Global PCB Connections: Rigid-flex and Flexible PCBs—The Backbone of Modern Electronics
Flexible Thinking: The Key to a Successful Flex Circuit Design Transfer
Happy’s Tech Talk #29: Bend-to-Install Semi-flex FR-4
14th Electronic Circuits World Convention
June 20, 2017 | Happy HoldenEstimated reading time: 10 minutes
Figure 3: World electronic equipment monthly shipments, converted at fluctuating exchange rates. (Source: Custer Consulting Group.)
Figure 4 shows the IC end-use markets and growth rates to 2020. Self-driving cars may reach 10 million by 2020. The 5G telecom market is expected to grow to $250B by 2015. This will start with Korea Telecom using 5G for the 2018 Winter Olympics. IoT has $16B worth of installed devices in 2016, and this is expected to grow to $200B by 2023, with nearly 75 billion devices connected by 2020. In the same vein, Figure 5 shows the estimates of wearable devices from 2015 to 2017, in millions. In 2016, there were 17,600 robots in factories (most related to automobiles), 5,100 in electronics assembly and 1,900 in metal fab/foundries. The growth of PCBs is less certain due to the need for more integrated packaging strategies between the chips and the board.
Figure 4: IC end-use systems markets ($B) and growth rates. (Source: IC Insights 12/16.)
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