Week In Review: Manufacturing, Test


Government policy For the last four years, the U.S. and China have been embroiled in a trade war, especially on the technology front. The U.S. has implemented a number of export control measures and tariffs in the arena. But there might be a thawing in the tense relationship between the two superpowers. “Reports surfaced Thursday indicating the China Semiconductor Industry Association (CSIA)... » read more

MRAM Evolves In Multiple Directions


Magnetoresistive RAM (MRAM) is one of several new non-volatile memory technologies targeting broad commercial availability, but designing MRAM into chips and systems isn't as simple as adding other types of memory. MRAM isn’t an all-things-for-all-applications technology. It needs to be tuned for its intended purpose. MRAMs targeting flash will not do as well targeting SRAMs, and vice vers... » read more

Cloud Vs. On-Premise Analytics


The immense and growing volume of data generated in chip manufacturing is forcing chipmakers to rethink where to process and store that data. For fabs and OSATs, this decision is not one to be taken lightly. The proprietary nature of yield, performance, and other data, and corporate policies to retain tight control of that data, have so far limited outsourcing to the cloud. But as the amount... » read more

Making Sense Of New Edge-Inference Architectures


New edge-inference machine-learning architectures have been arriving at an astounding rate over the last year. Making sense of them all is a challenge. To begin with, not all ML architectures are alike. One of the complicating factors in understanding the different machine-learning architectures is the nomenclature used to describe them. You’ll see terms like “sea-of-MACs,” “systolic... » read more

Week In Review: Design, Low Power


Analog Devices acquired the wireless assets of Comcores. Analog Devices plans to continue to evolve the wireless technology and participate in the O-RAN forum. Teams based in Denmark and Poland, including Comcores founder and former CEO, Thomas Noergaard, will join ADI. Comcores will retain its other lines of intellectual property and digital systems business, Chip-to-Chip and Ethernet Systems ... » read more

Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


Aerospace The NASA's Mars Perseverance Rover, which landed safely on Mars this week, has some new autonomous systems. The landing craft flew autonomously to find a good landing spot. When on the ground, the rover can drive in an autonomous traverse mode. Also autonomous is the small helicopter, the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter, being tested on Mars. The helicopter can fly up to 90 seconds autonom... » read more

FeFETs Bring Promise And Challenges


Ferroelectric FETs (FeFETs) and memory (FeRAM) are generating high levels of interest in the research community. Based on a physical mechanism that hasn’t yet been commercially exploited, they join the other interesting new physics ideas that are in various stages of commercialization. “FeRAM is very promising, but it's like all promising memory technologies — it takes a while to get b... » read more

Week In Review: Manufacturing, Test


Chipmakers The U.S. Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) and several chip executives have sent a joint letter to President Biden, urging the administration to include substantial funding for semiconductor manufacturing and research in the U.S. As reported, the share of global semiconductor manufacturing capacity in the U.S. has decreased from 37% in 1990 to 12% today. “Semiconductors pow... » read more

Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


Automotive/Mobility With the chip supply so tight it is shutting down automotive production lines, U.S. chip company CEOs signed a Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) letter asking the U.S. president to include funding incentives for the chip manufacturing in U.S. economic recovery plans. The letter references the CHIPS for America Act and asks the president to work with Congress to suppo... » read more

Data Issues Mount In Chip Manufacturing


For yield management systems the old calculation adage, "garbage in/garbage out" still rings true. Aligning and cleaning data remains a dirty business. With the increased value in data in the semiconductor supply chain, there now are essentially two supply chains running in parallel. One involves the physical product being created, while the other includes the data associated with each proce... » read more

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