dual engines for the second digital tsunami ----- soc and

MAKIMOTO LIBRARY / Exhibit VI / No.10

Dual Engines for the Second Digital Tsunami

----- SoC and SiP -----

International Electronics Forum, Future Horizons, May 6, 2002

Invited Speech

Commentary

I made a speech at IEF two years ago in 2000, and showed that digital consumer products would

rise as a new post PC wave, and named it “Second Digital Wave" (included in Exhibit VI of

Makimoto Library). The momentum became more and more intense since then, and they are now

catching up or surpassing the First Digital Wave driven by PC. The time of "replacement of growth

driver" is here. In order to emphasize the magnitude of its impact, I used the expression “Second

Digital Tsunami“ this time. This speech is about the latest trend of digital consumer products in

terms of market and technology.

Firstly, it is shown that the "consumer & communication" segment exceeded the PC segment in

2000. Next, some examples of Tsunami are shown including digitalization trend of televisions, shift

from VCR to DVD, transition from film cameras to digital cameras, reversal of the shipment of PC

and mobile phones. These are some facts which characterize “Second Digital Tsunami”.

SoC and SiP are highlighted as the technological base that makes such transition possible, in the

expression of “dual engines". SoC only is not enough to do the job, and SiP plays the supplemental

role effectively.

Finally, I touched on Sony's business vision of "Ubiquitous Value Network". As concrete examples, I

showed prototype of the world's smallest Walkman and watch type interactive communicator. They

can be regarded as the originator of today's wearable devices.


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In the speech which I made two years ago, the post PC trend was taken up as the “Second Digital Wave“. In order to

emphasize the magnitude of its impact, I named it the “Second Digital Tsunami" this time. SoC and SiP are enabling

technologies for this tsunami. The latest trend will be shown in this speech.


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It was the PC that drove the semiconductor market so far. However, from 2000 onward, the situation is changing. As

shown in the figure, the proportion of PCs has been declining since 2000, and that of "consumer & communications"

has been growing. It is a change of market leader and we must prepare for that trend.

4


The figure shows the analog to digital conversion of TV in Japan. Digital CS started in 1996, and digital BS in 2000.

The digitalization of terrestrial broadcasting will begin in 2003, and full-scale conversion to digital will start. In 2011,

all analog broadcasting will be terminated and the transition to digitalization will be completed.

5


The figure shows the trend of the digitalization ratio of TV in Japan. Although it was less than 5% in 2001, it is

expected to grow linearly thereafter, reaching over 40% in 2006. The semiconductor content is shown in the table in

the figure, which indicates that the semiconductor content in a TV set becomes overwhelmingly larger for digital TV

compared with analog.

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One example of the conversion from analog to digital is a shift from VCR to DVD. The shift began gradually from

around 1997, and the ratio was reversed in 2001. After that the gap between the two is widening rapidly. VCR was

one of big segments of semiconductor market in 1990s.

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The shift from film camera to digital camera is also a remarkable case of analog to digital conversion. Since the

first digital camera QV - 1 was released from Casio in 1995, the number has been growing rapidly. Meanwhile,

film camera started to decline with its peak in 1997, and the number of shipments will be reversed in 2003. The

semiconductor content in the digital camera is more than 10 times than that of analog.

8


This figure symbolizes the transition from PC era to Post PC era. The representative of the post PC era is a mobile

phone, growing rapidly into the future and becoming the driving force of electronics. In 1997, it surpassed the

shipment of PC by approaching 100 million units, and reached 400 million in 2000.

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The figure expresses the transition of products that have driven the electronics since 1970s in the form of three

waves. The first speech on the "second digital tsunami" was the IEF speech in 2000 (included in Exhibit VI). It

shows that the digital consumer products connected by the network will become the main stream products of the

future replacing PC.

The history up to now has been moving as shown in this figure; smartphones as the flagship.

10


This table compares the first and second digital tsunami. Driving the second tsunami is SoC and SiP. Thanks

to SoC/SiP, compact and lightweight information terminal becomes widespread, the nomadic lifestyle expands,

and the environment becomes cleaner. The winner of the 1st tsunami (PC) was the US, but the second

tsunami's match is now starting and everyone has a chance.

From today’s viewpoint, the US became the winner of the Second Digital Tsunami led by Apple.

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This is to explain about SoC, one of the drivers of the Second Digital Tsunami. 3D graphic engine on the board

with CPU, DRAM, and DSP, etc. is shown on the left. SoC is on the right which integrates all those chips on a

single chip. In this way, the performance is greatly enhanced up to 4 times, the power to 1/5, the number of chips

to 1/4, contributing to reduce the size, weight and power of the equipment.

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This is an example of SoC for Sony’s Handycam. In the new model, encoder, decoder, and DRAM which were

separate chips in the old model, are all integrated on a single chip as SoC. In this way, the power dissipation was

greatly reduced from 3.2W to just 170mW. This indicates the remarkable effect of DRAM on chip SoC.

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The figure shows the history of DRAM embedded chips in Sony. The integration level of the chips for 8mm

Camcorder in 1995 was still very low, but it gradually increased, and 3D graphics engine in 2000 integrates DRAM

of more than 250Mbits and 2M logic gates.

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This is the summary of major issues of SoC. It is not almighty, and SiP will supplement Soc.

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The figure shows mask cost trend as a representative of initial cost. As integration level increases lifetime

production volume decreases, since versatility is lost (green curve). On the other hand, mask cost increases (blue

curve). Therefore, the mask cost per production volume skyrockets like a red curve. This is the fundamental

problem about SoC.

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Basic structures of SiP are shown here. The upper left is a system in which chips are arranged on the board and

connected by wire bonding. The lower left is a method of stacking packaged chips. The right is a method of

interconnecting various chips via a silicon interposer.

At that time, it was in the early stage of SiP, and TSV was still in R&D level and not commercialized yet.

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Key technologies for manufacturing SiP are shown. The necessary technology development is shown clockwise

from upper left; rerouting technology (line spacing of 10 μm), thinning of wafer (less than 100 μm), chip placement

(5μm accuracy), and patterning technology, etc.

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The picture on the left is the world's smallest Walkman with volume of 3.8cc, prototyped at Sony's semiconductor

company. The cross section of SiP is shown with three bare chips mounted on both sides of a six-layer buildup

board. Electronic parts such as R, L, and C are also mounted.

This was a case to show the power of state-of-the-art SiP at the time of this speech.

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This figure is Sony‘s business vision toward the 21st century. Until around 1994, the business was AV-centric, then

fusion of AV and IT was promoted. Furthermore, networking of AV and IT was promoted. From now on, the

objective is to create value from ubiquitous network. Its base is “always-on connection”, “on-demand”, and

“interactive communication”. This is Sony’s "Ubiquitous Value Network".

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This figure shows that all home appliances are connected. Equipment such as TV, DVD, PC, camera, Walkman,

AIBO, camcorder etc. are connected wirelessly. Content sent from terrestrial broadcasting, BS/CS broadcasting,

the Internet, etc. are shared by all devices.

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"When will Dick Tracy 's watch be available?" was a dream of those days. This is the ultimate nomadic tool. Its

functions include interactive communication, language translation, e-secretary, camera, music, electronic money and

so on. The picture on the right is a prototype made by Sony.

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COMDEX was a computer-related exhibition held in Las Vegas from 1979 to 2003. It was the largest one in those

days. The keynote speaker in 2001 was Mr. Ando, President of Sony. As can be seen in the article, the wristwatch

type interactive communicator shown here was unquestionably a COMDEX star. It can be said that the device is

the origin of today's wearable watch.

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The end of the speech is "Fugaku Sanjurokkei (Thirty-six Sceneries of Mt. Fuji) “ by Hokusai Katsushika.

Now the big wave is about to attack the boat and the boatman has to overcome this difficulty. “Second Digital

Tsunami" is also raging in the semiconductor field. We must fully utilize “Dual engines of SoC and SiP" in order to

survive this.

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dual engines for the second digital tsunami ----- soc and

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