Foveon, Inc., was an American company that manufactured and distributed

image sensor An image sensor or imager is a sensor that detects and conveys information used to form an image. It does so by converting the variable attenuation of light waves (as they refraction, pass through or reflection (physics), reflect off objects) into s ...

technology. It made the Foveon X3 sensor, which captures images in some

digital camera A digital camera, also called a digicam, is a camera that captures photographs in Digital data storage, digital memory. Most cameras produced today are digital, largely replacing those that capture images on photographic film or film stock. Dig ...

s. Foveon was founded in 1997 and is based in

Santa Clara, California Santa Clara ( ; Spanish language, Spanish for "Clare of Assisi, Saint Clare") is a city in Santa Clara County, California. The city's population was 127,647 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List of cities and towns i ...

. In 2008 it was bought by Sigma Corporation.

Details

The company, founded in 1997 by

Carver Mead Carver Andress Mead (born 1 May 1934) is an American scientist and engineer. He currently holds the position of Gordon and Betty Moore Professor Emeritus of Engineering and Applied Science at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), ...

, Richard Lyon, Richard B. Merrill, Richard Turner, Richard Nedwich, and others, was a spin-off of National Semiconductor and Synaptics. The founding directors were:

Federico Faggin Federico Faggin (, ; born 1 December 1941) is an Italian-American physicist, engineer, inventor and entrepreneur. He is best known for designing the first commercial microprocessor, the Intel 4004. He led the 4004 (MCS-4) project and the desig ...

(president and CEO of Synaptics), Brian Halla (chairman, president/CEO of National Semiconductor), and Dick Sanquini (VP of National Semiconductor). It was based in

. Foveon was initially known for their high-end digital portrait camera systems built around a color-separation beam-splitter prism assembly. Later, the X3 pixel sensor became the company's main product. Both the prism system and the X3 technology derive their benefit from sampling all three primary colors at all pixel locations, instead of employing a Bayer pattern approach sampling a specific color at each pixel location. Foveon was previously known as Foveonics. The name is derived from the fovea of the human eye, which enables sharp imaging while reading or watching television. George Gilder wrote ''The Silicon Eye'', which tells the story of Foveon and its founders. On 11 November 2008, when Federico Faggin was the CEO, all

shares In financial markets, a share (sometimes referred to as stock or equity) is a unit of equity ownership in the capital stock of a corporation. It can refer to units of mutual funds, limited partnerships, and real estate investment trusts. Sha ...

of Foveon

stock Stocks (also capital stock, or sometimes interchangeably, shares) consist of all the Share (finance), shares by which ownership of a corporation or company is divided. A single share of the stock means fractional ownership of the corporatio ...

were acquired by Sigma Corporation. The company continued in a new location as a wholly owned portion of Sigma. At the end of 2020, the company ceased operations in Santa Clara and all further work was transferred to Sigma in Japan.

References

External links

*{{Official website, www.foveon.com
Italian Foveon Community
Companies based in Santa Clara, California Technology companies established in 1997 Photography equipment manufacturers of the United States Technology companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area 1997 establishments in California Defunct semiconductor companies of the United States Image sensors