Release Date: January 10, 2019
1. Introduction to Chips and Main Product Types
The driver chip is located between the main circuit and the control circuit, serving as an intermediate circuit that amplifies the signals from the control circuit (i.e., amplifying the signals of the control circuit to enable it to drive power transistors). The driver chip amplifies the PWM pulses output by the control circuit to a level sufficient to drive power transistors—this is the switching power amplification function. Driver chips can be mainly classified according to application fields into: motor/drive chip, display driver chip, lighting driver chip, tweeter motor driver chip, audio amplifier chip, etc.
Motor/motor drive chips generally refer to chips that integrate CMOS control circuits and DMOS power devices. They can be used with the main processor, motor, and incremental encoder to form a complete motion control system. Motor drive chips can be used to drive inductive loads such as DC motors, stepper motors, and relays. The application range of motor drive chips is very broad, including driving DC motors, stepper motors, robot control systems, digital control systems, computer printers, and plotters.
Display driver chips generally refer to those that have the function of driving the display screen. They typically use industry-standard universal serial or parallel interfaces to receive commands and data, and generate signals with appropriate voltage, current, timing, and demultiplexing to display the required text or images on the screen. Display driver chips are commonly used in various electronic devices such as smartphones, computers, tablets, wearable devices, and various display-equipped devices like cars, industrial machinery, and medical instruments. Display driver chips are usually semiconductor integrated circuits that provide a microprocessor, microcontroller, ASIC, or general peripheral interface between interface functions and a specific type of display device, such as LCD, LED, OLED, e-ink, CRT, vacuum fluorescent display, or digital tube/holographic tube.
Lighting drive chips are generally used in lighting systems, serving to convert the power supply into a specific voltage and current to drive light-emitting devices. With the full penetration of LEDs into the lighting market, LED driver supplies and chips have developed rapidly, and the market size has continued to expand.
The voice coil motor driver chip is a type of chip used for driving voice coil motors, which are commonly found in the camera lenses of consumer electronics such as smartphones. These motors are used to push the lens to move and produce an autofocus imaging module.
An audio amplifier chip is an integrated circuit that amplifies weak signals from the sound source or preamplifier and drives a speaker to produce sound with a certain power. Audio amplifier chips are the core components of multimedia playback devices, providing power for the playback equipment and being one of the important aspects related to sound quality and work efficiency.
2.Driver chip market size
According to shipments, the global market for driver chips in 2014 totaled 72.369 billion units, with the Chinese market accounting for 21.585 billion units, accounting for 29.8% of the global market shipments. By 2018, global shipments of driver chips increased to 89.637 billion units, with a compound annual growth rate of 5.5%. The Chinese market reached 29.231 billion units, with a compound annual growth rate of 7.9%, and its share in the global market has been increasing year by year, reaching 32.6%. Since 2000, the Chinese government has issued a series of policies to strongly support industrial development, including the 'Notice of the State Council on Printing and Distributing Several Policies to Further Encourage the Development of the Software Industry and Integrated Circuit Industry' (Guo Fa [2011] No. 4), which provides policy support in seven aspects, as well as the 'Made in China 2025' initiative which mentions the need to enhance the application capabilities of domestic chips. With China's policy support and technological progress in integrated circuits, it is expected that shipments of driver chips in China will continue to increase, market share will also grow, and the degree of localization will be higher. It is estimated that by 2023, global market shipments will exceed one hundred billion units, reaching 122.14 billion units, with a compound annual growth rate of 6.4%; the Chinese market is expected to maintain a faster growth rate, with a compound annual growth rate of about 9.4%, and by 2023 it will account for 37.4% of the total global market shipments, with shipments of 45.651 billion units.
Source: Frost & Sullivan
3.Market size of driver chip segments
From 2014 to 2018, global shipments of motor drive chips increased from 37.784 billion units to 45.145 billion units, with an annual compound growth rate of 4.6%. It is expected that this rate will maintain a steady pace of 5.2% per year for the next five years. By 2023, global shipments of motor drive chips are projected to reach 578.93 billion units; in the past five years, global display drive chips have maintained an annual compound growth rate of 6.1%, increasing from 14.852 billion units to 18.822 billion units, and it is expected to increase to 26.398 billion units by 2023, with an annual compound growth rate slightly higher than the previous five years at 7.1%; lighting drive chips also maintained an average annual compound growth rate of 6.5% during the period from 2014 to 2018, with shipments ranging from 9.343 billion units to 12.020 billion units, and it is expected to rapidly increase to 17.401 billion units by 2023 at a compound annual growth rate of 7.8%.
Source: Frost & Sullivan
Dr. Wang Xin, Global Partner of Frost & Sullivan, Vice President of Global Market Strategy Planning and President of the China Region, pointed out that after years of development, China's chip industry has gradually formed a pattern of coordinated development with design, manufacturing, and packaging testing industries working side by side. However, the situation where high-end driver chips still rely on international imports still exists. In the future, with national financial support and the drive of industrial and financial capital, the development growth rate of China's driver chip industry will be fully higher than the global level. Technological breakthroughs and solutions to difficult problems in high-end driver chips will make progress. Under the trend of chip localization, the development prospects of China's driver chip industry are very broad, and the status of domestic driver chips in the international market will also rapidly improve.
