A research team in Taiwan has disclosed it has developed flexible (bendable) chargeable batteries based on magnesium fabric.The team leader, Hung Fei-yi, a professor at the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, National Cheng Kung University (NCKU), said the batteries use magnesium alloy/ceramic powder and nonwoven fabric produced by KNH Enterprise.A small patch (1.5cm in diameter) of such a fully-charged battery can support over 36-hour continued lighting by an LED light bulb, Hung said.Some types of chargeable batteries run the risk of explosion when batteries are ovcercharged, but magnesium fabric-based ones featuring no electrolytic solutions are safe and environmentally friendly, Hung noted.The flexible chargeable batteries can be stacked to increase power storage capacity and multi-layer packaged into battery packs for electric vehicles (EV), Hung indicated.Based on global literature concerned, all of available solid-state chargeable batteries are inflexible, therefore magnesium fabric-based chargeable batteries are the world's first flexible solid-state model, Hung indicated.Magnesium fabric-based flexible chargeable batteriesPhoto: NCKU

Global top-5 notebook brands saw their combined shipments nosedive nearly 40% on month and 38% on year in February as the notebook supply chain, which has over 90% of poduction capacity in China, was seriously disrupted in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak, according to Digitimes Research.Among the global top-5 brands, only Dell and Lenovo shipped over one million notebooks in February. Dell, which had its ODM partners keep some workers at plants to work during the Lunar New Year holidays, had an on-month shipment decline only larger than those of Lenovo and Asustek, and was the largest brand worldwide for the second consecutive month in February, Digitimes Research's numbers show.Lenovo's in-house production lines in Hefei achieved a production resumption rate of nearly 60% in February, allowing its shipment to be above par.Hewlett-Packard (HP), without arranging production during the Lunar New Year break and having most of its production lines in China's Chongqing, where rules for production resumption are stricter than other places, experienced an over 50% on-month decline in February shipments.The top-3 ODMs suffered an on-month decline of 42% in their combined shipments in February. Quanta had a larger on-month drop than the other two as its production resumption was much slower than its fellow makers.Although ODMs' capacity is likely to be restored fast in March, tight supply of components resulting from labor shortages at related makers are expected to become an issue for notebook makers.

The coronavirus pandemic is sweeping across the US and Europe, casting a shadow over the consumer electronics market. Now the semiconductor supply chain fears that the end-market demand may not pick up until 2021. In China, where the epidemic seems to be easing, supply chains reportedly are quickly returning normal operations. But makers are still worried that the impacts of the virus in other parts of the world may chill demand. For motherboard and graphics cards makers, shipments in first-half 2020 are expected to drop to record-low levels.Chipmakers turn pessimistic about end-market demand in 2020: Some chipmakers, as well as others engaged in the semiconductor industry, have turned pessimistic about end-market demand this year, judging from a more severe than expected impact from the quickly spreading coronavirus.Supply chains fast returning to normal in China: Electronics supply chain makers with operations in China are accelerating production resumption as the coronavirus epidemic there eases, and upstream components suppliers are fulfilling shipments as fast as possible to avoid any undesirable changes to their orders in hands, according to industry sources.Mobo and graphics card shipments set to hit record low: Global motherboard and graphics card shipments are set to drop to record-low levels in the first half of 2020, thanks to the quickly spreading coronavirus pandemic sweeping over 130 countries, according to sources from motherboard companies.

While smart healthcare is widely available in Taiwan, not every patient is willing to pay for or can afford such software-based services, and therefore a well-defined pricing mechanism is necessary for promoting sound development of smart healthcare solutions, according to Jimmy Huang, who is a digital health consultant and senior emergency physician for MacKay Memorial Hospital's BioMedical Development Center.Digital transformation of the medical industry involves upgrading of medical hardware and software-oriented improvements, such as better interaction between doctors and patients. If the transformation requires drastic modifications of regular operational processes, the medical staff need to be educated on digital mentality and collaborative creativity, Huang said.Currently in Taiwan, smart healthcare hardware and solutions are mostly developed by academic-industry alliances and some of them have been adopted by many hospitals, Huang noted. But these products or solutions may not be able to survive in the market if they cannot be supported by resonable pricing, he said.Smart medical care services developed in advanced countries have proved to be effective in hiking medical quality and reducing medical cost, with value created competitive enough with that created by medical instruments, and therefore have been adopted by life insurance companies, Huang said. In Taiwan, realization of the situation necessitates cooperation among the government, hospitals and life insurance industry to amend regulations and formulate incentives, Huang noted.As compared with payable medical instruments of which medical effects are obvious, software can be used to extend healthcare to homes to add value for medical services, but the problem is that there are no payment schemes for software-based medical services, such as how much AI-based interpretation of medical images shoudl be charged, he said. A lack of pricing mechanism is why smart medical care is not easily operated in Taiwan, Huang noted.Hospitals are generally more accustomed to procurement of medical instruments than to that of medical software, Huang noted. For medical care, medical software is of variety in small volumes like medical instruments and hardware solutions and software ones create respective values, Huang indicated.However, smart medical care enables doctors to understand patients' real-time conditions and medical care-givers to monitor multiple patients under their care simultaneously, Huang said.An integrated information system used in smart medical carePhoto: Jimmy Huang

The coronavirus outbeak that has disrupted the supply chains in China has again highlighted the need for manufacturers to diversify their production bases. But it is easier said than done when it comes to moving production out of China, particularly for a company as big as Foxconn. Digitimes offers a look at Foxconn's deployments in China to shed light on the difficulties it has trying to move production out of the country. And the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, chip vendors may still be optimistic about the 5G smartphone market, but their focus is shifting towards the entry-level to mid-tier segments. In the semiconductor sector, China-based foundry SMIC is stepping efforts transitioning to 7nm processes.Relocating capacity out of China would be mammoth task for Foxconn: The US-China trade war sent many firms rethinking their global capacity deployments. And the ongoing coronavirus outbreak that has disrupted the supply chain in China has given them more impetus to move some - if not all - of their production out the world's factory. But that is easier said than done.SoC solution providers eyeing mid- to entry-level 5G chip segment: SoC solution providers have recently shifted their focus to promoting mid- to entry-level 5G chips as 5G-enabled smartphones with a price tag below CNY3,000 (US$429) are likely to become a major market segment, at least in China, in the next three years, according to industry sources.SMIC gearing up for 7nm process manufacturing: Semiconductor Manufacturing International (SMIC) has moved 14nm FinFET process to volume production with orders from Huawei's chip arm HiSilicon, and is gearing up for its next-generation FinFET process manufacturing, according to sources familiar with the matter.

The TWS device market looks promising, and despite the uncertainty lying ahead of the global economy in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, Apple reportedly is sticking to its shipment target for AirPods devices for 2020. Neither has the outbreak deterred the datacenter and server sectors from stepping up their deployments, which has in turn fueled momentum for memory prices. NAND flash chip contract prices are expected to go up 15% in second-quate 2020. But for PCB makers, they are set to see a sluggish year with a growth much lower than they had expected. Apple still looks to ship 90 million AirPods in 2020: Apple has not revised downward its shipment forecast for AirPods devices, and is expected to stick its goal of shipping 90 million units in 2020, an increase of 50% from a year earlier, according to sources from the supply chain.NAND flash contract prices to rise 15% in 2Q20: NAND flash contract prices are expected to rise 15% sequentially in the second quarter of 2020, driven mainly by robust demand for servers and enterprise-class applications, according to industry sources.Taiwan PCB production to grow 3% in 2020, says TPCA: The production of Taiwan's PCB industry is estimated to rise 2.82% on year to reach NT$681.1 billion in 2020 if the coronavirus outbreak can ease in the first half of the year, according to Taiwan Printed Circuit Association (TPCA).

Development of smart machinery in Taiwan hinges on locally-developed industrial sensors, according to Alex Ko, chairman for Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry (TAMI).Most of the industrial sensors used in Taiwan are imported, and they are expensive and insufficiently-customized in specification to meet local needs, Ko said. As a result, many local smart machinery makers are unwilling to adopt imported industrial sensors, hindering development of smart machinery in Taiwan, Ko indicated.Since machines general have service lives of 10 years or more, replacement of industrial sensors is much less frequent than that of sensors used in consumer electronics, and accordingly shipments for the former are smaller than those for the latter. In addition, accuracy requirements for industrial sensors are higher than those for consumer electronics. That's why few Taiwan-based firms are developing and producing industrial sensors, Ko said.Taiwan-based IC design houses PixArt Imaging and Sitronix Technology have developed image and optical sensors for industrial use, but few companies have been engaged in industrial sensors for temperature, pressure and vibration detection.Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) and other government-sponsored research organizations lead in R&D of industrial sensors in Taiwan currently. ITRI's Smart Microsystems Technology Center has cooperated with TBI Motion Technology, Homkom Precision Industry, Gloria Material Technology and Chiah Chyun Machinery to develop sensors for monitoring working conditions of ball screws for diagnosing their operating health.With Ministry of Economic Affairs' incentives, Taiwan-based semiconductor companies, including TSMC, UMC, MediaTek, Realtek Semiconductor and Novatek Microelectronics, are willing to develop or produce industrial sensors.Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) and its National Applied Research Laboratories have promoted a smart machinery service platform, with the platform cooperating with machine tool maker Tongtai Machine & Tool and gas sensing and detecting instrument maker Macro Technology Instruments to arrange testing of locally-developed industrial sensing devices and modules at factories.According to market studies, global production value for industrial sensors will rise from US$3.48 billion in 2018 to US$5.39 billion in 2022.Application of industrial sensorsPhoto: ITRI

Demand for 5G handsets may have been dampened by the quick spread of the coronavirus, but other 5G segments, such as instrastructure deployments, have remained robust enough to help shore up IC backend firms' sales. The outbreak has fueled further talks among IT firms about moving production facilities out of China, but for the HDD sector, its major manufacturing hub is already in Southeast Asia, with Thailand boasting the biggest ecosystem. For server PCB suppliers, their sales in the first two months of 2020 were impressive, unaffected by the outbeak. IC backend firms see strong demand from non-handset 5G segments: IC backend houses are enjoying stronger demand from 5G infrastructure, server and datacenter segments than the handset sector that is being increasingly hit by the fast spread of the coronavirus, according to industry sources.HDD manufacturing cluster formed in Thailand: A cluster of PC hard disk drive (HDD) supply chain makers has been formed in Thailand with Taiwan-based Cal-Comp Electronics & Communications and Quanta Storage also participating, allowing them to circumvent impacts of the coronavirus outbreak, according to industry sources.PCB makers GCE, ACC gaining from strong server demand: Taiwan-based PCB makers Gold Circuit Electronics (GCE) and Allied Circuit (ACC), both dedicated mostly to server applications, have reported significant revenue gains for the first two months of the year as shipments have stayed in high gear since the server market resumed growth momentum in the fourth quarter of 2019, according to industry sources.

Taiwan-based automation solution developer Solomon has cooperated with Denmark-based Mobile Industrial Robots (MiR) to release disinfection robots that could help prevent the spread of viruses, while Taiwan-based Papago has also devoted efforts to developing a facial recognition system that can identify mask-wearing people.Solomon is currently offering two disinfection robots with one using UVC and the other a sterilizing atomizer. Solomon's sensor-equipped UVC disinfection robot can avoid coming into contact with people and prevent UVC from causing harm to human bodies.The robot with sterilizing atomizer can atomize and spread disinfectant as high as two meters for an effective coverage.Both robots are based on MiR's autonomous mobile robot (AMR) system and are able to conduct disinfection after working hours or in unmanned environments. Solomon is currently in talks with several hospitals for shipments.Papago has seen increased inquiries for its Face8 facial recognition system in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak. The system is able to identify a person's face even with a surgical mask on and can be used on many occasions. The company is now looking to expand its penetration with customized Face8 solutions.Papago saw consolidated revenues reach NT$1.85 million (US$60,920) in February down 41.57% on year with combined sales for the first two months of 2020 arriving at NT$4.22 million, down 63.61% on year.Solomon disinfection robotPhoto: Company

China-based Suning Holdings is trialing unmanned last-mile delivery of online purchased merchandise items to buyers in place of conventional delivery by couriers to avoid possible coronavirus infections via person-to-person contact, according to China-based media reports.The entire delivery process except the last-mile delivery is already highly automated, including automated sorting and loading of merchandise items and automatically assigned logistics cars for transportation to local distribution centers.Suning began experimenting last-mile delivery using autonomous vehicles in 2018, and is now trialing autonomous vehicles equipped with a 5G-based tracking system for delivery to buyers within 3km, the reports said.But Suning Technology, Suning Holdings' subsidiary which develops automated logistics technology, indicated that it is technologically difficult to realize completely unmanned last-mile delivery for the time being, the reports said.Suning's subsidiary e-commerce operator Suning.com has seen online sales value hike 419% since the outbreak, the reports said.