Eric A. Kurth

Microbolometer development and production at Indigo Systems

While microbolometers have been in production for several years, the number of companies producing them is quite small. Indigo Systems has entered into the development and production of VOx based microbolometers, at its Goleta facility. Through the investment of significant capital, Indigo has established a high volume production facility based on the silicon industry model. The 6-inch, cassette-to-cassette, highly automated facility is capable of yielding hundreds of thousands of die per year. Discussed in the paper will be the design and layout of the facility, performance of the devices, as well as yield, trend and throughput data.

Microbolometer production at Indigo Systems

Indigo’s emergence as a production source of uncooled microbolometers was reported in the SPIE proceeding in 2003. With now over a year of modest volume production history on the small-format FPAs, the details of the production experiences are reported. Progress on the mid-format arrays is discussed as are the efforts towards large-format, small pixel devices. Also discussed is the status of the production ramp that will lead to the supply of uncooled FPAs into the automotive market.