News and Events

Conventional 6T SRAM is headed for roadblocks at the 22nm node or perhaps even earlier. Process variability is driving changes to the approaches used in the cell layout as well as the memory macro architectures. In this report, we use the industry leader in advanced logic processes, Intel, as a case study to determine

Perhaps the most talked about topic this year at SEMI's Industry Strategy Symposium (ISS) was China, and its tremendously growing impact on the world's semiconductor industry. As industry analysts turned their eyes toward a market recovering from one its worst economic downturns, they repeatedly pointed

Days of inventory (DOI) among semiconductor suppliers are expected to decline to 68.3 at the end of the first quarter of 2010, down from 68.5 for the fourth quarter of 2009, according to market researcher iSuppli (El Segundo, Calif.). With DOI already 2.9% below the historical average in the fourth quarter, first-quarter inventories are expected to be 6.9% below the norm. While inventory in the first quarter is expected to remain at about

GlobalFoundries Inc. (Sunnyvale, Calif.) and Qualcomm Inc. (San Diego) announced a foundry and technology-development partnership, including an intention to investigate 3-D packaging technologies.

The trend to smaller, cheaper and more flexible test equipment is hitting even the image sensor market. "Customers don't want three different platforms for testing image sensors — one for early design, one for R&D characterization and another for high-volume production," said Martin Vasey, co-founder of Jova Solutions Inc.

In a briefing prior to next week's Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in San Francisco, Bohr said Intel is "shipping large numbers of 32 nm samples to customers, who are engaged in major testing of their computer systems. The 32 nm process is certified, and we are loading up our first factory in support of planned Q4 revenue production."

One should not waste a crisis' opportunity to innovate. It has been at the tail-end of some of the severest economic downturns that novel products have emerged, creating profitable markets, with the best yet to come. This was the message given by Anand Chandrasekher, senior vice president and general manager of Intel Corp.'s

NEC Corp. (Tokyo) has developed a scalable MRAM cell using vertical magnetic spintronics for embedded memory applications. The approach, detailed today at the 2009 Symposium on VLSI Technology in Kyoto, Japan, differs from conventional horizontal magnetic spintronics. The structure is similar to a MOS transistor structure

Komatsu Engineering Corp. (Kawasaki, Japan) has developed a laser marker that produces a data matrix that provides an identification number on a silicon chip. The 16×16 dot data matrix measures 100 µm2, and complies with a standard that SEMI is proposing.

Schiltron Corp. (Mountain View, Calif.) is giving credit to the role chemical mechanical planarization (CMP) technology provider Entrepix Inc. (Tempe, Ariz.) has played in developing prototypes of Schiltron’s 3-D memory architecture.

Schiltron Corp. (Mountain View, Calif.) is giving credit to the role chemical mechanical planarization (CMP) technology provider Entrepix Inc. (Tempe, Ariz.) has played in developing prototypes of Schiltron’s 3-D memory architecture.

Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing Ltd. (Singapore) denied a report in a Singapore business newspaper that it had received a bid from the same Abu Dhabi investment arm that is the majority investor in GlobalFoundries Inc. (Sunnyvale, Calif.).

What impact is the global economic downturn having on the advanced packaging industry? Some ramifications are obvious, while others are much more subtle.

IBM and the Bulgarian government have partnered in the area of nanoscience in a deal that will create the first Bulgarian nanotechnology center.

Sanyo Electric Co. Ltd. (Tokyo) announced today that it has broken its own record for the highest energy conversion efficiency for a crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar cell in a practical size (¡Ý100 cm2). Sanyo¡¯s proprietary HIT (heterojunction with intrinsic thin layer) photovoltaic cell conversion efficiency has been boosted from 22.3% to 23.0% at the research level

T-RAM Semiconductor Inc. (Milpitas, Calif.) and GlobalFoundries (Sunnyvale,
Calif.) said they will work together to adapt T-RAM’s Thyristor-RAM embedded memory technology to 32 and 22 nm processes. The joint development agreement is aimed at low-power, high-performance dense cache applications

Texas Instruments Inc has expanded its MCU portfolio with the acquisition of Luminary Micro, a leading supplier of ARM Cortex-M3-based 32-bit MCUs.

Nearly two years ago, Texas Instruments Inc. (TI, Dallas) announced plans to build an assembly/test facility within the Clark Freeport Zone in the Philippines — with the goal of becoming one of the most environmentally efficient sites in the world. The Clark facility, as it’s known, is now up and ramping, focusing on the latest wafer-level chip-scale

Inlustra Technologies Inc. (Santa Barbara, Calif.), a spin-out from the gallium nitride (GaN) research laboratories at the University of California at Santa Barbara, said it has started to fill orders for its nonpolar and semipolar GaN substrates. The company’s materials are aimed at the blue and green light-emitting diode (LED) and laser markets.

Optimistically, but realistically, Gartner Inc today reported that although excess inventories have been reduced and a first bottoming in some parts of the electronics markets has provided a stabilizing influence, the equipment markets will most likely not begin their recovery until Q4 of this year.