Multimedia Devices

Multimedia features have moved from simple co-processing functions to the forefront of semiconductor and system design.  However, there appears to be an alarming trend of fewer in-house and third-party solutions available despite the growth prospects of the mobile market.

According to the latest Quarterly Worldwide FPD Forecast Report, global flat panel display revenues for 2009 will be $87.6B, down 15% Y/Y from 2008. The major reason for the decline is erosion in large-area TFT LCD panel prices compared to 2008, despite the fact that the TFT LCD market started to recover in Q2’09. Despite the gloomy forecasted results for 2009, the market is expected to recover in 2010 with a 5% compound annual growth rate and revenues of $93.3B.

The total market size for e-paper displays in 2010 is $131 million rising to $1.17 billion in 2014. This is the value of the display component, not the product. To date, e-paper display technologies have been used in more than $1 billion worth of products. Much of the growth is driven by e-readers following the huge success of Amazon's Kindle. However, much more is to come. In 2020 the market value will reach $7.45 billion thanks to the availability of flexible, color displays and faster refresh rates.

Electronics.ca Publications announces the availability of new database research services. The three databases provide customers with detailed market, product and technology data on global pay TV subscribers, set top boxes (STB), and Wi-Fi enabled products.

Mobile computing devices have eliminated the boundaries between consumer electronics, telecommunications and computing devices. Without a doubt, they constitute the fastest growing segment in consumer electronics and telecommunication end-user devices.

 As the worldwide PMP/MP3 market matures, with shipment growth of only 5% in 2009, competitors are scrambling to add features such as touchscreens and Wi-Fi connectivity to re-ignite demand.  Just a few years ago, the PMP/MP3 player market was among the strongest growth segments in the portable consumer electronic (CE) industry. Today, the market is stalled due to a perfect storm of weak consumer demand, a poor economic environment, a stalled replacement market, and competition from the iPhone and other audio/video-capable smartphones.

CMOS image sensor unit shipments dominate over CCDs nearly 10 to 1 across all market segments. However, excluding the nearly 1.3 billion CMOS camera phone image sensors, CCDs remain strong contenders across several application segments including digital still cameras, camcorders and video surveillance.

The market for digital photo frames has taken-off, particularly since prices dropped to affordable levels in the first half of 2009, according to a new market researach report available at Electronics.ca Publications. However, due to difficult economic conditions and the trend to purchase digital photo frames as gifts pre-loaded with pictures, most units shipped still lack advanced features such as wireless connectivity to the Internet. Nevertheless, wireless-enabled photo frames are a key growth driver as they will grow at twice the rate of overall digital photo frames in 2010.

Although the global recession will prompt a slight decline in USB-enabled device shipments this year, next-generation “SuperSpeed” technology will fuel the market over the next several years, according to a new market research report available at Electronics.ca Publications. SuperSpeed, USB’s new incarnation, will deliver 5Gbps, a ten-fold improvement over high-speed USB. With the late 2009 introduction of SuperSpeed, the question is not whether it will be successful, but how successful it will be.

The personal video recorder (PVR) market is continuing to grow, fueled by high-definition models (HD), according to a new market research report available at Electronics.ca Publications.