Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1098973
APRIL 2019 I SMT007 MAGAZINE 67 Johnson: In this parti-cular application, you're demon- strating a fairly large piece of flexible PCB material with printing on it. Liu: This is a printed pres- sure sensor mapping system. The whole device is very thin and flexible, and integrated with our battery. There are other pressure sensors in the market, but not of this kind. The pressure sensor has a long history, but most of them are using rigid semiconductor or ceramic bases. If you want to realize a mapping system, for example, you want a 100 by 100 pixels—which means 10,000 pixels—you need 10,000 sensors. That is not cost effective, and you need a complex driver and circuit design. With our technology, we print all of the mate- rials on a piece of plastic. With this sensor, you just need three layers—electrode, pressure- sensitive materials, and another layer of the electrode. We print it by using this technology. Johnson: You're printing in a matrix. Liu: Yes, like a matrix. Each compact point is a pixel. If you want 100 or 10,000 pixels, you can just change the printing screen. You can get 10,000 pixels in one go. So that's an amazing point of this technology. Johnson: By using a fairly simple material in a fairly simple manufacturing process—just three layers—you can create a highly custom- izable sensor bed. Liu: It can be large or small. You can have more or less pixel points and print it in differ- ent shapes. It can be used in your shoe pad, a wheelchair, and even for kid's gait monitoring. Johnson: These types of sensor applications tie in very nicely to the emerging IoT transition going on. You're providing input devices to track things such as the mobility of an elderly person? Liu: Yes, or even to track if your posture is correct as you're sitting here. Johnson: Right, so it's very flexible in a lot of different ways. Is this also a technology that you are planning to take to market? Liu: We are looking into different industries such as wheelchair companies or smart robot- ics. I cannot disclose more at this moment. Johnson: Is this technology something that the NAMI is looking to manufacture or are you licensing the technology? Liu: We're licensing the technology. The NAMI is government-funded, non-profit institute. We offer solutions and technology transfer, and we are very happy to work with industries from all over the world to apply our technology to products from various industries. Johnson: Thank you, Tracy. Liu: Thank you. SMT007 Printable batteries in a variety of configurations. Liu points out that these batteries are versatile enough to be applied to paper or textiles.