Minxin Shares: MEMS solutions will tap the unlimited potential of intelligent robots

Recently, with the confirmation that the humanoid Opmus will be launched next year, the industry predicts that the global robotics industry is in the best investment window from 0 to 1, and the relevant industrial chain will usher in an opportunity for explosive growth. Among them, the foundation of robots to realize perception functions will encounter important development opportunities.

According to McKinsey's forecast, in the long run, the global humanoid robot market space can reach 120 trillion yuan, which is a brand new and huge blue ocean market. According to other data, the scale of my country's humanoid robot market will be about 870 billion yuan in 2030, which will become the largest single market in the global MEMS industry, with a growth rate far higher than the global average.

Like electric vehicles, intelligent robots can also drive the huge upstream industrial chain and downstream application demand. The three major robot industrial chains: upstream parts and raw materials, midstream system integration and body manufacturing, and downstream personal and enterprise-related application scenarios. The cost can be divided into powertrain systems, intelligent sensing systems, structural parts and other parts. MEMS sensors serve as the basis for robots to realize intelligent sensing functions and will encounter important development opportunities.

According to McKinsey's forecast, in the long run, the global humanoid robot market space can reach 120 trillion yuan, which is a brand new and huge blue ocean market.

Sensors are an integral part of intelligent robots

Intelligent robots will have natural language processing, motion planning and control functions, and the ability to interact with the physical world such as voice interaction, walking and performing complex tasks. The foundation and core of all perception is sensors.

MEMS sensors solve the contradiction between low power consumption, miniaturization, high integration and intelligence, so they have unparalleled application advantages in the field of intelligent robots. By sensing a variety of motion and environmental factors, they provide highly reliable, scalable, sensitive and cost-effective solutions for data collection. Moreover, the higher the degree of anthropomorphism of the robot, the more types and quantities of sensors will be used.

From the classification point of view, they can be divided into internal sensors and external sensors. Internal sensors include physical sensors such as position, speed, force, acceleration, etc., which are mainly used to measure the robot's own state to achieve independent walking, dynamic balance, general limb movements, etc.; external sensors imitate human senses, including vision, touch, hearing, smell, taste and other sensors.

As robots become more intelligent, they will be loaded with more and more MEMS sensors. According to experts’ estimates, the sensing part accounts for about 10% to 20% of the total cost. The robotics field is expected to become an emerging market for MEMS sensors after automobiles.

MEMS will tap into the unlimited potential of robot “humans”

Minxin Technology Co., Ltd. is a technology platform company focusing on MEMS. It was founded in Suzhou in 2007 and listed on the Science and Technology Innovation Board in 2020. It is known as the "No. 1 MEMS Stock in China". As one of the few companies in China that has the ability to design and manufacture multiple categories of MEMS chips, Minxin Technology Co., Ltd. provides MEMS microphones, inertial sensors, MEMS IMU and other MEMS solutions to support the development of intelligent robots.

For example, the interactive function of intelligent robots cannot be separated from multiple complex and compact MEMS microphones, which must be able to distinguish the speaker's voice from the noise and locate the direction. Minxin's high-performance MEMS microphone sensors are manufactured with advanced processing technology, and use beamforming technology to identify the speaker's direction based on arrival time and intensity differences, and eliminate noise components from external background sounds through noise cancellation technology. Minxin's MEMS microphone shipments have ranked fourth in the world, and can be customized according to customer needs.

Pressure sensors can sense accurate information for robots, helping them to move stably and accurately. When performing tasks such as object recognition, grasping, and manipulation, they can also sense information such as the shape, size, and position of objects and perform precise operations, thereby improving the intelligence and autonomy of humanoid robots and enabling them to better adapt to complex environments and tasks.

This year, Minxin Co., Ltd. developed an ultrasonic ToF sensor based on PMUT. The most popular ultrasonic sensor in robot applications is that it can work under any lighting conditions and is not affected by the color and transparency of the object being measured. It is used for obstacle, high and low slope detection and ground detection, including the hardness of the ground, with an accuracy of up to millimeters.

MEMS IMU (Inertial Measurement Unit, also known as inertial sensor) is mainly used to detect and measure acceleration and rotational motion, and can provide motion perception and control capabilities for robots. For example, it can achieve robot posture control, walking stability, gait coordination, and imitate human movements.

Zhonghong Weiyu, a holding subsidiary of Minxin Co., Ltd., was established in 2013. Over the past ten years, it has focused on the research and development, upgrading and iteration of technologies such as MEMS inertial sensors and MEMS IMU, which also confirms Minxin Co., Ltd.'s concept of building a MEMS technology platform enterprise - technology research, technology superposition, and technology precipitation.

MEMS IMU is difficult to develop, requires high technical accumulation, and has strong technical barriers. For example, it takes nearly ten years for MEMS gyroscopes to go from research and development to mass production. Minxin shares, through the accumulation of Zhonghong Micro-Universe IMU, invested in Minyi Chain Semiconductor's gyroscope design and self-developed acceleration sensor technology, will lay out the industrial chain from MEMS acceleration sensors, MEMS gyroscopes and MEMS IMUs. In the blue ocean of the large domestic market, it is expected to replicate the success in the field of acoustic sensors, thereby achieving a qualitative leap in the fields of unmanned systems and intelligent robots.

In the future, robots will become more and more similar to humans, and MEMS solutions are the basis and condition for all the "humanization" of intelligent robots. Minxin Co., Ltd., which has the title of "China's first MEMS chip stock", as a MEMS technology platform enterprise, has sounded the clarion call for entry.