SK Hynix "Strength in Pixel Miniaturization Technology... Leap to Leading Position in Image Sensor Market"

[Asia Economy Reporter Su-yeon Woo] SK Hynix has declared its leap to the forefront of the next-generation CMOS image sensor (CIS) market by leveraging its strength in pixel miniaturization technology. The company aims to achieve a meaningful market share globally through strengthening its product portfolio and development competitiveness, and to target the industry’s top tier in the near future.

On the 12th, SK Hynix released an interview with Song Chang-rok, head of the CIS business responsible for the image sensor division, in its newsroom, revealing these details. Song expressed confidence that the CIS business will become a key growth pillar within SK Hynix’s business areas, which currently have a large proportion of memory semiconductors, and that the company will rise as a leading player.

Song said, “Idle assets and advanced technologies generated during the technological development of the memory semiconductor market can be applied to the CIS business. The CIS business, which is expanding its applications beyond mobile to security, robotics, autonomous driving, and augmented/virtual reality fields, will serve as a bridgehead for SK Hynix to expand into the non-memory market.”

Song Chang-rok, Head of CIS Business at SK Hynix / Photo by SK Hynix

According to market research firm Gartner, the global CIS market size is expected to grow from $19.9 billion in 2021 to $26.3 billion in 2025, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.3%. This growth rate is significantly higher compared to the overall semiconductor market’s CAGR of 4.0% and the memory semiconductor market’s CAGR of 4.1% during the same period. Currently, Samsung Electronics and Sony hold over 80% of the market share, while SK Hynix, OmniVision, and GalaxyCore compete for the remaining 20%.

Song identified securing a product portfolio and strengthening development competitiveness as the prerequisites for SK Hynix’s meaningful growth in the CIS market. He also shared three strategies to achieve this: ▲enhancing user and customer experience analysis ▲shortening product development cycles ▲innovating the development system.

He explained, “To analyze customer experience, we have deployed personnel locally where customers are located and formed teams by region to establish a dedicated customer management system. For innovation in the technology development system, we are building a library of necessary technologies that can be accessed and utilized as needed, and we are attempting to unify the development infrastructure scattered across Korea, the U.S., and Japan into a single system.”

Song joined SK Hynix (then Hyundai Electronics) in 1999 at the memory research lab, entering the industry. He contributed to process innovation in the DRAM manufacturing division and future technology research institute, and from 2017 until last year, served as CIO in charge of digital transformation (DT), leading company-wide business process and system innovation. Now in charge of the next-generation future growth business, the CIS division, Song is reorganizing the CIS organizational structure and initiating changes in the way team members work.

Song said, “We are actively adopting IT systems to establish operational standards unique to the CIS division. When moving to the next stage of work, if team members focus less on preparing meetings or reports and more on finding ways to improve work efficiency, productivity will increase and business competitiveness will be strengthened.”

Finally, Song emphasized, “The future CIS market will evolve beyond simple visual sensors into information and intelligence sensors. During market upheavals, existing technological gaps become meaningless and market shares are reshuffled, so our top priority is to emerge as a leader in the upcoming battleground.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.