Yole: MEMS pressure sensors boosted by consumer applications
After years of limited growth, the MEMS pressure sensor market is growing due to consumer electronic applications and is expected to show a 22 percent CAGR.
Pressure sensors are currently playing an important role in modern industries. MEMS pressure sensors are already widely adopted in different applications for their high-performance, low cost and small size.
In its new report, "MEMS Pressure Sensor," Yole Développement gives a detailed overview of the MEMS market.
The firm says emerging consumer applications are boosting the growth of the MEMS pressure sensor market and reshuffling the main players, MEMS pressure sensors are one of the very first MEMS components appearing in the microsystem world.
The technologies are quite mature and the market is big and expected to grow from $1.9 billion in 2012 to $3 billion in 2018.
MEMS pressure sensors for consumer applications, especially for smartphones and tablets, is following the model of accelerometers and gyroscopes.
This adoption should help the MEMS pressure sensor market to boom again.
This huge opportunity is expected to result in the global volume of the MEMS pressure sensor market to hit 2.8 billion units by 2018 says Wenbin Ding, Technology & Market Analyst, MEMS Devices & Technologies at Yole Développement.
"Consumer pressure sensor will represent 1.7 billion units and will overtake automotive as the market leader in volume,"sh e adds.
Even though consumer applications have a much lower ASP than other applications, this promising segment will bring more than 8 percent CAGR to the global MEMS pressure sensor market .
Yole's report presents a global overview of the current MEMS pressure sensor technologies, market and competitive landscape. The covered industries in the MEMS pressure sensor 2013 report are automotive, industrial, medical applications, consumer electronics and high-end (aeronautic, military, defence) applications.
Automotive applications are still dominating this market. TPMS, MAP and BAP will be the biggest sub applications in this field. Automotive, medical, industrial and high-end markets are growing by 4 to 7 percent. However the consumer market is growing 25 percent in value, equating to 38 percent in volume, because of new opportunities in smartphones and tablets.
MEMS pressure sensors find new applications in each domain,
For example, in cylinder pressure sensing for automotive, CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) machine for medical use, smartphone (Samsung Galaxy Slll for indoor navigation) and tablets for consumer electronics industry, among other things.
All these emerging applications are still in their infancy, but they appear promising and Yole analysts believe MEMS pressure sensor will find new ways to satisfy end users in each domain.
MEMS technologies are still gaining market share compared to other classic technologies.
Pressure sensors in particular are showing advantages compared to other current technologies, such as ceramic thick-film, ceramic capacitive and thin-film technologies.
Thin-film technologies are still needed for use in harsh environments, particularly with high temperatures and corrosive medias. MEMS pressure sensor manufacturers are also working on components which could be used in these environments.
Since the MEMS pressure sensor market is huge, it's not surprising that more than 50 players are involved. Yole says the top 5 players are Bosch, Denso, Sensata, GE Sensing and Freescale. Together they represent about 50 percent of the total market.
Automotive, medical, industrial, and high-end markets already have their mature leaders and smaller companies following. The consumer electronics market is still emerging with some conventional MEMS sensor companies interested.
Lots of companies are targeting this industry but Bosch has always dominated this sector.
The supply chain of the automotive industry is complicated with different types of players: Car Manufacturers, Tier1 Automotive Part & Systems Suppliers (related to Pressure Sensors), Full Package Sensors Specialists and MEMS & Semiconductor Specialists.
With new opportunities appearing in consumer electronics, new comers from the USA and China are targeting this segment.
According to Yole, local Chinese companies are making an effort to try and fulfil the huge domestic demand in automotive and consumer applications.
