Presentation overview

20-11-2012 Large area flexible and stretchable electronics enabling future products

Ex. SMART BLISTER

Kris Van de Voorde – I&I - imec Leuven

Jeroen van den Brand - Large area flexible and stretchable electronics

© Holst Centre

Large area flexible electronics, manufacturing

One of the key challenges: How to manufacture these products?

Large quantities and large sizes…

• roll-to-roll (R2R) manufacturing preferred

easier to make large quantities at low costs

• to be build on low cost flex foils

not on polyimide-foil: ~ 50 euro/m2

but on PET-foil: ~ 3 euro/m2

Printing preferred over lithographic patterning

• easier for roll-to-roll processing

• fine features without complicated masks

But we cannot print everything…

• making large area flex „smart‟: integration of conventional electronics needed

Jeroen van den Brand - Large area flexible and stretchable electronics

< 2

© Holst Centre < 3

Holst Centre: a solid partner in research

Holst Centre

• an independent, open innovation research institute having focus on large area flexible electronics; specific emphasis on manufacturing technologies

• located at the High Tech Campus in Eindhoven, Netherlands (8000 m2 cleanrooms, state-of-the-art facilities)

Jeroen van den Brand - Large area flexible and stretchable electronics

Materials Analysis

Electronic

measurement

Thin Film

clean room

OLED Device

Processing

Reliability lab

Photonics

cleanroom

Electronic

Prototyping

8000 m2 cleanroom

Equipment

Engineering

Life Sciences

facilities

EMC lab

Holst

R2R lab

Holst

Offices

Düsseldorf

Eindhoven

Aachen

Amsterdam

Leuven

Netherlands

Belgium

© Holst Centre < 4

Holst Centre: a solid partner in research

• Independent, with reputed parents

founded by imec (1300 fte, Belgium) and TNO (4500 fte, The Netherlands)

established in 2005

• Critical mass

own staff 190; 25 nationalities

70 „resident‟ researchers

• Characteristics

bridging gap between industry and academia: working on technologies that will reach market in 3-5 years

perform joint research with industrial partners in Shared Research Programs

• Funding

supported by both Dutch government and industrial partners

Jeroen van den Brand - Large area flexible and stretchable electronics

© Holst Centre

Jeroen van den Brand - Large area flexible and stretchable electronics

< 5

Industrial partners from across the value chain

© Holst Centre

Flexible

Smart Devices

© Holst Centre

Flexible Smart Device

Label or other foil based product

that contains some sensor functionality

and associated electronics

that can be read out wirelessly

© Holst Centre

Large area flexible electronics at Holst Centre

Jeroen van den Brand - Large area flexible and stretchable electronics

< 8

manufacturing technologies to make devices possible

special emphasis on roll-to-roll

• coating / printing of functional materials (OLED/OPV) on large areas

• printing of conductive structures on foil

• lamination of foils and integrating chips

• patterning on/of foils (imprint, laser)

flexible lighting (OLEDs) flexible solar cells intelligent food/pharma

© Holst Centre < 9 < 9

Integration technologies

Technologies under development…

• integrating components with foils

• lamination and interconnection of foils

LED

embedded chip

< 9

Jeroen van den Brand - Large area flexible and stretchable electronics

thin chips

© Holst Centre

Assembly, the next step, early 2012:

• move to single chip solution, dedicated ASIC

• integration as thin „bare die‟: easier foil handling, chip „hidden‟ in adhesive

Jeroen van den Brand - Large area flexible and stretchable electronics

< 10

without package

thinning chip down to 20-30 µm

chip becomes flexible

fully operational, 30 μm thick radio chip on PET foil

Enabling future smart products: Smart Blister

© Holst Centre

Trends in printed electronics

World’s first organic TFT microcontroller on a foil

(8 bit, 3000 transistors, running at 6 Hz) – ISSCC 2011

© Holst Centre

But it will take quite some time until we can print this…

Si IC technology still the most logical way to give the large area flexible electronics product its

intelligence

Texas Instruments MSP430

microcontroller

16 bits, runs at 8 MHz, contains clock, AD & DA convertors, memory,…

at a cost of down to 1-2 euro

© Holst Centre

Holst Centre

Printing structures

• electronic circuitry (down to 50 um line/spacing)

• passives

• technologies

inkjet printing

(rotary R2R) screen printing

printed passives

R2R infrastructure electronic circuitry

© Holst Centre

General purpose NFC-compatible flexible sensor label

- demonstrated to work with humidity, temperature, amine, ethylene

Holst Centre

Examples of what can be made with technologies

printed antenna

printed battery

surface mounted chips

© Holst Centre

Challenges of smart blister

• Assembled

• “3D”-system

• High cost

• Added to existing package,

• Fully integrated

• 2D-System in Foil

• Low cost, mass fabrication

• Roll to Roll compatible

© Holst Centre

A good case for large area flexible electronics:

• label with electronics, to be „glued‟ onto existing blisters

• comparably large surface area (15 x 5 cm)

• large quantities needed at low cost (PET foils)

• simple electronic circuitry • coarse pitch, can be printed

• single chip solution

Enabling future smart products: Smart Blister

< 16

dedicated ASIC (integrated sensor, radio, microcontroller)

breaklines for measuring pill push-through antenna

battery

Jeroen van den Brand - Large area flexible and stretchable electronics

© Holst Centre

• Features

3 chip solution (MC, RTC, NFC Eeprom)

All electronics in footprint blister

Printed resistance ladder

Monitor when en what pill is pushed through

NFC communication

Proto-type

© Holst Centre

Enabling future smart products: Smart Blister

an essential ingredient: the ‘Smart Blister’

• intelligent medicine blister

• registers/stores time and date of pill push through

• wirelessly communicates with doctor through mobile phone

• team-up in Holst ecosystem to develop blister

Jeroen van den Brand - Large area flexible and stretchable electronics

< 18

© Holst Centre

Examples of what can be made with technologies

Holst Centre

health monitoring functionality, integrated into a low cost, disposable foil-based patch

embedded chips (thickness 20 µm)

fine pitch Cu-on-PET circuitry

self-adhering

© Holst Centre

Summary

• Classical electronics and foil technology meet in flexible integrated smart systems

Sensor enabled RFID “labels” are based on classic technologies

Sensors simple time temperature, humidity

Printed electronics lacks computing power

Little effort on integration on system level

• Hybrid integration

Printed circuitry has advantages over Cu: Integrated manufacturing possible

Classical components can be bonded reliable to PET

Sensors developed on Si can be transferred to foil

• Technology allows for production ready NFC labels

Smart Blister

Smart Label

• Outlook: electronics will disappear entirely into the substrate

© Holst Centre

-7x8 Led matrix designed for testing and developing the technology - functional samples are used as demonstrators

CMST – stretchable electronics