Page 49 - EE Times Europe Magazine | June2020

EE|Times EUROPE —Sensors Insert 49

BIOSENSORS happens, we cannot have this dead space
MEMS Foundry Rogue Valley where there are very little resources on the
manufacturing side.”
Describing her company as a shop for
Thinks Globally, Acts Locally microelectronics, Gomez said, “We have the
basic building blocks to make all kinds of
By Anne-Françoise Pelé devices.” This has proved to be a definite
advantage as transportation restrictions
during the pandemic have squeezed the sup-
fter decades of watching compa- coat. With experience in biomedical- ply chain. “Part of our business is supporting
nies move production to regions device manufacturing, the company has been other manufacturing facilities, so we have
with low labor costs, the Covid-19 solicited to cope with the exponential rise in been working with other foundries and uni-
A pandemic is compelling govern- demand for diagnostic tests for Covid-19. versities and supporting them when they have
ments to see manufacturing in a new light “We have definitely seen a big shift as had a missing capability,” said Gomez.
and consider improving domestic sourcing of a manufacturing company,” said Gomez.
microelectronics. For entrepreneurs who had When companies working on Covid-19 tests PREVENTION BETTER THAN CURE
chosen to set up their foundries locally, this approached Rogue Valley with requests to Bringing production back is a recurring topic,
long-awaited change in perception is music to be made a top priority, Gomez would answer but this pandemic could serve to make it a
their ears. “No problem.” But inevitably, “that created priority. As Gomez explained, when China —
Rogue Valley Microdevices Inc., a micro- a general shift in where our focus was, and it “which is responsible for 80% of the supply
electromechanical systems (MEMS) foundry definitely had an impact on where we put our chain” — came to a standstill early in the
located in Medford, Oregon, has been playing resources, what our schedules are, who we pandemic, the downside of relying on Chinese
a strategic role in the scramble to develop have doing what.” manufacturing hubs to “feed the rest of the
Covid-19 diagnostic tests. EE Times Europe Responding to the global emergency, many world with parts” became clear.
spoke with Jessica Gomez, the company’s biomedical companies have indeed adapted Gomez stressed the importance of diver-
co-founder and CEO, about the rationale for their existing technologies, originally used for sifying the supply chain to limit or contain
having domestic production capabilities and cancer and other diseases, to detect Covid-19 vulnerabilities. “We need to diversify those
how to support the establishment of more infection or antibody responses. For instance, manufacturing centers so that we have con-
domestic companies like hers. Maryland-based Hememics Biotechnologies sistency, we maintain a robust supply chain,
Inc. recently received a grant we are not vulnerable to natural disasters,
from the U.S. Department of and we have the ability to shift things around
Health and Human Services to as needed.”
speed development of its lateral Part of that is a policy discussion about
flow biosensor, which detects taxes “and how we manage tariffs that
SARS-CoV-2 and associated encourage companies to manufacture in par-
antibodies from nasal swabs or ticular parts of the world,” she said. A tradeoff
white blood cells. Each biosen- must be found to allow supply chain diversi-
sor, which comprises 17 sensors fication and mitigate risk. “When things go
in a multiplexed sensor array, fine, everyone makes money, but when the
includes a multilayered chip political situation is tricky, when we have a
from Cypress Semiconductor, a pandemic, a number of things that happen
Bluetooth LE radio, and a MEMS at large scale get disrupted. And we are so
die made by Rogue Valley. connected now that it has a much bigger
The Hememics tool, Gomez impact.” Thinking about how to rebalance the
said, “is quick, not overly supply chain, especially in the microelectron-
sophisticated, meaning that it ics supply chain, is going to be an important
is not going to give you tons of discussion, said Gomez.
information, but it will give you Another trend to watch is investors’
an answer, one way or the other.” interpretation of and reaction to the current
Rogue Valley’s Jessica Gomez The World Health Organi- situation, she said. In the early 2000s, inves-
zation has been advocating tors identified small companies developing
the need to “test, test, test” to technologies for the telecom industry and
RIGHT PLACE AT THE RIGHT TIME control the spread of the virus. MEMS manu- invested heavily in them. Those companies
When Rogue Valley opened its doors in 2003, facturers have a prominent role to play in that brought their own R&D and manufacturing
it was the first and only microelectronics effort. “It’s one thing to develop a technology, capacity to the table, but when the econ-
manufacturing facility in Southern Oregon. but in order to use it, you have to manufac- omy collapsed, “investors realized it was
Considered a daring endeavor by some, it was ture it,” said Gomez. a big waste of money [to have everything
a calculated risk for its founders. Since then, In general, the U.S. and Europe are lacking in-house] and required these companies to
the company has grown to more than three some manufacturing infrastructure. “You outsource.” Some of those facilities tran-
times its original size. can get all the FDA [U.S. Food and Drug sitioned to a foundry model; many others
A full-service precision MEMS foundry, Administration] approvals that you want, completely disappeared.
Rogue Valley specializes in MEMS device but if you can’t make [your product], it’s not That’s where we are now, and Gomez
fabrication and silicon wafer services, includ- helping anyone,” said Gomez. “We need to wonders what comes next. “Are we going to
ing low-pressure chemical vapor deposition start thinking how we are going to deliver this see some sort of hybrid model? Are investors
(LPCVD) nitride, oxide, metal, and resist spray technology because once commercialization going to invest in companies and tell them

www.eetimes.eu | JUNE 2020