EDACafe Industry Predictions for 2023 – Presto

2023: An Initial Rough Ride with A Long-term Vision of Smooth Sailing

By Michel Villemain, Executive Chairman, Presto Engineering

Michel Villemain

After a bumpy 2020-22 cycle due to unforeseen issues such as COVID and geopolitical uncertainty, we are entering into a period of supply chain normalization in 2023. However, I anticipate that semiconductor pricing will remain volatile due to geopolitical (China/Russia) and macroeconomics (inflation/energy) reasons. As a result, and in common with most industry experts, I anticipate a semiconductor contraction in 2023, driven by consumer demand decrease (especially PCs) after the COVID bubble.

On the bright side, the markets that Presto Engineering serves are expected to be relatively immune from this downturn. These sectors, including medical, industrial, automotive, communications, will continue to invest in innovation and growth.

The medical industry is a very exciting area of growth for us, as COVID has been both a game changer and an eye opener, prompting the need for remote diagnostic and point-of-care-products. However, virtual point of care is not realistic if one needs to use a power outlet – so we are very focused on power efficiency, enabling battery-operated, portable/mobile devices. For example, in 2022, we developed our first IVD ASIC platform solution for infectious disease to materialize our customer’s vision of lab-in-the-palm smartphone.

An important area that I believe will contribute to the next medical revolution is biosensors – and we have invested in the development of analog mixed signal design IP for this growing market. We have also invested in optical front-end technology for impedance spectrometry, which is the next point of care detection arsenal for skin cancer.

For the industrial market, we are preparing the next connectivity capabilities for the industrial internet of things (IIoT), focusing on low power consumption and energy harvesting. Customers are leveraging our combo RFID/NFC/UHF IP platform (“Thor”) for transportation and logistics (e.g., traceability, temperature control, and localization). Semiconductor technology is also enabling “cobots” in the factory, for automation (automatic vision), process control (analog measurements) and preventive maintenance; our analog front-end for optoelectronics coupled with an environmental sensor interface is directing playing into those use cases.

Re-shoring is another major trend I anticipate will continue to advance, although their realization will take time (more 2030 horizon). As major European ASIC supplier, we are looking at opportunities to re-shore key semiconductor manufacturing steps, besides production test that we already perform in our three local operations (in France and Denmark). These local production capabilities provide high value to our European customers, as well as full supply visibility provided by our proprietary OCEAN platform. We are also looking deeper into our supply chains, as material constraints (e.g., leadframes, substrates) will become critical. Related to the travails we went through in the past cycle, we are more systematically developing dual sources, both for assembly and (more surprisingly) for foundry.

In addition, high transportation/freight costs will continue add more justification for shorter, localized supply chains.

Finally, we are anticipating increased focus on securing electronics and semiconductor products, that’s why we’ll continue to leverage our EAL 6 infrastructure.

In summary, while some contraction in 2023 will take place, I expect it will be short, as companies will continue to invest in innovative new products that improve the world we live in — and semiconductor technology is a necessity to make these products a reality.

Category: Predictions

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 17th, 2023 at 11:59 am. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.