opportunities and challenges in printed electronics production

Opportunities and challenges in printedelectronics production

Wim Christiaens, PhD, R&D Director

Printed Electronics Europe conferenceBerlin, April 27-28, 2016

Printed Electronics – 27/04/2016 – Wim. [email protected]

Outline

Introduction to Quad Industries

Printed Electronics

Introduction to IoT

Quad Industries: vision & roadmap

Printed batteries

Temperature logger

Smart shoe insoles


Quad Industries

Core business: User interfaces/control panelsPrinted Electronics

Founded in year: 1997 Annual sales: EUR 5 mln.

2 production sitesQuad Belgium, Sint-Niklaas

• > 20 employees

Quad Slovakia, Žilina – Bytčica• > 60 employees

Internet: www.quad-ind.com


Quad Industries

Core business (I): User interfaces/control panels

Membrane switches

Overlays & foils

Capacitive touch

Piezo touch- screen printing and digital printing- domed foils- backlight integration

LED/EL backlighting – EMCshielding – embossing– silicone switches

Capacitive switches P-Captouch screens

- software enhanced piezo touch- Aito Chip- haptic feedback

- transparent switches,sliders and wheels- customisable cover glass

- single/multi touch- rotating, pinching, sliding- customisable cover glass- optical bonding in clean room


Quad Industries

Background technology: electronic assembly

PCB assembly

- several pick & place machines

- manual and semi-automatic stencil printersfor paste and glue printing

- automatic reflow ovens

- vapour-phase soldering system

- wave-soldering

- optical stereo viewers

- AOI

Cable assembly

- Flatcables, data cables

- Power cables, signal cables

- Coaxial cables

- Complex cable harnesses


Quad Industries

Core business (II): printed electronics

‘Printed electronics’ is very old technology…

membrane keyboards were the first printed electronic products

Quad has over 30 years experience in printed electronics

… but many new applications are emerging!!!

Quad Industries builds on existing technology platform screen printing component assembly integration technologies laser & die cutting

to produce a new range of products


IoT

Internet-of-Things / Internet-of-Everything

network of physical objects or "things" embedded with electronics, software, sensors

and connectivity to enable it to achieve greater value and service

= every object becomes ‘smart’, gathers and shares information with each other and

the cloud

things to be connected to the internet by 2020

• 25 Billion (source: Gartner)

• 50 Billion (source: Cisco)

• 200 Billion (source: Intel)


IoT Applications are everywhere

Few examples:

Home and building automation: Nest Learning Thermostat

Automotive: maintenance monitoring, fuel and mileage management, driver security

Smart cities/public transportation: London iBus system

(source: http://datasciencebe.com/)


IoT

Another example: healthcare

(source: freescale.com/healthcare)


IoT

Drivers of the IoT revolution are a combination of:

omnipresent connectivity

low-cost sensors

microelectronics that allow almost anything to be

connected

smartphone, with ability to scan bar codes or RFID tags


Printed electronics

DefinitionPrinted electronics = manufacturing of electronics by standard printing processes

Advantages Lightweight, flexible substrates:

• PET• coated paper• textiles

Low-cost + low ecological footprint• Additive manufacturing• No (etching) chemicals• Less process steps

Quad Industries’ technology platform precision, fine-pitch screen-printing

• interconnection / circuitry• printed functionality

component assembly on foil


printed foilsensors energy

storage

energyharvesting

electronicsdisplay

actuators

memory

communi-cation

• temperature• humidity• cap sensor• photodetector• piezoresistive• piezoelectric• gas• bio: glucose, lactate

• RFID• NFC• Bluetooth low energy

• electrochromic• OLED

• printed battery

• OPV• MEMS

• passives• active components

• discrete or organic TFT

• substrate: PET / paper / textiles / metal / glass• screenprint• fine pitch• cond ink: nano / stretchable / transparent• component assembly

• piezo

component integration direct integration

• printed memory• integrated component

Vision / roadmap


Cornerstones of the implementation of the roadmap:

Partnerships

• Technology partners: Example: Enfucell for printed battery technology

• Collaborative Research or Development projects bilateral or funded research projects

• Example: EU-FP7 Terasel, Horizon2020 INREP, IWT Met@Link,..

product development

• customers are partners!

• from prototype to volume production

• Example: temperature logger / smart textile insole

Investments

• New capabilities

• Increase capacity Current situation: < 10k pcs

Short term focus: 10K <> 250K pcs

Medium term focus: 100K <> 5mln pcs

Vision / roadmap


Printed battery technology

Quad Industries is new licensee for manufacturing Enfucell SoftBattery®

enables to manufacture full range of custom designed and integrated batteries

Technology

All-printed power source

Flexible and thin

ECO-friendly materials

On foil integration

Capacity of few mAh per cm2

Suitable for BLE or NFC enabled applications


Temperature logger

Smart disposable tag, with

Integrated temperature logger

NFC antenna

Printed battery

Application:

Item-level monitoring of temp sensitive products

Medical and pharmaceutical field

Development of NXP together with Enfucell


Temperature logger

Hybrid electronics on thin PET foil

Printed electronics:

• NFC antenna

• Interconnections

• Printed battery

low-cost, large scale production, flexible,

disposable

Semiconductor technology

• NXP temp sensor

ultra-low power consumption, high precision,

miniaturized (memory, NFC comm, temp sensor)

Manufactured in Quad Industries facilities

NHS3100

Printed battery

NFC antenna


Smart shoe insole (I)

Development in collaboration with ATO Gear

Product: ARION printed pressure sensitive insole the fits underneath existing insole of running shoe

in combination with Bluetooth transmitter to connect to mobile devices for real-time feedback

Technology printed, force sensitive resistor (FSR) technnology

8 embedded pressure sensors

• placed at strategic locations

design, build-up and materials

optimised for optimal sensor

responsiveness and reliability

Fully integrated solution

Flexible and thin




Product: ARION

printed pressure sensitive insole the fits underneath existing insole of running shoe


Application

gait-analysis + analysis of running technique




Product: ARION

printed pressure sensitive insole the fits underneath existing insole of running shoe


Application

gait-analysis + analysis of running technique

Market intro

professional athletes

specialist retailers (RunnersWorld, Run2Day)

Mass-market launch planned for late summer


Smart shoe insole (II)

Development in collaboration with medilogic®

Application:

insole for Wireless Dynamic Pressure Measurement

during rehabilitation or training

Technology

Ag & carbon printed capacitive sensor on textile

14 sensor areas

Fully integrated solution

Flexible and thin


EU-FP7 TERASEL project

Thermoplastically deformable circuits for

embedded randomly shaped electronics

Funded under: 7th FWP (Seventh Framework Programme) Start date: 01/10/2013 Duration: 3 years Partners:



Fabrication of flat electronic circuit boards in a conventional wayusing industrial processes

Embedding these circuits into thermoplastic polymers

(Thermo)forming these circuits into 2.5 D / 3D shapes+ additional polymer application (injection moulding)

High pressureforming

Screen printing onthermoplastic

polymers



Quad Industries demonstrator

Replacement of the ‘classical’ mechanical turning knob by 3D touch-wheelbutton (a version without moving parts)

A rotating movement with the fingertips is converted into the requiredsignal (pulses)

Challenges

Material selectionBuild-up

Electronic design• 3D, stretched capacitive slider• Electronics


Conclusions

Quad Industries has…

over 30 years of experience in Printed Electronics for membrane switch / userinterface market

a strong focus on co-development of new emerging applications of PrintedElectronics, based onexisting technology platform and competences in the field of screen printing, assembly,

engineering

development of new capabilities and new technologies

a strong network and is open for further partnerships• technology partnership

• bilateral or funded research projects

• product development from prototype to volume production

Thank you for your attention!!

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