Touch-Screens Feeling Hot

Quick Quiz: How many gadgets do you have in the house that use touch-screen technology? At first glance as I look around my house I would say six gadgets, but I am probably missing three or four.

This technology seemed to struggle to gain acceptance until Apple (AAPL - Analyst Report) released the iPhone.

The capacitive touch-screen and touch-button controller segment is projected to hit 1.3 billion units by 2012, a 44 percent compounded annual growth rate, according to market research firm Gartner: "Capacitive touchscreens are rapidly becoming common in mobile handsets, spurred by the success of the iPhone," said Gartner analyst Amy Leong.

Armed with this information, on June 11, 2009, Integrated Device Technology (IDTI - Analyst Report) announced it has purchased the touch sensor technology assets from Leadis Technology. In addition, IDT will also acquire the Leadis Technology (LDIS - Snapshot Report) intellectual property and employee teams that run the touch sensor business.

Gartner feels the next growth arm for touch will be for the PC market. According to Leong, "In the past, capacitive touch technology has been widely used in touch pads for notebook PCs. However, manufacturers are now implementing capacitive touch technologies into PCs and PC peripherals in the form of touchscreens, proximity touch-sensing buttons or sliders and multi-touch mouse pads."