CEO's Note

Dear Readers,

3D TOF is such a nice new technology! When Istarted my research more than 30 years ago - it wasexactly in 1985 - I wanted simply to make better lightbarriers. Light barriers which detect dark objects overshort distance only. Or light barriers which alwaysneed a reflector to reach several meters operatingrange. In 1985, who would have thought autonomousdriving, drones, people counting, full area elevatordoor protection, low cost handheld digital rangefinders, mobile robotics - even robots in factorieswere just about to come? Maybe guys like GeorgeOrwell!

Today, the number of 3D TOF applications is almostendless. Due to better understanding of this tech-nology, range resolution in the sub-millimeter domainfor facial scanning is possible as well as long rangeapplication to support autonomous driving. It's ouraim to support the photonics community with applica-tion ideas and hints to open up new markets andapplications. Our newsletter tries to inspire you, dearreader, to make your dream come true!

Beat De Coi

epc611 Application Example: SLAM Deviceepc611 Application Example: SLAM Device

SLAM becomes more and more important! SLAMstands for Simultaneous Localization And Mappingand is essential for mobile robots to navigate in aunknown area. At the same time, the SLAM sensor isused to avoid collision with objects in the scenery.

A very powerful but simple way to do SLAM is using a(fast) range finder, put it to a rotating turntable andread the distances from the range finder synchronouswith the rotation. The result is a map of the scenery.Typically, SLAM sensors have to provide a full 360°distance map ten or more times per second. At thesame time, an angular resolution of 1° or better isrequired. With these requirements, a range findersolution is needed, which allows fast, long distanceand accurate range finding. And it has to be low cost!

The epc611 range finder chip is designed exactly forthis kind of applications. It allows

■ up to 8,000 range measurements per second■ 15m or beyond operating range■ cm accuracy■ low power■ low costA small IR-LED is good enough for the illumination,e.g. a SFH4059 which is available for only a fewcents. The LED is driven directly by the epc611 chiphence no additional driver is needed. Compare thefeatures of the epc611 implementations with SPADsolutions. You will immediately recognize that it alsoworks under full sunlight conditions, much higherspeed, much higher accuracy and much longer range.For easy implementation, an evaluation kit will beavailable soon. It will come with full documentation ofhard and software so it can be used as a referencedesign. Since the epc611 chip does not just provideone spot distance measurement, but a pixel field of8x8 pixel, it allows also for simple gesture control atextremely low cost. The evaluation kit comes withtwo sensor heads:■ A range finder with 15m operating range■ a 8x8 imager with approx. 1 m rangeSoftware is included which allows range finding aswell as simple gesture control (up/down, left/right,forward/backward). Check it out. It's powerful yetsimple and very cost effective.Contact your nearest ESPROS sales representative formore information or checkout our website www.es-pros.com.

CHIPS Newsletter April 2018 www.espros.com

CHIPS. NewsletterApril 2018

If you want to make yourdream come true, wake up.

Rudyard Kipling

Hyperspectral TDI Imager: Start of Mass ProductionHyperspectral TDI Imager: Start of Mass Production

A successful product launch of a customer specificimager took place recently. It utilizes the benefits ofour CMOS/CCD technology in best practice:

■ Very high QE from 350 to 1100nm■ High performance CCD■ Mixed signal CMOS

3k TDI imager on a OHC15F 8" wafer

Our customer implemented two different imagermodels: A 3k TDI with a 10µm pitch and a 4k TDIimager with 7.5µm pitch. Both for low light hyper--spectral imaging. These imagers fill a full reticle withfive wavelength channels. All of them use approx.100 CCD stages for a 40dB signal gain by time-de-layed imaging (TDI). The nice feature of TDI is thatit amplifies the signal without any additional kTCnoise and is thus shot noise limited. This is by far thebest possible way to do imaging with very short(global) shutter exposure at a low light level. Highperformance CCD is an important part of our OHC15Ltechnology and offers incredible options!

The design of the chip has been made by ourcustomer using the PDK of our OHC15L technology.ESPROS supported this design by designing the pixeland CCD stages and some support of the customer'sengineers to use the PDK.

High precision scale readingHigh precision scale reading

Question:

What is the major challenge of scale reading?

Accuracy!

ESPROS' unique bare-die chip scale package opensdoors to get better in accuracy by a factor of 3 to 5:

■ Minimal cross-talk and stray-light effects due tocloser distance of the scale to chip.

■ Anti-reflective coated chip surface: No mirroringeffects by the surfaces of a cover-window (reflec-tions).

One more important advantage: Frame rates up to50'000 lines per second with a resolution of 1'024pixels per frame allow high speed operation forscaling and measuring in real-time applications e.g.positioning systems in servo-system applications.

PCB

Photosensitivesurface far awayfrom glass scale: > 0.5 mm

Photosensitive surfaceclose to glass scale: typ. 0.1mm

high cross-talkwindow

PCB

low cross-talk

light source light sourceGlass scale

Competitor epc901 CCD line imager

chipbond wire

plasticpackage

Glass scale

The slim CSP design of epc901 allows high precision scale reading by being closer with the photosensitive surface to the glass scale

CHIPS Newsletter April 2018 www.espros.com

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