Infineon Technologies announced its entry into the packaged silicon microphone market to address the demand for high-performance, low-noise MEMS microphones.

Leveraging Infineon's dual-backplate MEMS technology, the analog and digital microphones deliver an exceptional 70dB signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and ultra-low distortion of 10% at 135dB sound pressure level (SPL). Packaged in a 4mm x 3mm x 1.2mm MEMS package, the microphones are ideal for applications such as high-quality audio recording and far-field voice capture.

“Working with our packaging partners allows us to expand our high-volume bare die MEMS and ASIC business model,” said Dr. Roland Helm, Head of the Sensors Business Unit of Infineon’s Power Management and Multimarket Division. “While we will continue to focus on our bare die business, we can now address the needs of low-noise, high-end applications with two packaged microphones.”

Current MEMS microphone technology consists of a charged membrane and a voltage-detecting backplate. Infineon's dual-backplate MEMS technology embeds a membrane between two backplates, generating a truly differentiated signal. This improves high frequency immunity, resulting in superior audio signal processing and raising the acoustic overload point, which causes 10% total harmonic distortion (THD), to 135 dB SPL.

The 70dB SNR represents a 6dB improvement over conventional MEMS microphones, doubling the distance at which user voice commands can be captured. Furthermore, these analog and digital microphones exhibit excellent microphone-to-microphone matching, making them ideal for array implementation. Therefore, these MEMS microphones are ideal for ultra-precision beamforming and noise cancellation.