Considerations for MEMS packaging

MEMS devices have complex topography and delicate moving parts. Unlike microelectronics which really never wants to "touch" the media, MEMS is designed to interact with media for sensing and actuation in a special environment. The variety and specialty of MEMS challenge its packaging. Generally, MEMS can be packed either at wafer level or die level. There are a lot of researches and progresses on the wafer level packaging recently. In this paper, the requirements of MEMS packaging are outlined from the unique features of MEMS devices. Various MEMS packaging methods and materials are introduced as well. More discussions are given to reduce stress and improve hermeticity of MEMS packages at both die level and wafer level.