category: Manufacturing, Packaging and Materials

category: IoT, Security & Automotive

Automotive Foundries
By Ed Sperling - 16 Nov, 2017 - Comments: 0

The race to win a piece of the automotive electronics business has now reached the foundry level, and right now it's not clear exactly how this is going to work. This is uncharted territory for everyone. The build-out of electronics for assisted and autonomous driving is brand new. For existing cars, most of the chips being used are off-the-shelf microcontrollers, commodity MEMS sensors, and... » read more

Five Trends In IC Packaging
By Mark LaPedus - 16 Nov, 2017 - Comments: 0

At one time, chip packaging was an afterthought. Chipmakers were more worried about IC design. Packaging was considered a mere commodity, which was simply used to house the design. More recently, though, chip packaging has become a hot topic. The IC design is still important, but packaging is a key part of the solution. In fact, the industry can go down two paths. The traditional way is t... » read more

What’s What In Advanced Packaging
By Choon Lee - 16 Nov, 2017 - Comments: 5

Ever open the body of your smartphone (perhaps unintentionally) and see small, black rectangles stuck on a circuit board? Those black rectangles are packaged chips. The external chip structure protects the fragile integrated circuits inside, as well as dissipates heat, keeps chips isolated from each other, and, importantly, provides connection to the circuit board and other elements. The manufa... » read more

Another Dimension For Virtual Reality
By Kerry Cunningham - 16 Nov, 2017 - Comments: 0

When you put on a virtual reality (VR) headset, you are connecting visually to another place—real or imagined. Most people connect VR with gaming, but increasingly business, industry and government users are finding new applications for the evolving technology. These applications, and many more to come, will help drive the adoption of VR and the devices used to access virtual environments. ... » read more

Variation Spreads At 10/7nm
By Ed Sperling - 16 Nov, 2017 - Comments: 6

Variation between different manufacturing equipment is becoming increasingly troublesome as chipmakers push to 10/7nm and beyond. Process variation is a well-known phenomenon at advanced nodes. But some of that is actually due to variations in equipment—sometimes the exact same model from the same vendor. Normally this would fall well below the radar of the semiconductor industry. But as t... » read more

Top Takeaways From SEMI-MSIG MEMS & Sensors Executive Congress 2017
By Paula Doe - 16 Nov, 2017 - Comments: 0

The MEMS and sensors sector has been talking about smarter, lower power devices forever, but this year’s recent SEMI-MSIG Executive Congress stressed the market drivers and the emerging technologies that look to bring those changes to the market. Ubiquitous sensing now demands lower power for its always-aware sensors to be useful, while acoustic wave and piezoelectric technologies are emer... » read more

What’s Next For Atomic Layer Etch?
By Mark LaPedus - 16 Nov, 2017 - Comments: 0

After years in R&D, several fab tool vendors last year finally began to ship systems based a next-generation technology called atomic layer etch (ALE). [getkc id="284" kc_name="ALE"] is is moving into 16/14nm, but it will play a big role at 10/7nm and beyond. The industry also is working on the next wave of ALE technology for advanced logic and memory production. Used by chipmakers fo... » read more

Overlay Challenges On The Rise
By Mark LaPedus - 16 Nov, 2017 - Comments: 2

The overlay metrology equipment market is heating up at advanced nodes as the number of masking layers grows and the size of the features that need to be aligned continue to shrink. Both ASML and KLA-Tencor recently introduced new [getkc id="307" kc_name="overlay"] metrology systems, seeking to address the increasing precision required for lines, cuts and other features on each layer. At 10/... » read more

Chips In China
By Wallace Pai - 16 Nov, 2017 - Comments: 1

The Chinese semiconductor industry is undergoing radical change. The national imperative is to increase self-sufficiency in semiconductors dramatically in the next few years, because while China is the world’s fastest-growing semiconductor market, it currently must import about 80 percent of the chips used in equipment manufactured by Chinese OEMs. Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province ... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Nov. 14
By Mark LaPedus - 14 Nov, 2017 - Comments: 0

GaN for electric cars Leti is coordinating a new European project to improve the drivetrain in electric vehicles. The so-called ModulED project will focus on the development of gallium nitride (GaN) technology for electric vehicles. The goal is to use power-based GaN devices for the motor, enabling a change from direct current to alternating current. The three-year, €7.2 million proje... » read more

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