December 2014 - Page 2 of 11 - Semiconductor Engineering

Is The Stacked Die Ecosystem Stagnating?
By Ann Mutschler - 23 Dec, 2014 - Comments: 0

While the stacked die ecosystem in general is currently status quo, with not much happening in the past year, there is definitely work being done —albeit cautiously—on the design tools side of things. It would be easy to feel impatient that the design tools are not complete and available today for [getkc id="82" comment="2.5D"] and [getkc id="42" comment="3D IC"] implementation until hearin... » read more

Power/Performance Bits: Dec. 23
By Ann Mutschler - 23 Dec, 2014 - Comments: 0

Glimpsing pathway of sunlight to electricity According to University of Oregon and Lund University researchers, four pulses of laser light on nanoparticle photocells in a University of Oregon spectroscopy experiment have opened a window on how captured sunlight can be converted into electricity. The work, which the researchers expect could inspire devices with improved efficiency in solar e... » read more

Industry Scorecard For 2014
By Brian Bailey - 22 Dec, 2014 - Comments: 0

At the end of last year, Semiconductor Engineering asked the industry about the developments they expected to see in 2014. If you care to refresh your memory, they were categorized under markets, semiconductors and development tools. Now it is time to look back and see how accurate those predictions were and where they fell short. Part one addressed the market and semiconductor areas and in thi... » read more

Integrating DSA
By Katherine Derbyshire - 22 Dec, 2014 - Comments: 0

As previous articles in this series have shown, directed self-assembly may be a promising alternative for manufacturers seeking to shrink feature sizes in the face of a stalled exposure tool roadmap. It is simpler than some other frequency-multiplication techniques, can be implemented with existing equipment, and does not appear to introduce insurmountable defect issues of its own. Which does n... » read more

DSA Moves Ahead
By Katherine Derbyshire - 19 Dec, 2014 - Comments: 0

It can be difficult to make DSA structures other than uniform arrays. One solution is to print a grating over a large area, then use a “cut” mask to eliminate the unwanted features. The challenge, though, is that aligning the cut mask to an array of tightly spaced features, such as the fins for a FinFET transistor layer, can require extremely demanding overlay specifications. While reducing... » read more

The Week In Review: Design/IoT
By Ed Sperling - 19 Dec, 2014 - Comments: 0

Deals Sonics won a deal with Korea's Nexell, which will use Sonics' on-chip network technology for customer-specific application processor designs for the consumer and communications markets. Nexell will use the NoC technology with Samsung's 28nm LP high-k/metal gate process. GlobalFoundries and Cadence rolled out an SoC enablement solution using ARM's Cortex-A17 processor in a 28nm super l... » read more

Week 28: Free Every Day At DAC!
By Anne Cirkel - 19 Dec, 2014 - Comments: 0

When I started this blog back in June, one of the first questions I got was from Daniel Payne, one of my favorite SemiWiki bloggers: “This year at DAC on Monday morning when the exhibits opened at 9 a.m. I saw for the very first time that attendees were coming down the escalators, then making a U-turn and deciding to attend the sessions instead of the exhibits. Usually there is a line waiting... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing
By Mark LaPedus - 19 Dec, 2014 - Comments: 0

This announcement could send some shock waves throughout the foundry business. For its baseband chips, Qualcomm uses several foundries, namely GlobalFoundries, Samsung and TSMC. Now, Qualcomm has another foundry partner. China’s Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC) says that it has fabricated Qualcomm’s 28nm Snapdragon 410 processors. Snapdragon 410 is a processor that int... » read more

Unraveling The Mysteries At IEDM
By Mark LaPedus - 19 Dec, 2014 - Comments: 0

In some respects, the 2014 IEEE International Electron Devices Meeting (IEDM) was no different than past events. The event, held this week in San Francisco, included the usual and dizzying array of tutorials, sessions, papers and panels. On the leading-edge CMOS front, for example, the topics included [getkc id="82" kc_name="2.5D"]/[getkc id="42" kc_name="3D IC"] chips, III-V materials, [getkc ... » read more

Market Outlook For 2015
By Ed Sperling - 18 Dec, 2014 - Comments: 0

It's always easier to look back at what happened in the past 12 months than to try to piece together a coherent picture for what could happen over the next year. A good prediction relies on lots of data points, and even then it can be wrong. In a global industry, where geopolitical strife or pandemics can send markets tumbling or open up new ones, it's not possible to account for all the unk... » read more

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