MEMS resonator startup raises funds
Tikitin claims to be the first company to introduce MEMS resonantors that can be driven by the same circuits as quartz and thereby allowing pin-compatible replacement. The MEMS-based technology, which makes use of the piezoelectric properties of aluminum-nitride, offers thermal stability that is better than quartz down at +/-10ppm across a broad temperature range. This means that for many applications it is unnecessary to provide temperature compensation, said Aarne Oja, CEO and co-founder of the company.
The technology has a frequency range from 16MHz to 120MHz and enables small die sizes. Phase noise performance is also similar to that of quartz-based oscillators.
When even higher precision is required the technology is applicable to an oven-controlled MEMS oscillator (OCMO), a miniaturized, high performance MEMS oscillator with an integrated micro oven. Compared with OCXO the OCMO offers small size, low power consumption, and operation in high ambient temperatures suitable for small basestations in 4G/5G radio communications market.
Oja told eeNews Europe: “We will try to go to market through partners. For the first three years we will fabricate the MEMS devices and sell them to oscillator makers to incorporate in a component. The big market leaders have already shown interest.”
Tikitin is doing its manufacturing at Micronova in Espoo, a pilot and research wafer fab run by VTT. Oja said that prototypes have been delivered to customers and that subject to these meeting qualifications the Tikitin expects to go into commercial production before the end of 2018.
In 2019 the company expects the first OCMO based on Tikitin technology to be launched and the MEMS resonator technology to transfer to a high volume wafer fab.
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