Cost continues to drop capacitive touch grab into low-cost smartphone

With the efforts of manufacturers, with the adoption of innovative touch control ICs and new single-layer touch screen designs, the cost of capacitive touch solutions has been continuously reduced, and in addition to having gradually penetrated into smart phones (Smart PhONe), there is also a chance to enter Feature Phone and handset vendors plan to launch a low-cost, $100 smart phone.

Helen Francis, product marketing manager for Atmel's touch technology division, said that in 2010, two-thirds of smart phones are expected to use touch screens; about one-fifth of feature phones.

Helen Francis, product marketing manager of Atmel's touch technology department, said that touch screens have gradually become the standard equipment for mobile phones, regardless of resistance and capacitive touch technology, although resistive touch technology It has long been adopted by smart phones, but capacitive touch technology will be favored by consumers because the emergence of innovative touch control ICs and new single-layer touch screen designs has resulted in lower cost capacitive touches on the market. The control screen solution, which allows more functional mobile phone designers to move from resistive touch technology to multi-touch capacitive technology, provides a better user experience. It is estimated that in 2010, shipments of capacitive touch products will exceed resistive touch products.

Since the touch screen allows the handset designer to design with a larger display without affecting the overall size, not only is it useful for reading content such as web browsing, for content creation, such as writing an email using a virtual keyboard interface. It is also an ideal choice, and as a result, a large number of multi-touch smart phones were launched in 2009. Helen Francis expects that in the next 12 months, the number of touch screen mobile phones on the market will increase. Not only smart phones but also touch screens will enter functional phones and even more basic mobile phones with more functions.

However, the current cost of capacitive touch technology is still high, and the low-cost pressure of the $100 handset may become a stumbling block for capacitive touch screens. In response to this, Francis said that capacitive touch technology is used in lower-cost devices. There are indeed system-level design challenges, with the main problem being noise from the lower cost AC VCOM Liquid Crystal Display (LCD). However, through the use of noise suppression technology, as well as lower cost capacitive touch screen components, the cost is no longer an obstacle, and consumer demand for capacitive touch interface will continue to promote the industry's development, and even in the Capacitive touch screens are used in entry-level smartphones.