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A novel optical incremental and absolute encoder based on an optical application-specific integrated circuit (opto-ASIC) and an encoder disc carrying micro manufactured structures is presented. The physical basis of the encoder is the diffraction of light using a reflective phase grating. The opto-ASIC contains a ring of photodiodes that represents the encryption of the encoder. It also includes the analog signal conditioning, the signal acquisition, and the control of a light source, as well as the digital position processing. The development and fabrication of the opto-ASIC is also described in this work. A laser diode was assembled in the center on top of the opto-ASIC, together with a micro manufactured polymer lens. The latter was fabricated using ultra-precision machining. The encoder disc was fabricated using micro injection molding and contains micro structures forming a blazed grating. This way, a 10-bit optical encoder with a form factor of only 1 cm 3 was realized and tested successfully. validation, J.S., A.B., A.F., and C.S.; formal analysis, J.S., A.B., A.F., and C.S.; investigation, J.S. and A.F.; resources, A.Z. and J.B.; writing-original draft preparation, J.S., A.B., and A.F.; writing-review and editing, K.-P.F. and C.S.; visualization, J.S.; supervision, A.Z. and J.B.; project administration, J.S. and A.F.; funding acquisition, J.

Apart from the ongoing debate about using CMOS active pixel sensors (APS) or CCD imagers for today's consumer and commercial applications the emerging biomedical market presents new opportunities to CMOS APS. Prominent examples addressing distinct issues in life style and health care are the possibilities to restore vision through a sub-retinal CMOS imager implant and to fabricate a low-cost intracorporeal video probe through a miniature CMOS imager.