Taiwan RedEye Biomedical will present at the upcoming CES 2020 its home-based health-monitoring optical hemoglobin sensor that can provide insights into people's health in just 10 seconds, according to the company.The Taiwan-based startup is introducing what it calls the world's first hemoglobin sensor that performs an optical scan of toilet water after bowel movement to detect invisible blood. This is a significant improvement from the traditional fecal occult blood test (FOBT), with which people have to collect stool samples, making sure the sample does not mix with water, and send the samples to the hospital or lab for testing. RedEye said its home-based health monitoring solution allows regular checks to be conducted and can encourage people to more willingly go to the hospital for early detection - a great step forward in preventive healthcare.RedEye has been chosen by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) to present its award-winning solution at the Taiwan Tech Arena (TTA) at CES 2020, allowing it to expand beyond Asia and connect with more international investors, medical institutions, distributors and bathroom accessory brands to jointly build a global healthcare ecosystem.Pre-warning can start at homeRedEye said its optical hemoglobin sensor is not intended to replace the conventional examining procedures at hospitals. Quite the contrary, it is aimed to serve as a self-monitoring solution, with which pre-warning can start at home and people can take precautions and go for more detailed checks.Bleeding is an early sign of many serious diseases, according to RedEye's founder Nelson Yan, citing colon cancer as an example. It is the most commonly occurring cancer in Taiwan for 11 consecutive years with more than 15,000 cases being diagnosed every year. That is, 41 people are diagnosed with colon cancer a day on average. More than one third are stage 3 or 4 cases and they only go to the hospital after finding blood in the stool or experiencing other obvious symptoms. Making use of photoelectric technology, RedEye's hemoglobin sensor enables health screening at home so that people can detect early warning signs such as invisible blood and take precautions.People can also use RedEye's solution at home to regularly monitor intermittent bleeding resulting from tumors or polyps with scientific data which can be saved. In the future, they can also keep track of the measurement results with trend charts through an app purpose-built to work in correspondence with RedEye's hemoglobin sensor.RedEye looks to expand into US, Europe and JapanAside from detecting early signs like bleeding resulting from colon or stomach cancer, RedEye's hemoglobin sensor can also check blood in the urine, which can be a warning sign of diseases such as kidney cancer, bladder cancer, urinary tract infection, kidney stones and urethritis. In the future, the sensor, after being wrapped in filter paper, can be inserted 4cm into toilet water after urination. It will take only 10 to 15 seconds for the sensor to show a positive or negative result, Yan said.Yan pointed out that there could be other substances in the water including anthocyanidin, chlorophyll and uric acid. RedEye is working with National Taiwan University Hospital Hsin-Chu Branch on clinical studies to develop algorithms that can collect optical readings and intelligently identify different substances.RedEye's sensor currently come in the form of either a handheld device that can be mounted on a wall or placed on a bathroom counter, or a module that can be embedded in a smart toilet. For the former, the company is looking into ODM partnerships with international brands as well as potential China-based OEM opportunities. It is projected that 80% of the product sales will be B2B and the remaining 20% will be B2C through e-commerce channels.Smart toilets designed and made by a Japanese bathroom equipment brand are being marketed in Taiwan with plans to expand into American and European markets to follow. RedEye was chosen to participate in the From IP to IPO (FITI) program. As part of the startup incubation program, RedEye employees were sent to the Netherlands for training for a month in September, 2019. Dutch health examination centers have expressed interest to lease RedEye's solution, which gave a boost to the RedEye team's confidence in their product's application in smart toilets, Yan said.In addition to steadily expanding its market footprint, RedEye, with an NT$20 million capital, plans to undertake another round of funding. The target is to add NT$30 million to its capital by 2020, raising the total to NT$50 million.RedEye founder Nelson Yan (center) and his teamPhoto: Digitimes stafff, December 2019

Two major Taiwan-based CMOS image sensor packagers Tong Hsing and Kingpark have agreed a merger deal that will make turn them into one of the world's largest packaging firms for the CIS segment. They are eyeing the smartphone, advanced driving, IoT, IoV, VR and AR markets. For the smartphone market, LPDDR5 is expected to become the mainstream memory for flagship phones in 2020. In China, CPU developers are stepping up efforts rolling out processors, as China has vowed to replace all PCs in use in the government sector with locally-made devices. China-based CPU developer Loongson has recently announced its in-house developed 3A4000 series processors.Tong Hsing, Kingpak to merge into heavyweight CIS packager in Taiwan: A heavyweight CMOS image sensor (CIS) packaging firm will be born in Taiwan soon, as Tong Hsing Electronic Industries, a handset CIS backend and wafer reconstruction specialist, has announced plans to fully acquire automotive CIS packager Kingpak Technology, seeking to increase its economies of scale through a larger product portfolio and strengthen its competitiveness in the market.LPDDR5 to become new DRAM standard for 5G smartphones in 2020: LPDDR5 mobile DRAM is expected to be widely adopted in 5G smartphones in 2020 with Samsung Electronics set to feature its in-house made LPDDR5 memory in its flagship 5G smartphones for 2020, according to sources from the upstream supply chain.China-based Loongson unveils new CPUs: China-based CPU developer Loongson has announced its in-house developed 3A4000 series processors, which the company claimed were created without using intellectual properties (IPs) from third-party firms except the design tools provided by the chipmaker during pilot production.

Taiwan AI Labs is engaged in applying AI to medical care, smart city and human-machine interface, with medical care given the priority, according to founder Ethan Tu.Taiwan has four factors crucial to developing AI-based medical care: Software experts with creativity and capability of hardware/software integration; medical staff understanding how to use IT to solve medical care problems; man power in health and medical care; medical data accumulated over the years, such as those from its national health insurance program and electronic medical records, and such data can be integrated with the medical IoT supply chain, Tu explained.Taiwan AI Labs has cooperated with Taipei Veterans General Hospital to develop DeepMets, an AI-based automatic brain tumor diagnostic system, via using over 8,000 brain MRI images, Tu said. While the hospital has adopted DeepMets for clinical practice, feedback is continually collected to improve the system, Tu noted. Technological innovations in medical care, if found on medical domain knowledge, can be effective, Tu indicated.Viewing that genetic attributes, living habits and residential environment vary from one person to another, development of precision medicine and personalized medical care should be based on prediction, diagnosis, therapy and prognostication of diseases by virtue of AI technologies including big data analysis, machine learning and deep learning, Tu noted. AI will not replace human power, but doctors who know how to use AI technologies will become mainstream, Tu added.Some of hospitals and large clinics have cooperated with AI R&D teams to develop application of AI technologies to detecting diseases and assisting diagnoses, Tu said. As AI technologies and their application are relatively new to the medical care market, processes and methods of adoption are not yet mature, Tu noted, adding the government, academic and research organizations as well as industries related to medical care are making efforts to establish uniform formats for medical data and consistent standards for developing AI technologies for use in medical care.Taiwan AI Labs founder Ethan TuPhoto: Shihmin Fu, Digitimes, December 2019

Information and Communications Research Laboratories (ICRL) under government-sponsored Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) and automotive electronic component maker Mobiletron Electronics have signed a pact to jointly produce 10 Level 3 autonomous electric buses by 2021, with the first to be launched the earliest in first-quarter 2020.Mobiletron in 2011 established a subsidiary, RAC Electric Vehicles, for production of electric buses, company chairman Kim Tsai said.For the production of Level 3 autonomous electric buses, Mobiletron will be responsible for system integration, RAC for making car chassis and bodies, and ICRL for providing sensing and decision-making systems.Teco Electric & Machinery will provide power motors; Unex Technology, V2X wireless mobile communication devices; Moxa, mobile networking devices; Alpha Networks, automotive radars; and Kingwaytek Technology, high-definition digital maps, it said.Mobiletron, ICRL and RAC will apply for permits to undertake trial operation of autonomous electric shuttle buses on highways as well as rural roads on a DRT (demand-responsive transport) basis in some areas in northern Taiwan.Mobiletron has been tapping the Southeast Asia and Latin America markets for export of power battery systems, electric/mechanical systems and electronic control systems of electric buses, Tsai noted.An autonomous electric bus jointly developed by ICRL and MobiletronPhoto: Yihan Li, Digitimes, December 2019

Hipposcreen Neurotech (HNC) has introduced a stress electroencephalogram (EEG) assessment system, a diagnostic tool that combines AI algorithms and brainwave signal amplifying circuits. It only takes the system 90 seconds to measure brainwave signals and generate scientific data that help doctors diagnose and treat depression, according to the company.HNC, founded by a National Taipei University of Technology (Taipei Tech) research team with investment from Compal, noted that more than 300 hundred million people in the world suffer from depression and fewer than half of them are receiving treatment. In some countries, no more than one tenth of the people with depression are getting medical care.HNC has been chosen by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) to be among the teams that will present their achievements at the Taiwan Tech Arena (TTA) at CES 2020. It is hoped that HNC's participation at the event will help it expand internationally and make it a pioneer leading Taiwan's foray into the AI-based smart diagnostics systems sector.HNC's system features high usability, fast measurement and high accuracyThe research team led by Yi Hung Liu, a professor from Taipei Tech, that founded HNC in April 2019, have engaged in the study of brainwave signal processing, AI algorithms and neuroscience analysis for more than a decade.Daniel Weng, HNC's CTO, said the diagnosis of mental disorders, mostly depression, has always relied on the doctor's expert knowledge and clinical experience, along with the use of the patient's self-assessment reports. HNC's stress EEG assessment system is aimed to enable doctors to make diagnosis based on scientific measurements of brainwave signals and data readings so as to allow early detection and treatment.HNC's stress EEG assessment system amplifies brainwave signals measured through EEG, processes the signals and sends the results to the cloud for analysis. The system is easy to operate, fast and accurate so it can proceed to commercialization ahead of the competition, Weng said.Weng explained that HNC's system requires simple preparation procedures. The patient only needs to put on a black electrode cap and sit in front of the computer. Signals are collected through the electrodes. After the patient looks at the black cross on the screen for 90 seconds, an assessment report is generated to indicate the stress level with a colored distribution chart. Darker colors represent higher stress levels and the distance to the dark color zone indicates the subject's likelihood of having depression."The system's smart analysis achieves 80% accuracy, making it a valuable clinical reference," said Weng. The achievement is possible because when they were doing research at Taipei Tech, the team had collaborated with National Taiwan University Hospital and Harvard Medical School to collect EEG data from depressed patients and non-depressed individuals for machine learning. With the establishment and growth of HNC, they now partner with three major medical institutions in Taiwan for access to EEG data, which will help further enhance the accuracy and optimize the system, Weng said.Expand preventive medicine to mental health careWith Compal's support in hardware, HNC said it was able to complete the device side of its system in a short time. Furthermore, with Compal's well established presence in the biomedical sector, HNC's device is expected to pass safety certifications by the end of December 2019, making it the first brainwave instrument supplier in Taiwan to obtain medical-grade certifications.HNC plans to begin pilot operation of its first-generation stress EEG assessment system in the second half of 2020 and officially launch the system in 2021. It looks to market the system to hospitals and clinics in Taiwan in the first phase and tap the physical examination sector in the second phase.As part of its efforts to bring its product to market, HNC is also in the process of obtaining US FDA approval for medical devices in an attempt to foray into international markets. Aside from depression, HNC is also working on developing AI algorithms to help doctors diagnose other brain-related disorders including dementia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) using scientific measurement tools. The aim is to make AI an important aid to medical professionals in mental health screening and treatment.Compal is HNC's largest shareholder, having invested NT$42 million (US$1.4 million) to hold a 70% stake.Weng expects HNC's participation at the TTA at CES 2020 to broaden HNC's horizon, and bring opportunities for HNC to team up with with international partners.HNC CTO Daniel Weng demonstrates how to operate the company's stress EEG assessment systemPhoto: Digitimes staff, December 2019

Taiwan-based startup La Vida Tec has established WaCare medical care social network to connect individuals and their families with health care professionals to promote personalized preventive medicine, according company CEO Pan Ren-hao.WaCare integrates government open health data, personal medical records, and personal health data collected from smart wearables, and uses AI-based inference engine, machine learning algorithms, natural language analysis and big data to predict health risks and automatically send warning to facilitate individuals' online consulting with health care professionals, Pan said. All personal data are encrypted using RSA algorithm and based on AES (advanced encryption standard) for information security, Pan added.WaCare plays active roles helping medical practitioners, mainly doctors, pharmacists and senior nurses, advertise their online consulting services, and they set their own consulting fees, samll portions of whicn are shared by WaCare, Pan noted.WaCare is extending health care to about 40 communities in remote areas around Taiwan by having doctors, pharmacists and medical experts provide online educational courses concerning health care for fees that they set. These courses will also help them provide online consulting services.La Vida Tec has raised venture capital investment of over NT$40 million (US$1.32 million) and hopes to obtain NT$45 million in C-round fundraising in 2020, Pan said, adding the company plans to tap markets in the Southeast Asia in 2021, with overseas Chinese to be target users.La Vida Tec CEO Pan Ren-haoPhoto: Mark Tsai, Digitimes, December 2019

With the rising business opportunity of 5G applications, orders for related technologies and components have continued to pick up and are expected to benefit TSMC over its InFO-AiP and Taiwan-based CCL makers in 2020. Meanwhile, China-based DRAM maker CXMT has been pushing its LPDDR4x memory for the adoption into the handsets of China-based second-tier vendors.TSMC to launch InFO-AiP volume production for mmWave devices in 2020: TSMC's backend antenna-in-package technology, dubbed InFO-AiP, has attracted orders from US-based clients for packaging 5G mmWave devices, with volume production set to kick off next year, according to industry sources.CCL makers poised to reap 5G application opportunities in 2020: Taiwan-based CCL makers including Elite Material, Taiwan Union Technology, Iteq and Ventec International have raced to send high-frequency, high speed CCL samples to clients for validation in 2019 seeking to explore the growing 5G application opportunities in 2020 and beyond, according to industry sources.CXMT developing LPDDR4x memory for handsets: China-based DRAM startup ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) is making progress in the development of LPDDR4x memory chips, which will initially attract orders from China's second-tier handset vendors, according to industry sources.

China's overall IC production capacity will continue to expand in 2020 as both IDMs and foundry houses there have readied expansion plans covering 4-, 6-, 8- and 12-inch wafer fabs and will enter 14nm node next year, according to Digitimes Research.The capacity expansion plans are driven by the mounting demand for logic ICs, memory chips, power chips and analog ICs for 5G and IoT applications in China, as well as the government's aggressive push for pursuing IC self-sufficiency, Digitimes Research noted.Both IDMs and foundry firms have seen some of their new fabs start commercial runs in 2019, with some more to kick off volume production of new products or technologies in 2020, when new capacity expansion plans will also be implemented.Meanwhile, the adoption of 14nm node, mass production of 3D NAND flash chips, and growing demand for power devices and analog ICs for IoT applications all serve to prompt Chinese IDMs and foundry houses to strengthen deployments in 2020 in both mature and special process nodes, whether at 12-inch, 8-inch or lower-inch wafer fabs.

High-definition (HD) maps will be used in combination with data collected by various traffic sensors to become local dynamic maps.Under the Ministry of the Interior's commission, National Cheng Kung University's Department of Geomatics in Taiwan has set up a national High-definition Maps Research Center to provide HD maps in OpenDrive+Extension format for use in intelligent transportation systems.Telematics service provider TMS Technologies indicated that such HD maps will hike efficiency in modeling traffic scenarios and broaden scope of using traffic data.TMS said it can combine real-time traffic data and traffic infrastructure information available at its DataBar-MaaS marketplace with HD maps to produce customized map products based on user needs.Updating HD maps can rely on sensors installed on taxis, public buses and logistics cars that run along fixed routes or in regular areas to provide latest data, said Thomas Cheng, general manager for transportation consultant Thinktron.

Foldable phones are already a commerical reality, and the market can expect to see more from multiple vendors in 2020. But those who are looking forward to foldable-screen notebooks may have to wait a little longer. Intel reportedly was looking to showcase a 17-inch foldable-screen notebook at the upcoming CES, but decided to drop the plan due to issues with flexible panel supply and immature OS support. But IC design house MediaTek is set to unveil its Dimensity 800 at CES - a 5G SoC for midrange smartphone segments. In the displays market, LCD panel makers may be able to heap a sigh of relief, as prices of TV applications may jump as much as 20% in first-half 2020. Intel not yet ready to promote foldable-screen notebooks: Intel is unlikely to promote foldable-screen notebooks until after issues such as insufficient flexible panel supply and immature OS support are solved in mid 2020, according to sources from the upstream supply chain.MediaTek to showcase Dimensity 800 5G SoC at CES 2020: MediaTek is set to unveil its second sub-6 GHz 5G SoC, codenamed Dimensity 800, at the upcoming CES 2020 and start delivering the chips in the second quarter of the year.LCD TV panel prices likely to rise 20% in 1H20: LCD TV panel prices may stage a rally in early 2020 thanks to an improved supply-demand balance, with the upward spiral to continue into the second quarter and quotes for mainstream panel sizes likely to rise about 20%, according to industry sources.