Mar 11 2004
STMicroelectronics, one of the world's leading semiconductor manufacturers, today announced details of its leadership role in PolyApply, a new, four-year research project launched by the European Commission under its 6th Research, Technological development, and Demonstration Framework Programme. The aim of the PolyApply project is to lay the foundations of a scalable and ubiquitously applicable communication technology that will make 'ambient intelligence' commercially viable through the use of low-cost, polymer-based electronic circuits.
'Ambient intelligence' means integrating a variety of electronic functions, such as sensing, computing, and communications, into everyday objects, all of which will be able to interact via a low-cost, RF-communications technology. Today, although most electronic functions are implemented by means of silicon chips and each new generation of silicon chip technology reduces the cost of implementing a given electronic function, there are many potential applications of 'ambient intelligence' that require costs far lower than will be achieved with silicon-based technology.
To enable these applications, a new technology will be required; one that preserves existing system- and circuit-design expertise but uses materials and devices that can be manufactured at substantially lower cost. Polymer-based electronics promises to allow these sensing, computing, and communications functions, as well as additional capabilities that will result in new products with added value, to be implemented on a wide range of substrates. These substrates include flexible or paper materials such as consumer-packaging materials.
Within the PolyApply project, ST has been chosen to coordinate all of the activities and will also lead the team working on the development of new materials, devices, and circuits. Gianguido Rizzotto, Group VP and General Manager of ST's Soft-computing, Silicon optics and post-silicon Technologies (SST) group, will act as overall co-ordinator of the PolyApply project. The PolyApply consortium comprises 20 partners, including leading European industrial enterprises as well as renowned academic and research institutes.
"Although silicon technology has underpinned most advances in electronic devices and applications for many decades and will continue to have this fundamental role for at least the next ten years, there are many exciting potential applications that can only be enabled by the development of new technologies, such as polymer electronics, that are inherently much less expensive than silicon," said Rizzotto.
The aim of the PolyApply project is to provide a complete framework for such developments, from the protocols that will be used by 'intelligent objects' to communicate with each other to the actual polymer-based technologies that will be used to manufacture them.
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