account for about 50%, of the remaining 50%, imaging products account for 25%, and other diagnostic or therapeutic electronics products account for 25%.

Stability, high precision, and strong anti-interference ability are the main requirements of portable medical electronics for semiconductor devices. John Di Cristina, director of marketing strategy at Maxim, said in an interview with China Electronics News that portable medical electronic devices require semiconductor solutions with some or all of the following features: low operating voltage, low power consumption, compact package, and high integration. High precision and consistency. He explained that if medical electronics are battery powered, low operating voltage and low power consumption are critical; if medical electronics are handheld or portable, then miniaturized packaging is the right product size for the user. necessary. For some high-volume applications, high integration is a must for low cost and high reliability. In order to ensure that many medical products have better control over the safety and health of patients, high precision and product consistency are very important.

Xu Yong particularly emphasized the importance of high precision. Because the human body signal received by medical electronic products is very weak, high-precision products are required for signal amplification and processing. From this perspective, the application of wireless technology in medical electronic devices is not unlimited. The application of low-power, low-rate and narrow-band wireless technologies may be no problem, but in order to avoid interference, the application of broadband wireless technology needs to be cautious.

Careful supply of high quality

Due to the high precision requirements of medical electronic equipment and the long development cycle, the essential requirements for semiconductor suppliers are high. At the same time, because demand is smaller than consumer electronics and communications products, it is also important for semiconductor suppliers to respond to small-volume supply requirements. Manufacturers will follow two principles when selecting components: one is the mainstream solution of the market; the other is easy replacement. Mainstream solutions and suppliers are more secure in terms of continuous supply, while standard devices are used in the design as much as possible, which guarantees the ability to quickly find alternatives in the event of supply problems such as production downtime. For the above requirements, semiconductor manufacturers have their own methods.

Zou Zhixiong, senior manager of Virtex Marketing in Xilinx Asia Pacific, told the China Electronics News that as a leader in programmable logic, Xilinx's products pay special attention to reliability, low power consumption and high performance. This coincides with the demand for medical electronics. At the same time, Xilinx's strength lies in providing cost-optimized FPGAs for low-volume and mid-range medical devices as high-performance, off-the-shelf resettable DSPs.

Bao Zhen, MSP430 market development specialist of TI's semiconductor business unit, told the China Electronics News that the company has cooperated with the famous distributor Shiping Group to use its small enterprise online ordering system to respond to customers' demand for small batch products. Xu Fenglin, general manager of AMS (Austria Microelectronics) China, told the China Electronics News: "We track every potential customer project and will prepare a certain amount of inventory in the early stage to meet customer needs."
The development direction of European trail lighting (Figure) Electronic components LED illuminate the world's green energy Lianchuang Optoelectronics: energy saving and environmental protection military concept (Figure) 06 Hohhot lighting dealers 10 major single store rankings 2006 Taiyuan lighting dealers 10 Big single store rankings 2006 Shijiazhuang lighting dealers top 10 single store list


1