OmniVision to acquire wafer-level lens manufacturing operation

SANTA CLARA, USA: OmniVision Technologies Inc., a leading developer of advanced digital imaging solutions, has entered into an agreement with VisEra Technologies Co. Ltd, or VisEra, OmniVision's joint venture with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd, or TSMC, to acquire from VisEra its wafer-level lens production operations. OmniVision currently outsources the wafer-level lens production and assembly processes associated with its CameraCube technology to VisEra.

The cash consideration for the operations is $45 million. OmniVision anticipates that the parties will close the transaction in the second quarter of its fiscal year 2012.

"We believe that our CameraCube technology represents one area where we can extend our market leadership while increasing the content that we sell into each consumer device," said Shaw Hong, CEO of OmniVision Technologies.

"Historically, sensor and lens manufacturing have been separate endeavors in which the components come together at the modular assembly stage. Our CameraCube technology enables us to design our sensors and accompanying lens elements as an integrated unit that creates a reflowable, monolithic image sensor device. This transaction will enable us to further streamline the production process, consolidate the supply chain, expand production capacity, and reduce the cost to meet customers' growing demand for our CameraCube products."