Thursday, May 12, 2011

Panasonic Announces 1.4um Pixel Sensor Made in 32/45nm Process, Apparently FSI

Panasonic announced it has developed 1/2.33-inch 14MP MOS sensor with industry highest sensitivity of 3050 e-/lx/sec/μm2. The new MN34110 is manufactured in 32nm/45nm combined process and features a "new light-focusing structure [which] significantly expands the incident light angle, ensuring uniform and high picture quality, as well as produces a slimmer camera".

Based on the announced sensor's diagonal of 7.7mm and resolution of 14MP, its pixel size appears to be of order of 1.4um. However, no word of BSI appears anywhere in the PR. Instead it's said that "the simple manufacturing process is based on the current MOS image sensor structure, ensuring a stable supply" and "image sensor mass-production technologies allow stable production of MOS image sensors with high picture-quality".

Panasonic will start mass production of a new sensor for digital cameras in December 2011 and says that it "continues to develop various types" (of sensors based on the same pixel technology, probably).


Update: The sensor's preliminary datasheet is available on-line.

4 comments:

  1. My calculations indicates 1.4µm, not 1.1µm pixel size.
    FSI should be more competitive at 1.4µm than at 1.1µm.

    Sensor size: 6.16 mm x 4.62 mm => 7.7 mm diagonal
    With 1.43µm pixel size => 6.16*4.62/1.43^2 = 14.0 Megapixels

    ReplyDelete
  2. You are right. I'm changing the post. Thanks!

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  3. In the Google-translated version of Panasonic's own announcement, it is stated that the sensor is based on Panasonic's SmartFSI(tm) technology.
    So, it's an FSI sensor for sure.

    Here's the link:
    http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=ja&u=http://industrial.panasonic.com/jp/news/nr201105SC001/nr201105SC001.html&ei=DLXNTaaDCISisAPqkdC5Cw&sa=X&oi=translate&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CC0Q7gEwAQ&prev=/search%3Fq%3DPanasonic%2BSmartFSI%26hl%3Den%26biw%3D1369%26bih%3D1056%26prmd%3Divns

    ReplyDelete

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