What are the emerging application areas of integrated circuit chips?

Starting from six aspects, the development trend of integrated circuit chips in emerging applications is analyzed. Since 2010, the MEMS market has entered a rapid growth period driven by silicon microphones and inertial sensors. From the perspective of downstream applications, automotive electronics and consumer electronics are currently the most important applications. IDC predicts that wearables will experience double-digit growth between 2015 and 2020. As an emerging application in the communications industry, the Internet of Things will expand in size under the general trend of the Internet of Everything. The accelerated development of the industrial robot industry has become a promising explosive growth strategic emerging industry. In recent years, investment in virtual reality at home and abroad has been very hot. The capital market has keenly captured the commercialization prospects of artificial intelligence, and the heat of investment and financing in the field of artificial intelligence in China has rapidly increased.

1 sensor (MEMS) market

MEMS (Micro-Electro-Mechanical System) is an emerging field developed on the basis of semiconductor manufacturing technology. It is the integration of micro-circuits and micro-machines on the chip according to functional requirements. It is based on semiconductor technology such as photolithography and etching, and is integrated into ultra-precision machining. Combining materials, mechanics, chemistry, optics, etc., enables a millimeter or micron MEMS system with precise and complete electrical, mechanical, chemical, optical and other characteristics. MEMS devices mainly include sensors, actuators, micro-energy, etc. The sensors are mature, and the actuators and micro-energy are mostly in their infancy.

MEMS is currently mainly used in the fields of consumer electronics and automobiles. As products continue to mature, applications in the aerospace, medical, and industrial fields are becoming more common. Table 1 lists the main application areas of MEMS.

1.1 Global MEMS market

Since 2010, the MEMS market has entered a rapid growth period driven by silicon microphones and inertial sensors. From the perspective of downstream applications, automotive electronics and consumer electronics are currently the most important applications.

From 2010 to 2015, the annual compound growth rate (CAGR) of automotive electronics was 6.8%, which was higher than 5.1% of consumer electronics [1]. Due to the rapid innovation in the field of consumer electronics, the CAGR of the consumer electronics sector from 2015 to 2020 was 10.9%. It is predicted that the CAGR of automobiles, industry and medical care will be 4.3%, 7.7% and 11.8% from 2015 to 2020, respectively.

Globally, the current market size of MEMS is about 12 billion US dollars, and it is expected to reach nearly 20 billion US dollars by 2020, with an average annual compound growth rate of 11.6%, as shown in Figure 1, far exceeding the single digit increase of the traditional semiconductor industry. Speed ​​[2]. Figure 2 shows the total size of the global MEMS market by application category.

1.2 China's MEMS market

In recent years, the hardware innovation market has gradually shifted to China. The demand for MEMS sensors in the Chinese market is much higher than that of the global MEMS market, which is about 13.9%. The growth rate is much higher than the growth rate of the global MEMS market. It is expected that the total market will reach nearly 2020 by 2020. $6 billion. From the perspective of downstream applications, automotive electronics and consumer electronics are also the main growth drivers in China's MEMS industry. The CAGR for automotive electronics and consumer electronics in 2010-2015 was 12.4% and 10.6%, respectively, as shown in Figure 3. Due to the acceleration of the localization of China's consumer electronics and automotive electronics industry chain, the average annual compound growth rate of consumer electronics is expected to reach 17.2%, and automotive electronics will reach 10.3% [1]. Figure 4 shows the division of the Chinese MEMS market by application.

China's sensor industry has formed a complete industrial system from technology research and development, design, production to application. Some sub-divisions have reached the world's leading level [3]. During the “Twelfth Five-Year Plan” period, China's sensitive components and sensors industry accounted for 20.9%. The annual compound growth rate has achieved rapid development. However, as far as the overall level is concerned, domestically produced sensor products are still dominated by the low-end and the technical level is relatively backward [4]. The middle and low-end products can basically be “self-sufficient”, but the import of medium and high-end sensors accounts for 80%, and the digital, intelligent and miniaturized products are lacking.

2 wearable device market

A smart wearable terminal is a device that can be worn directly on the body or integrated into clothes and accessories, and can be interacted with by the software to interact with the cloud. Currently, wearable terminals often appear as mobile phone auxiliary devices, among which smart bracelets, smart watches and smart glasses are the most common [5].

2.1 The global wearable device market

IDC announced the global wearable device market report for the fourth quarter and full year of 2016 in March 2017. In the fourth quarter of 2016, global wearables shipments were 33.9 million units, up 16.9% year-on-year; the year-on-year growth was 25.0%, reaching 102.4 million units, surpassing 100 million units for the first time. The old-fashioned powerhouse Fitbit is still the first, with 6.5 million units shipped and 29.0% share, no one can compare; but the quarter-on-quarter decline of 22.7%, the year-on-year increase of 2.4%, reaching 22.5 million, with a share of 22.0 %, down 4.8 percentage points. In the fourth quarter of 2016, Xiaomi's shipments were 5.2 million units, a sharp increase of 96.2%; the year-on-year growth was 31.0%, and the shipment volume was 15.7 million units, with the market share rising to 15.4%. Apple's Apple Watch shipments fell 7.9% year-on-year to 1.07 million, with a share of 10.5%, as shown in Table 2.

IDC predicts that with the growth of the wearable device vendor team and rapidly increasing consumer awareness and demand, wearables will see double-digit growth in 2015-2020, driving wearable device shipments More than 200 million units in 2019 and 237.1 million units by 2020.

2.2 China's wearable device market

IDC's “China Wearable Device Market Quarterly Tracking Report (Q4 2016)” shows that China's wearable device market has maintained a rapid development trend in 2016, and annual market shipments increased by 68.1% compared with 2015. In the fourth quarter of 2016, China's wearable device market shipments were 12.43 million units, a year-on-year increase of 53.5%. Among them, basic wearable devices represented by wristbands, children's watches and smart running shoes increased by 62.7% year-on-year.

However, it is worth noting that smart wearable devices based on smart watches have fallen by 14.1% year-on-year, which is due to the serious homogenization of products [6]. IDC predicts that by 2020, China's wearable device shipments will reach 83 million units, with a CAGR of 28.5% over the next five years.

At present, China's smart wearable device market is still in an attempted product-driven phase, and market performance is greatly affected by external factors such as product replacement. In the future, as the independence of smart wearable devices increases, the scene experience and application model will be more optimized and mature. After the user needs are fully cultivated and mobilized, the market will transition from a trial-oriented product driver to a mature demand driver. Come to steady and rapid growth.

3 Internet of Things market

According to statistics, the global IoT market reached US$62.4 billion in 2015, a year-on-year increase of 29%. By 2018, the global IoT device market is expected to reach US$103.6 billion, and the compound annual growth rate will reach 21% from 2013 to 2018 [7], as shown in Figure 5.

At the same time, more and more items and equipment are being connected to the Internet of Things. In 2015, the number of global IoT devices has reached 4.9 billion units [7]. In 2016, the cumulative number of devices will reach 6.392 billion units. By 2020, the number of IoT devices used worldwide will increase to 20.8 billion units. It is expected that the number of IoT devices will exceed the total of PC, tablet and smartphone stocks by 2018. The number of new IoT devices connected in 2019 will increase from 1.691 billion in 2015 to 3.054 billion, as shown in Figure 6.

In China, the Internet of Things has been included in the key development areas of the 13th Five-Year Plan, and the development of the Internet of Things in China is also in full swing. According to the data released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the scale of China's Internet of Things industry reached 600 billion yuan in 2014, a year-on-year increase of 22.6%. In 2015, the industry scale reached 750 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 29.3%. It is predicted that the overall scale of China's Internet of Things will be 2020. More than 1.8 trillion yuan, as shown in Figure 7.

As an emerging application in the communications industry, the Internet of Things will expand in size under the general trend of the Internet of Everything. With the improvement of industry standards, continuous technological advancement, and national policy support, China's Internet of Things industry will continue its good development momentum and provide new impetus for sustained and steady economic growth. The wave of expansion of mobile internet to the Internet of Everything will prompt China to create greater market space and industrial opportunities than the Internet [8].

4 Industrial robots

It is estimated that the global service robot market will reach US$45 billion in 2017, with a compound annual growth rate of 16.9% in the next five years (2017-2021) and a global service robot market size of US$82 billion in 2021.

In April 2016, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the “Robot Industry Development Plan (2016~2020)”, which regards robots as a key development area and guides the rapid, healthy and sustainable development of China's robot industry. In December of the same year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology formulated the "Standard Conditions for Industrial Robot Industry" to strengthen the quality management of industrial robot products and standardize the market order of the industry. The accelerated development of the industrial robot industry has become a promising explosive growth strategic emerging industry.

In 2016, China's industrial robot production has reached 72,400 units, an increase of 34.3% [9], and sales account for about 1/4 of the world's total. It is the world's largest industrial robot consumer market. The industry expects that the total size of China's industrial robot market will reach 600 billion yuan in the next 10 years [10].

At present, there are more than 3,000 industrial robot manufacturing and service enterprises in China. The industrial structure has taken initial shape. Currently, it is in the growth stage. The market share of independent brands is only 32%, and foreign products in the high-end market account for 95%. The key core components still rely on imports. . The number of robots per 10,000 people is only half of the international average, which is 15% of the advanced countries.

According to the data released by the China Robot Industry Alliance, the structure adjustment and upgrading of domestic robot products and the industrial structure have gradually improved, such as the proportion of multi-joint robots continues to increase. In terms of mechanical structure, in the first half of 2016, domestic coordinate robots maintained their leading position and sales accelerated. The sales volume exceeded 8,100 units, accounting for 42.1% of the total sales of domestic industrial robots, an increase of 4.7 percentage points over 2015. Multi-joint robots sold a total of 6,225 units in the first half of 2016, a year-on-year increase of 67.2%. The growth rate was basically the same as in 2015, accounting for 32.3% of the total sales of industrial robots, an increase of 5 percentage points over the full year of 2015. The sales volume of factory logistics robots exceeded 1,000 units, a year-on-year growth rate of 71.3%, accounting for the same proportion of total robot sales as in 2015. Plane multi-joint robots sold 1,750 units, up 12.6% year-on-year, accounting for 4.7 percentage points lower than the total sales in 2015.

Cylindrical coordinate robots sold 563 units, a year-on-year increase of 17.8%. Sales of parallel robots declined in the first half of 2016, and 330 units were sold, down 7% year-on-year.

From the perspective of the application industry, domestic industrial robots have served the 37 major industries in the national economy in 2016. Compared with 2015, the application fields are broader. Among them, 3C manufacturing (computer manufacturing, communication equipment manufacturing and other electronic equipment manufacturing) and automobile manufacturing accounted for the highest proportion of domestic industrial robot sales, accounting for 30% and 12.6% respectively. In particular, the 3C manufacturing industry accounted for nearly 20% increase over the same period of 2015, further demonstrating China's complete manufacturing sector and providing a broad market space for the application of industrial robots [11].

5 VR/AR (Virtual Reality / Augmented Reality)

Virtual Reality (VR) is an interactive three-dimensional dynamic real-time and motion simulation that uses computer simulation systems to generate multi-source information fusion to enable users to produce immersive experiences. The technology creates a new form of human-computer interaction by mobilizing the user's senses such as sight, hearing, touch and smell, and immersing the user in a computer-generated virtual environment. Augmented Reality (AR), which is closely related to virtual reality, is a technology that combines virtual images on the screen with optoelectronic technology to integrate it with the real world and interact with users. VR devices have much higher requirements for data processing, data transmission and image display than current electronic computers. In addition to the need to create realistic and immersive virtual images, AR also needs to seamlessly interface with real-world images. It is a higher grade than VR.

Although the concept of virtual reality was proposed as early as the 1960s, due to the large bottleneck of electronic and optical technology, there has been no experience of good products. In recent years, with the breakthrough of chip technology and display technology, the VR industry has ushered in a round of outbreaks. Especially at the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show in the United States, virtual reality products became the absolute protagonist of the show [12].

According to a report released by SuperData in March 2017, the global VR output value exceeded US$1.8 billion in 2016, of which PC terminal accounted for US$718 million, mobile terminal accounted for US$687 million, and host terminal accounted for US$411 million.

In 2016, the global shipment of VR helmets was 6.3 million units, of which Samsung Gear VR shipped 4.51 million units and the market share exceeded 71%. It is the best-selling VR helmet in the market. Other competitors include PS VR, HTC Vive, and Oculus Rift, with a total shipment of only 1.42 million units in 2016. PS VR sales followed closely behind Gear VR, with a total shipment of 750,000 units in 2016. HTC Vive shipped 420,000 units in 2016 and Oculus Rift 250,000 units. In 2017, global VR hardware revenue is expected to reach US$3.6 billion, an increase of 142% year-on-year. Shipments of VR headsets are expected to grow to more than 5 million units in 2017. The Chinese market is growing more rapidly [13], and the year-on-year growth will reach 441.2%.

IDC's assessment report released in March 2017 shows that the market for augmented reality (AR) will be twice as large as virtual reality (VR) in the next four years. Total shipments of AR and VR equipment are expected to exceed 99.4 million units in 2021, while total shipments of AR and VR equipment are currently 10.1 million units [14].

Although current virtual reality (VR) devices dominate the market in terms of revenue, IDC believes that the future of augmented reality (AR) will usher in rapid growth. The total revenue of AR equipment in 2016 was US$209 million, and it is expected to exceed US$48.7 billion in 2021. The total revenue of VR equipment in 2016 was US$2.1 billion, and it is expected to grow to US$18.6 billion in 2021, as shown in Figure 8. Because AR devices are on average $1,000 more expensive than VR devices, AR does not have too many consumers at first.

In 2016, the total size of China's virtual reality market was 6.82 billion yuan, which is still in the market cultivation period. With the launch of various products such as Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, and Sony PS VR, 2017 will usher in a rapid development period of VR. Based on the overall market, product maturity and key technologies, CCID Consulting is optimistic about the development of virtual reality. It is expected that the market will enter a relatively mature period by 2020, with a scale of 91.82 billion yuan and an average annual compound growth rate. 125.3% [15], as shown in Figure 9.

In recent years, investment in virtual reality at home and abroad has been very hot. In 2015, the global VR/AR sector received a total investment of US$690 million. In 2016, the investment scale increased to US$2.32 billion, a growth rate of 236.2%, which is higher than that of other sectors [15]. On the whole, unlike most of the VR investments in 2015, which were biased towards video and games, the investment hardware increased the most in 2016, mainly due to the large financing of hardware manufacturer Magic Leap. In addition, investment is more focused on areas such as advertising marketing that have higher realizable value, as well as more technically valuable software and solutions. From the perspective of the industry chain, the investment in advertising/marketing in 2016 accounted for 8% of the total investment in the VR sector, although the proportion was not high, but the growth rate reached 438.0%, as shown in Figure 10, second only to the hardware.

6 Artificial Intelligence (AI)

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a new technical science that studies and develops theories, methods, techniques, and application systems for simulating, extending, and extending human intelligence. Research in this area includes robotics, language recognition, and imagery. Identification, natural language processing and expert systems [16]. In March 2016, Li Shishi battled AlphaGo, and artificial intelligence quickly entered the public eye.

The capital market has keenly captured the commercialization prospects of artificial intelligence, and the heat of investment and financing in the field of artificial intelligence in China has rapidly increased. From 2012 to 2015, the amount of investment and financing, the number of participating companies and the number of participating institutions in China's artificial intelligence industry all increased rapidly, with an average annual compound growth rate of more than 50%. In 2015, the investment in the artificial intelligence industry reached 23 times in 2012, such as As shown in Figure 11, it fully demonstrates the recognition of the development prospects of artificial intelligence in the capital market.

In the next five years, China's artificial intelligence market has a vast space and its development rate is far faster than the global. In 2020, the global AI market will reach 119 billion yuan, with an average annual compound growth rate of 19.7%, as shown in Figure 12. In the same period, China's artificial intelligence growth rate will reach 9.1 billion yuan, with an average annual compound growth rate of over 50%, as shown in Figure 13, far exceeding global growth rate.

From the capital market investment and financing data, it is known that domestic enterprises mostly deploy artificial intelligence from the application layer. At present, about 71% of enterprises that have received artificial intelligence investment in China are application-oriented enterprises, 26% are technology-based enterprises, and basic resource-based enterprises account for only 3%, of which software service enterprises account for 83% of all invested enterprises. In addition, unlike the international investment in key machine learning, more than half of the investment and financing of technology-based enterprises focus on the field of machine vision, accounting for only 9% of investment in machine learning, and most of them are giant-type enterprises [16].

According to the “China Smart Industry Development White Paper”, the year-on-year growth rate of the speech recognition technology market in 2016 and 2017 will reach approximately 47% and 70%, respectively, as shown in Figure 14. For computer vision, face recognition technology will remain the main focus of the application level, and the market growth rate will remain stable at a higher level, as shown in Figure 15. According to the “China Face Recognition Industry Research and Development Trend Forecast”, the size of the face recognition market will maintain a high growth rate of 20% to 30% in the next five years.

7 Conclusion

Under the guidance of the National Integrated Circuit Industry Development Promotion Program and the support of the National IC Industry Investment Fund, China's IC industry has continued to advance rapidly and has aroused great repercussions around the world. In emerging applications, there is still a certain gap between China's IC industry and advanced regions. Under the condition that the industry's environment is still not perfect, the rise of China's IC industry will inevitably encounter some ups and downs.