SiTime Corporation, which specializes in silicon MEMS solutions for timing and synchronization applications, announced new venture funding led by Innovative Venture Fund, which is co-operated by NEC Capital Solutions and SMBC Venture Capital. All major investors participated in this oversubscribed round. Also, a new partner, Hercules Technology Growth Capital provided a commitment for debt financing to SiTime.
“A key goal of our Innovative Venture Fund is to invest in disruptive technologies that have the potential to transform large markets,” said Soichiro Matsuyama, Chief Financial Officer at NEC Capital Solutions. “SiTime’s timing solutions, based on game-changing silicon MEMS and analog technology, are revolutionizing the $5 billion timing market. SiTime has a remarkable market opportunity and we are excited to participate in SiTime’s future growth.”
“MEMS timing solutions are the inevitable future of the timing industry because they use silicon. Electronics companies worldwide are rapidly adopting SiTime’s solutions – we have shipped 175 million units to 1000 customers worldwide, including 35 Fortune 500 companies. With our recent introduction of oscillators for smartphones, we expect to accelerate the rate of adoption of MEMS timing solutions,” said Rajesh Vashist, CEO at SiTime. “We are pleased that NEC Capital Solutions and HTGC recognize the tremendous potential of MEMS timing technology.”
SiTime is based in Sunnyvale, California
Earlier this year, SiTime introduced a family of 32 kHz MEMS oscillators designed to replace legacy quartz crystal resonators in mobile devices, such as smartphones, tablets, fitness monitoring and watch products, medical monitoring and wellness devices, etc.
As with the company’s other MEMS timing solutions, the new SiT15xx family of oscillators compare favorably to existing quartz-based devices in several ways; SiTime’s MEMS are 85% smaller, use 50% less power, and significantly exceed the reliability metrics of quartz by 15 times.
The SiT153x family operates from a 1.2V to 3.63V regulated power supply, making them ideal for smartphones that use a coin-cell or super-cap battery backup. The SiT154x family also replaces quartz crystal resonators and operates from a 2.7 to 4.5V unregulated Li-Ion battery.
