Disruptive technologies for the future generation smart systems

With our busy lifestyles and no time for health, with a rise in chronic diseases and an aging population, a need exists for a new generation of smart handheld devices that are human centric, flexible and always connected. At the same time this future generation of multifunctional, wireless and intelligent devices should be energy autonomous and lessen the continuous hunger for higher data throughput and computational power. Research institutes around the world are exploring revolutionary technologies that drive innovation in the application area of mobile consumer electronics, bio-medical electronics and consumer healthcare. They aim to bring mankind a better life in a sustainable society. Enabling innovative product development starts with the ambition to bring ideation, academic research and proof-of-concepts to mature prototypes. Furthermore, solving system level challenges caused by heterogeneous integration of exciting technologies into a small form factor opens up new opportunities. Finally, a realistic path to industrialization must be supported by a vision for technology development. There are challenges remaining. In this talk, future trends and technology solutions are illustrated by means of several of the most promising solutions that imec has researched and developed in the frame of smart handheld devices. The aim is to inspire and stimulate the technology community in general, to pick-up research results that drive the development of new innovative products of the future generation smart multifunctional devices.