The capacitor market is expected to reach $20.2 billion in revenue by 2018, according to a new report from industry research firm Research and Markets. The report predicts a 2.5% compound annual growth rate for capacitors worldwide, driven by trends that continue to affect the overall electronics industry, including demand for compact, portable, and more complex electronic devices and the accompanying need for better, smaller, and more efficient component solutions.
The anticipated increase follows a decline in the global capacitor market in 2012 due to slowing shipments of PCs and televisions, weaker production capacities for wireless handsets, and lower consumer and business spending on electronics, the report says. The industry also suffered from the lingering effects of natural disasters in 2011, particularly the Japanese tsunami early in the year and severe flooding in Thailand in the second half.
But the growing amount of electronic content in automotive applications and the increased demand for consumer electronics such as notebooks, ultrabooks, and smart phones are key trends driving capacitor growth over the long term. Component manufacturers are responding with enhanced products and solutions that offer greater efficiency and compact size to meet the new demands. Distributors were promoting many of these new offerings online this spring.
On The Market
Kemet Corp. released a series of new tantalum chip capacitors in May: the T488 Small Case Substrate Terminal MnO2, the T527 Facedown Polymer, and the T529 Small Case Substrate Terminal Polymer. These miniaturized solutions offer the highest capacitance values (22 to 220 µF) available in both a standard 2012 (2 by 1.2 mm) and 3216 (3.2 by 1.6mm) Electronic Industries Association (EIA) case size with maximum package heights of as low as 1 mm.
The capacitors also feature advances in counter-electrode technology and package design, resulting in the lowest equivalent series resistance (ESR) values available in the industry for these package sizes (see the figure). Typical markets include computer/consumer and telecommunications. Mouser Electronics (www.mouser.com) is among the top distributors promoting the new offerings.
Regional distributor Tonar Industries (www.tonar.com) is promoting new products from Cornell Dubilier. The manufacturer expanded its line of SPCX and SPSX surface-mount aluminum polymer capacitors, which are now available with lower ESR and higher capacitance values, making them top-performing filter capacitors for board-level power conversion applications. Both types are supplied in a surface-mount molded package with the same footprint as a D size tantalum capacitor in a thin profile of 1.9 mm with voltage values ranging from 2 to 6.3 V dc.
ATC’s ultra-broadband capacitors are among Digi-Key’s (www.digikey.com) newest passive component offerings. They offer reliable and repeatable ultra-broadband performance from 16 kHz through more than 40 GHz. With ultra-low insertion loss, flat frequency response, and excellent return loss, the 550L series is ideal for dc blocking, coupling, bypassing, and feedback applications requiring ultra-broadband performance, the companies say.
