Senseeker's Custom Readout IC Design Will Make Your FPA All That It Can Be

Ross Bannatyne (Director of Business Development) & Thomas Poonnen, PhD (Director of Engineering)

 

 

 

There has been a lot of interest in Senseeker’s commercial Oxygen® and Magnesium® MIL readout IC products since they were launched in early 2020. What you may not know is that these products are just the tip of the iceberg in terms of advanced readout IC designs that Senseeker has completed. Over the last decade, Senseeker has completed over forty unique digital readout IC (DROIC) and digital pixel readout IC (DPROIC) designs. Although these custom products are not available off-the-shelf like the Oxygen and the Magnesium MIL, they have provided robust and innovative solutions to developers of focal plane arrays, in many cases advancing the state-of-the-art.

The range of readout IC designs that Senseeker has produced is shown in the scatterplot chart. The number of product designs completed is shown along the X-axis at the bottom of the graphic. Pixel pitches range from 4 µm to 100 µm and array formats exceed 25 Megapixels. Each design was optimized to address a unique set of requirements, enabling focal plane array (FPA) performance to conform to the most challenging specifications. For every custom IC design that is initiated, Senseeker provides a written guarantee of correct design.

One of the reasons FPA developers outsource readout IC designs to Senseeker is that our ICs use simple interfaces, command and control, programmability and useful operating modes to get up-and-running fast. We also provide back-end electronics and software that support plug-and-play interfacing with commercial frame grabbers and industry-standard test Dewars, such as those from SE-IR. This ecosystem of development and support tools has evolved over a decade, to ensure that new Senseeker ICs are ready for evaluation as quickly as possible after the design cycle is complete.

In addition to this rich heritage of custom IC design, Senseeker often helps out with further services to expedite FPA development for our customers. Senseeker closely partners with several U.S. based foundries and provides logistics management of running wafers through the fab if needed. After wafers have been manufactured, Senseeker has the capability of testing them in-house at our Santa Barbara facility. This has proven to be the fastest and most cost-effective way to get tested products into our customers' hands. Our engineers also typically stay engaged with customers as the FPAs are developed to ensure that the FPA performance is optimized with a refined readout IC configuration, enabled by the back-end electronics and software that support the chip.

Ask us about a custom readout IC design for your FPA!

About Senseeker Engineering

Senseeker is a wholly US owned transducer IC semiconductor company that specializes in the design of state-of-the-art digital imaging sensors and readout integrated circuits for hybrid infrared image sensing arrays. Senseeker's products and IP enable designers to produce world class infrared image sensing solutions. Read more at https://www.senseeker.com.

 

Media contact: info@senseeker.com | 1 (805) 617-0337

 

Insight # IS-20201201-01