Market Trends

A site with a lot of good aticles:
http://www.smalltimes.com/articles/stm_category_display.cfm?c=Elect&CatName=Electronics

NEW MICROSYSTEMS APPLICATIONS
DRIVE FAST GROWTH, STUDY SAYS

http://www.smalltimes.com/articles/article_display.cfm?Section=ARCHI&C=RD&ARTICLE_ID=267742&p=109

By Valerie Thompson
Small Times Correspondent

ZURICH, Switzerland, April 8, 2002 -- A study by members of Europe's key MEMS and microsystems association sees the world market for the products more than doubling from its 2000 level by 2005.

A new market research report from the Network of Excellence in Multifunctional Microsystems (NEXUS), a marketing organization for the microsystems industry, predicts that the worldwide market for microsystems technology (MST) will grow from $30 billion in 2000 to $68 billion in 2005.

NEXUS defines MST as all products that are microstructures in design, including monolithic and hybrid components and silicon-based devices, as well as anything micromachined.

Growth rate over the next five years is expected to be 20 percent each year.

Webcast on MEMS
Overview:
The development of microelectromechanical systems has long been plagued by a lack of standards and a multiplicity of processes - exactly the type of situation which makes the contract manufacturing of precision components difficult. And yet today a crop of nimble MEMS design companies are going into production to make tilt sensors, resonators, microphones, RF switches and more using contract manufacturers. Meanwhile, both industrial and consumer markets pose better opportunities for MEMS makers than they have in years.