February 2017 - Page 4 of 10 - Semiconductor Engineering


Semiconductor CapEx To Increase 4.3% In 2017


Semiconductor capital expenditures are an important bellwether for the industry. Based on preliminary findings, Semico Research predicts 2017’s total will increase 4.3% to $69.7 billion, a record high, and a slightly larger increase than in 2016. Semico tracks more than 80 companies for CapEx and R&D spending, although many of those companies have merged, have been acquired, or gone ba... » read more

Get Ready For Nanotube RAM


The memory market is going in several different directions at once. On one front, the traditional memory types, such DRAM and flash, remain the workhorse technologies in systems despite undergoing some changes in the business. Then, several vendors are readying the next-generation memory types in the market. As part of an ongoing series, Semiconductor Engineering will explore where the new a... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


Chipmakers Toshiba’s problems have gone from bad to worse. “Toshiba postponed its earnings call by up to one month, and the chairman resigned. The provisional results show large losses in its nuclear power business, while the NAND operations remain very profitable,” said Weston Twigg, an analyst with Pacific Crest Securities, in a research note. “The next few months appear very uncerta... » read more

The Week In Review: IoT


Consortia Optimal+ said this week that it has joined the Industrial Internet Consortium. “The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) will have a tremendous impact on industries worldwide. The application of smart manufacturing, combined with the collection and analysis of in-use/field stage data, will deliver powerful insights to brand owners and enable them to achieve dramatic improvements in... » read more

The Week In Review: Design


Tools Mentor Graphics launched the company's third generation data-center friendly emulation platform, Veloce Strato. The emulator has a capacity of 2.5BG when fully loaded, and total capacity can be increased by linking emulators. It has available slots for 64 Advanced Verification Boards (AVBs) and fully loaded consumes up to 50KW (22.7 W/Mgate) of power. Aldec uncorked the latest versi... » read more

The Return Of Time Sharing


As early as the 1960s, it wasn't uncommon to hear that transistors would be free. Those were pretty bold statements at the time, considering most computers in those days cost $1 million, required special rooms, and budding computer scientists usually had to sign up to use mainframe computers for one-hour time slots—often in the middle of the night or on weekends. Still, those predictions ... » read more

Battling Fab Cycle Times


The shift from planar devices to finFETs enables chipmakers to scale their processes and devices from 16nm/14nm and beyond, but the industry faces several challenges at each node. Cost and technical issues are the obvious challenges. In addition, cycle time—a key but less publicized part of the chip-scaling equation—also is increasing at every turn, creating more angst for chipmakers and... » read more

What’s Next For NOR Flash?


The flash memory market is the tale two of cities. Today, NAND and NOR are the two main flash memory types. Over the years, the NAND flash market has exploded. Targeted for data storage, NAND flash has moved into flash cards, solid-state storage drives (SSDs) and other products. The excitement for NAND continues to mount, as the technology is moving from planar to a 3D structure. In fact, 3D... » read more

China Moves To Top Spot In Fab Equipment Spending


By Clark Tseng, Dan Tracy & Gavin Wang of SEMI With 20, and possibly more, new fab projects underway or announced in China since 2016, spending on fab equipment will surge to $10 billion or more, annually, by 2018 and to even higher levels in the following two years. As a result, China is projected to be the top spending region for fab equipment in 2019 and 2020. Robert Maire, of Semicon... » read more

Better Chips, Better Cars


There are literally thousands of electronic components in a new car, and those numbers are only going to increase as cars become smarter, safer, greener, and increasingly connected. As automakers and Tier 1 and Tier 2 companies shift their focus from mechanical to a combination of mechanical and electrical, there is an ongoing race among fabless companies to come up with innovative technolog... » read more

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