Interlink Electronics, Inc. (Interlink) operates as a global sensor and printed electronics company. The company is operating in two principal sensor technology divisions: force/touch sensors, and gas and environmental sensors. The company’s force/touch sensors, including its Force-Sensing Resistor (FSR) technology and related technologies, and its membrane keypads, graphic overlays and printed electronics, are used extensively in Human-Machine Interface (HMI) devices. The company’s gas and envi...
Interlink Electronics, Inc. (Interlink) operates as a global sensor and printed electronics company. The company is operating in two principal sensor technology divisions: force/touch sensors, and gas and environmental sensors. The company’s force/touch sensors, including its Force-Sensing Resistor (FSR) technology and related technologies, and its membrane keypads, graphic overlays and printed electronics, are used extensively in Human-Machine Interface (HMI) devices. The company’s gas and environmental sensors and instruments are used in environmental and air quality monitoring across a broad range of applications.
Force/Touch Sensors
The company designs, develops, manufactures and sells a range of force-sensing technologies that incorporate its proprietary materials technology, firmware and software into a portfolio of standard products and custom solutions. These include sensor components, subassemblies, modules and products that support effective, efficient cursor control and novel three-dimensional user inputs. The company’s HMI technology platforms are deployed in a wide range of markets, including consumer electronics, automotive, industrial and medical. The application of its HMI technology platforms includes vehicle entry, vehicle multi-media control interface, rugged touch controls, presence detection, collision detection, speed and torque controls, pressure mapping, biological monitoring and others. Additionally, through its acquisition of Calman Technology Limited in March 2023, the company offers customized membrane keypads, graphic overlays, printed electronics and industrial label products for use in a wide range of fields, from industrial instrumentation, process control and monitoring to medical and diagnostic devices and defense systems. With over 25 years as a leading HMI provider, Calman Technology has developed to also become a specialized provider of printed electronics for the medical sector in the U.K. and Europe.
The company’s applications and solutions have focused on handheld user input, menu navigation, cursor control, and other intuitive interface technologies for the world’s top electronics manufacturers.
The company invented FSR technology and pioneered commercialization of printed electronics manufacturing, paving the way for industry-wide adoption of force-sensing technology. The company’s extensive knowledge and experience with this technology, along with the firmware it incorporates in its HMI solutions, differentiates the company from other providers of HMI solutions. The company, along with its customers, incorporate its FSR and force-sensing sensors and modules into end-user products. The company’s sensors and modules are used in electronics devices and systems where user input must be converted into useful output data. The company’s force-sensing technology solution platforms enable industry-first implementations in gaming, smartphone, rugged notebook, automotive cockpit and automotive entry applications. Consumer and end-user demand for enhanced user experience is driving the need for innovative multi-modal HMI technologies and applications. Force-sensing input provides a critical novel modality that drives a paradigm shift in HMI.
The company has had success in using its force-sensing solutions in combination with capacitive technologies to minimize the latter’s performance issues, enabling force-sensing solutions to complement competitive technologies and provide hybrid solutions and open up new opportunities for growth. At the same time, the company continues to expand its standard product portfolio and develop new technology platforms to grow existing markets and capture emerging markets.
The company has recently added a range of standard piezoelectric sensor products which are used as dynamic strain gauges and vibration sensors. These sensors are thin, flexible and light-weight while also being extremely rugged and durable. The company possesses deep domain knowledge about how to integrate these into custom applications and have developed machine learning and artificial intelligence to make information-rich data available to its customers for their unique and innovative applications. The company’s piezoelectric sensor solutions can be used in force-sensing, impact and vibration detection, contact microphones, air/liquid flow detection, ultrasonic transducers and many other settings. They have applications in medical vital sign monitoring, industrial solid-state switches, structural health and condition monitoring, touch and tactile sensing and motion sensing amongst others.
This portfolio expansion will incorporate other complimentary sensing technologies and will allow the company to use its expertise in integrating multiple sensing technologies for applications in the rapidly growing Internet-of-Things (IoT). The company has already begun integrating its force sensing technology into its recently acquired membrane keypad product line to create unique solutions not offered by others in this market.
Gas and Environmental Sensors: The company entered the gas and environmental sensing market in 2022 through its acquisition of the business assets of SPEC Sensors, LLC (SPEC) and KWJ Engineering, Inc. (KWJ), early pioneers in miniaturized, gas and environmental sensing technologies. The company offers electrochemical gas-sensing technology products and solutions for industry, community, health and home, with uses in fields, such as safety, personal wellness and air quality monitoring.
The company’s gas and environmental sensors operations focus on three primary business activities:
Proprietary Product Lines: The company provides an extensive line of miniature, low-power, robust electrochemical sensor elements for detecting several common, as well as complex gaseous compounds. These sensors are most suited for consumer and commercial IoT applications, as well as industrial and other demanding usage scenarios. Additionally, the company offers its own line of full-function instruments, including for example, Eco Sensors ozone monitors; an inline monitor for carbon monoxide and other gases; a low-pressure alarm to notify users when tanks for life-critical gases, such as oxygen and nitrogen need to be replenished; and sensor modules for air quality monitoring in smart city projects and IoT applications.
Custom Design and Engineering: For customers requiring specialized design and engineering work on new products incorporating gas and environmental sensing, the company offers custom-built sensors and modules, circuit design and optimization, advanced characterization and compensation techniques, development of operating firmware and algorithms, enclosure design and implementation, and testing and calibration. Examples include the world’s first carbon monoxide shutoff for portable generators and a rapid transdermal alcohol detector that can serve as a barrier to starting a vehicle while intoxicated.
In-House R&D: The company has been successful in obtaining Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grants from government agencies such as the NIH, the USDA, the NSF and the EPA that have enabled the company to conduct research and development and develop new products. For example, SPEC’s Screen Printed Electrochemical Sensor technology was developed in part under NSF Phase I, II and IIB grants. Recent SBIR-funded projects include wildfire air pollution monitoring and firefighter safety devices, transdermal blood alcohol monitors, a simple lead test for drinking water safety, and a grant to enable large-scale, mass-manufacturing of printed electrochemical gas sensors. The company’s team of in-house scientists has an established track record in winning awards for this advanced research and the company continues to submit proposals for funding for strategically relevant research projects that the company could commercialize in the future.
Locations: The company serves its world-wide customer base from its corporate headquarters in Irvine, California, from its facility in Camarillo, California, and from its facility in Newark, California (Silicon Valley area). The company has established a Global ProductDevelopment and Materials Science Center in its Camarillo footprint that has a state-of-the-art printed electronics development laboratory as well as a materials science lab. The company’s force-sensing/HMI engineering team is based in this center where the company works with its U.S. and global customers on developing, engineering, prototyping and implementing its advanced HMI and sensing solutions. The gas and environmental technology engineering team is located at the Newark facility. The company also maintains a focused, embedded software and IoT application development center in Singapore. The company manufactures all of its force-sensing/HMI products in its printed electronics manufacturing facility in Shenzhen, China, and at the Calman facility in Irvine, Scotland, and all of its gas and environmental sensing products in its production facility in Newark, California. In addition, the company maintains a global distribution and logistics center in Hong Kong, a technical sales office in Japan, and several manufacturer representatives and distributors in strategic locations in its key markets, all of which allows the company to support its global customer base.
Strategy
The company intends to utilize its role as a disruptive technology provider to bring its HMI and gas-sensing solutions to new markets. The key elements of the company’s strategy are to expand its presence in the markets it occupy; expand into new and emerging markets; expand its presence with its current customers; pursue a multi-technology roadmap; pursue acquisition opportunities.
Technology Platforms and Products
Force/Touch Sensing Technology and HMI: Interlink was founded on the invention and commercialization of FSR technology, the industry’s first force-sensing solution using printed electronics manufacturing. As the company transition from an FSR sensor supplier to an HMI solutions provider, the company is pursuing and embracing leading edge force-sensing and related technology platforms. The company’s materials science and engineering team in Camarillo, California, led by its VP of Engineering & Advanced Materials, and its embedded software engineering team located in Singapore, are focused on strategic technology roadmaps, development of scalable technology platform architectures and pursuit of synergistic technology partnerships. In an ever-changing and competitive landscape, the company is committed to staying ahead of the technology curve.
The two primary types of user-input technologies common in devices are capacitive and resistive. Capacitive sensors are used in the touch screens found in most smartphones and similar devices used globally by millions of consumers.
The company’s patented FSR sensor technology consists of a bottom layer of conductor electrodes, a proprietary resistive material top layer and a separator between the two layers. An additional top layer that contains graphics and protects the sensor can also be added. FSR® sensors can be as thin as eight thousandths of an inch, making them particularly well suited for use where the design space is restricted, as in portable or wearable electronics. The company’s force-sensing technology enables the sensor to be used for continuously variable control functions. For example, in a pointing device, increased pressure can be used to produce faster cursor movement. Unlike capacitive devices, an FSR sensor’s performance is not impeded by the presence of moisture, dirt or dust, making the sensor suitable for use outdoors and in moist and other hostile environments. The company’s FSR sensors have no moving parts, can be packaged in a sealed environment, and is lower power and less susceptible to false readings or unintended touches than capacitive sensors. Thanks to its optimized manufacturing processes developed over many years, the company can produce easily customized, high-margin solutions for its customers.
The company’s piezoelectric sensors consist of an electroactive polymer which generates an electric charge when a mechanical stress or strain is applied. This polymer film can be as thin as 30 micrometers (less than half the thickness of a human hair). The electric charge generated can be accumulated, collected and used with specially printed electrodes on the surface of the thin film. The resulting transducers can be used as dynamic strain, vibration and force sensors. The sensors are unique in that they can also be operated in reverse whereby applying an electrical charge to the sensor can cause it to bend or deform. This deformation can be used to create polymeric actuators for haptic applications. Finally, these sensors can also generate an electrical charge when exposed to a temperature change. This effect is known as a pyroelectric effect. This characteristic can be used to create passive infra-red motion sensors where the emitted heat of a body in proximity to the sensor causes a change in temperature on the sensor surface and the resulting charge can be transduced and correlated to a motion event. These properties enable the company to create thin, light-weight, and flexible dynamic strain gauges and vibration sensors. These sensors have a very broad frequency band and are suitable for many applications. They are extremely rugged and can be used for high impact force-sensing applications, and can also be implemented on large areas and curved surfaces. In addition, they have high voltage sensitivity and simple interface electronics. These transducers produce an information-rich signal, and it requires deep domain knowledge to successfully integrate these sensors.
The company has developed sophisticated algorithms and firmware that allows its FSR® and piezo sensor technology to become a complete solution delivering effective HMI functionality to its customers. The company is also using machine learning and artificial intelligence to further enhance the user experience and provide compelling solutions for its customers.
The company’s solutions fall into two categories, custom and standard:
Custom Solutions: The company offers a comprehensive portfolio of standard solutions, from simple force and piezo sensors to multi-finger capable rugged trackpads. The largest part of its business, however, is the development and manufacture of custom solutions for its major customers. The company offers full integration capability spanning initial concept to large-volume manufacturing. Custom solutions can be a single- or multi-technology platform to meet customer requirements and include both input and output technologies. The company also offers full embedded firmware development and integration support. In many instances, the company works very closely with its original equipment manufacturer (OEM) partners from the concept phase to ensure that its solutions are successfully integrated.
Standard Solutions. The company’s portfolio of standard solutions includes:
The company’s standard single-zone FSR sensors are the most versatile force-sensing technology on the market today. These innovative sensors provide an inverse change in resistance in response to an increase or decrease in applied force. These provide engineers and designers with a durable, reliable, easy to measure, easy to integrate, thin-form factor and solution for HMI touch solutions and analog data capture for machines. FSR sensors are available in a range of sizes, shapes and lengths and with several connection options. The company also offers them in different force-sensing ranges, with the introduction of its FSR X and FSR UX range of standard sensors. These new sensors were developed in its material science development lab.
Force-sensing linear potentiometers (FSLP) are sensors which can be used for menu navigation and control. The company’s use of force allows for high-rate scrolling and a more intuitive user experience. The FSLP is an easy to integrate, high resolution, ultra-low-power based solution that brings intuitive user controls to reduced form factor hand-held consumer electronic devices. These sensors are available in multiple lengths. The company also offers a ring sensor for full 360-degree position sensing. All of its FSLP sensors are designed to be integrated into a device’s host processor without the need for a dedicated microprocessor.
The company’s integrated mouse modules and pointing solutions can add touchpad or 360-degree pointing control to virtually any electronic device. Ranging from simple mouse button integration to NEMA-rated (National Electrical Manufacturer Association) industrial pointing devices, these solutions are ideal for applications away from the desktop. The modules use FSR technology and measurement firmware in a four-zone sensor or 4-wire resistive touchpad configuration along with a micro-controller to provide pressure sensitive cursor direction and speed control in a durable and easy to integrate form factor.
After initial product development activity in the area of piezoelectric film sensors consisting of a highly successful custom implementation in automotive applications, the company has a set of standard piezo sensors, as well as a development kit available for its customers to evaluate and test the capabilities and potential of this sensor solution. These sensors are polymeric piezoelectric sensors with a wide range of applications and uses, such as dynamic strain gauges, impact/force sensors, vital signs sensors, motion sensors, vibration sensors, accelerometers, and solid-state rugged switches. Many of these diverse application modes require extensive domain knowledge for successful integration. The company’s expertise in this area allows it to create custom solutions and be a trusted advisor to help its customers develop specialized solutions and solve their integration challenges.
Gas and Environmental Sensors Technology: The company’s gas and environmental sensing products and technologies are based on developing smaller, low-power, solutions to challenging applications in gas and environmental sensing. Through its acquisitions of SPEC and KWJ, the company combines a long history and deep domain knowledge with cutting-edge sensor technology and advanced instrumentation to make reliable products that also enable new applications for wireless and wearable gas sensing. The company’s engineering team includes five PhDs in a broad range of disciplines from chemical engineering to electrical engineering and physics.
The company designs and builds all of its sensors and instruments in-house in Newark, California, and its capabilities include proprietary high-volume electrochemical sensor manufacturing, device assembly and calibration, and advanced test and measurement capabilities. The company partners with leading institutions, such as Georgia Institute of Technology and San Jose State University to develop novel technologies under government grants, while also performing new product development and engineering services for private partners that include companies ranging in size from startups to Fortune 500 companies.
The company’s electrochemical gas-sensing technology products and solutions combine its innovations with custom electronics, as well as calibration and compensation techniques to deliver unique solutions and address needs in industry, community, health and home settings, with uses in fields such as carbon monoxide and ozone detection and air quality monitoring.
The company’s Eco Sensors branded line of ozone monitors and detectors is the market leader in the space, incorporating state-of-the-art SPEC sensors to achieve reference-level accuracy at a low cost. Ozone is commonly used in a wide variety of commercial applications to clean, disinfect and remediate odors without the use of environmentally harmful chemicals. Under the Eco Sensors brand, the company offers a full line of ozone instruments, including handhelds, wall mount alarms, remote generator controllers and OEM modules.
The company offers a number of standard and custom solutions for in-line carbon monoxide monitoring for supplied breathing air applications. Designed to meet the requirements of the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration monitoring for carbon monoxide in compressed gas lines and carrying Canadian Standards Agency (CSA) approval, its carbon monoxide monitors offer a robust and reliable solution for medical gas verification and demanding supplied air applications such as sandblasting and painting. The company also makes low-pressure cylinder alarms and the world’s smallest rechargeable Bluetooth-enabled carbon monoxide and harmful gas monitor, the SPARROW PROTECT+.
The company’s line of screen-printed electrochemical gas sensors offers high performance and a unique, small form factor at a low price. The company’s UL-2034 recognized carbon monoxide sensor offers air quality level sensitivity with an industry-leading 10-year lifetime. Additionally, the company offers sensors for hydrogen sulfide, ozone, nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide, ethanol, hydrogen, formaldehyde, ethylene, and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) among others. The company also sells gas-sensor modules that incorporate operating electronics and signal processing to deliver compensated parts per million (PPM) output off the shelf.
Intellectual Property
The company’s FSR sensors are manufactured using proprietary screen-printing techniques. All proprietary aspects of its force-sensing technology manufacturing process are conducted in-house at its U.S., China and Scotland manufacturing facilities to maintain quality and protect its technology from infringement.
As of December 31, 2023, the company held twenty-four (24) patents and had fourteen (14) patents pending. The company group its patents into three general categories: sensors, which includes eight (8) patents expiring between 2024 and 2032; sensing systems, which includes five (5) patents expiring between 2029 and 2038; and HMI devices, which includes eleven (11) patents expiring between 2024 and 2036. The company’s intellectual property strategy involves filing patent applications in its strategic focus markets on a regular basis. The company has also strengthened its patent portfolio to align with rapidly emerging market opportunities in IoT and smart surfaces. For example, its sensor fusion platform enables the capture of multi-sensing data, and using it in combination with haptics and wireless technology to transmit the data enables unique and innovative sensor applications. This will be further enabled by emerging advances in ultra-low-power wireless technologies including WiFi, BLE, LoRaWAN, as well as cellular technologies, such as LTE-M and NB-IoT.
Sales and Marketing
The company sells its products and solutions through its direct sales employees as well as outside sales representatives and distributors. The company works directly with large multinational companies, small start-up companies, technology design houses and OEMs. The company’s sales personnel have extensive engineering backgrounds and receive substantial support from its internal engineering resources. Sales frequently result from interactions between senior management, design engineers, procurement departments, and its sales personnel. The company interacts with its customers throughout the product development and order process. The company conducts its sales activities from the U.S., Japan, China, and the United Kingdom. The company uses worldwide distributors, primarily Digi-Key Electronics, for full-service distribution of its standard products, and the company has representative companies located in key markets so the company can provide local support to strategic customers in these regions.
Customers
The company’s customers include many of the world’s leading electronics companies. They encompass large multinational organizations as well as start-ups, design houses, original design manufacturers, OEMs and universities. The company supplies some of the world’s largest consumer electronics manufacturers, luxury and mid-market car companies, familiar names in the medical and industrial equipment markets, research engineers and designers entering the IoT market, and companies of all different sizes in other markets.
The company’s customer base is widely dispersed geographically. Sales to customers located outside the United States have historically accounted for a significant percentage of its revenues, and the company expects this to continue. International sales constituted 52% of its net revenues for the year ended December 31, 2023, with sales in 2023 to customers in Japan and China. For the year ended December 31, 2023, the company had three customers that each represented over 10% of its net revenues.
Principal Suppliers
The company sources certain of its components from single-suppliers, including multinational conglomerates Henkel, DuPont, Solvay, SABIC and 3M.
History
Interlink Electronics, Inc. was founded in 1985. The company was incorporated in California in 1985. It was reincorporated in Delaware in 1996 and again reincorporated in Nevada in 2012.
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