Recent earthquakes on Kyushu Island in Japan in April have interrupted production of some of Sony's CMOS fabrication lines, according to Sony's supplier Framos.
Image sensors and other CMOS components like Micro OLED or LCOS displays have been affected.
As of last week the back-end processes such as assembly and testing in the Kumamoto fab have resumed as normal, with the wafer fab areas starting sequentially. After experiencing a delay in the supply of components from certain third-party suppliers in the Kumamoto region, Sony has made inventory adjustments and put in place a timeframe for regaining supply levels, so no material impact is anticipated on the company’s business operations.
‘We have been informed by Sony production has been resumed and semi-finished goods, kept at different production stages, will be finished during the course of the next months. So we are expecting at least a few partial shipments to cover immediate needs of our customers,’ said Axel Krepil, head of the sensor sales division of Sony’s distributor Framos.
The supply situation for all rolling and global shutter CMOS image sensors for the industrial and security/surveillance segments will remain a problem. Further updates related to the supply situation and to individual orders are expected within June.
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