EMI Shielding for Electronics 2024-2034: Forecasts, Technologies, Applications

'EMI Shielding for Electronics: 2024-2034' explores the current status and technology trends within this essential aspect of many electronic circuits. Drawing on IDTechEx's expertise in evaluating developments within both advanced semiconductor packaging and conductive inks, the report provides a comprehensive overview of the status, innovations, players, and opportunities across this essential field.

 

As wirelessly connected devices continue to proliferate, innovations in EMI shielding will support the transition to higher communication frequencies and increasingly compact semiconductor package architectures for applications such as AR/VR and wearable electronics. These developments include new deposition methods such as spraying, inkjet printing, and fully additive 3D electronics along with new materials such as particle free conductive inks and MXenes.

 

A significant and growing trend in EMI shielding for electronics is the transition from board-level shielding towards conformal package-level shielding. The former, which describes soldering a conductive enclosure onto the board, is low-cost and well-established, but substantially increases size and weight. In contrast the latter approach utilizes a thin conductive layer directly on the package surface, which reduces size and weight. This makes conformal package-level shielding well suited to packages where compactness is a priority, such as smartwatches, smartphones, and some medical devices.

 

Sputtering is the dominant method of creating conformal EMI shields. Deposition occurs in a vacuum chamber, with ions fired at a metallic 'sputtering target' to produce nanoscale metal particles that coat the package surface. While the capital equipment is expensive the metallic sputtering targets are cost effective, with many providers having existing systems installed.

 

Emerging methods such as spraying and printing offer much lower equipment costs since no vacuum chamber is required, along with additional benefits such as reduced variation in package top and side coating thickness and fewer process steps. However, conductive inks are typically more expensive than equivalent sputtering targets per gram of deposited material due to the additional ink formulation steps.

 

An additional benefit of techniques such as inkjet printing is digital selective deposition, which enables reduced material consumption and hence mitigates the higher material costs of conductive inks. As the trend towards 'system-in-package' architectures gains further traction, greater use of compartmentalization will increase demand for selective deposition such as the top of a specific compartment. In the longer-term approaches such as fully additive 3D electronics will enable EMI shielding to be integrated throughout a complex bespoke package containing multiple compartmentalized components.

 

While materials for board-level shielding enclosures and indeed sputtering are straightforward metals and metal alloys (typically copper, steel, aluminium, zinc, or nickel), there is considerable innovation within solution processable conductors for package level shielding. Silver-based conductive inks dominate, with available products spanning a wide range of particle sizes and rheology.

 

Especially notable is the increasing adoption of particle-free (also known as molecular) inks, which are metallized in-situ and hence produce smooth coatings and eliminate the risk of nozzle clogging. Metamaterials, in which periodic structures are introduced during manufacturing, can also be used to introduce frequency dependent EMI shielding if desired. Another material alternative for solutions processable EMI shielding is MXenes. This term refers to a class of materials made up of metal carbides or metal nitrides that have excellent conductivity and are lightweight.

 

This report provides a detailed overview of the 'EMI shielding for electronics' market, with a focus on innovations that will support that the increasing adoption of heterogeneous integration. 10-year forecasts for both deposition method and conductive ink consumption are provided, drawing on analysis of consumer electronic device to assesses the semiconductor package area requiring conformal shielding. Forecasts are segmented across multiple application categories including smartphones, laptops, tablets, smartwatches, AR/VR devices, vehicles, and telecoms infrastructure.

 

This report provides detailed market intelligence about trends and opportunities within the 'EMI shielding for electronics' market. This includes:

 

 

 

 

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