category: Editor’s Note

category: IoT, Security & Automotive

The Final Deadline For EUV
By Ed Sperling - 27 Feb, 2014 - Comments: 5

When TSMC disclosed this week—in a public forum—that its production EUV lithography test had failed in one of the early test runs due to a power source issue, there were very different reactions. EUV, after all, is an emotional issue with billions of dollars invested and lots of jobs riding on this technology. To begin with, there has been the usual spin control. The message essentially ... » read more

A Different Kind Of Sales Job
By Ed Sperling - 30 Jan, 2014 - Comments: 0

For years EDA companies have been pitching the benefits of ESL tools and high-level modeling, and for just as many years chipmakers have been throwing that idea back at tools vendors saying it’s too expensive to retool. Talks between the two have waffled between polite bickering and contentious negotiations. Chipmakers have approached these “talks” from the stronger bargaining position... » read more

The End Is Near
By Ed Sperling - 30 Dec, 2013 - Comments: 0

Looking back is easier than looking forward, and looking narrow is easier than looking wide. In 2013, there were several fundamental changes. Change No. 1: IP is now a lucrative market. From Synopsys’ standpoint, it’s been a lucrative market for some time. But the acquisitions made by Cadence, beginning in late 2012, coupled with the push by ARM into the micro-server market and the flail... » read more

Counting Pennies
By Ed Sperling - 21 Nov, 2013 - Comments: 0

Even Intel may not have enough cash on hand to pay for a new state-of-the-art fab at 7nm. With fully equipped fabs expected to rise into the plus-$10 billion range over the next few process nodes, and each new process shrink jam-packed with a multitude of new problems, the momentum for continuing to shrink features appears to be slowing down. Technically, it’s possible to shrink transistor... » read more

Look Who’s Crosstalking
By Ed Sperling - 24 Oct, 2013 - Comments: 0

One of the common complaints among hardware engineers is that software engineers don’t understand how to really optimize their code to take advantage of the hardware. And software engineers complain that hardware engineers live in the past, hardwiring everything that can be done better in software. Those debates will continue as long as there are distinct groupings for hardware and softwar... » read more

Time To Think
By Ed Sperling - 26 Sep, 2013 - Comments: 0

The semiconductor industry seems to be running place these days—maybe even sprinting in place. At the leading edge of design, companies are still looking at the ramifications of moving to finFETs. The move to a 20nm process with double patterning on 16/14nm finFETs, depending on the foundry, looks like a fairly safe bet for those companies with the volume and the resources to design and de... » read more

Solar In Context
By Ed Sperling - 08 Aug, 2013 - Comments: 0

What made Apple’s iPod a winner was business context. There were plenty of other MP3 players on the market and Apple’s wasn’t particularly noteworthy from a technology standpoint. But rather than just sell another portable music machine, the company created something its competitors didn’t have—iTunes. In fact, it was iTunes that made the iPod, not the other way around. The same th... » read more

System-Level Security Issues
By Ed Sperling - 26 Jul, 2013 - Comments: 0

The more things that are put onto a single SoC, the greater the possibility that the entire system can be hacked. Centralization is good from the standpoint of speed, cost and power, but it’s not always good from the standpoint of security. This may sound contrary to the experience of corporate IT departments, but there’s a reason behind this. In the case of data centers, the advent of t... » read more

System-Level Security Issues
By Ed Sperling - 25 Jul, 2013 - Comments: 0

The more things that are put onto a single SoC, the greater the possibility that the entire system can be hacked. Centralization is good from the standpoint of speed, cost and power, but it’s not always good from the standpoint of security. This may sound contrary to the experience of corporate IT departments, but there’s a reason behind this. In the case of data centers, the advent of t... » read more

The Process At TSMC That No One Talks About
By Ed Sperling - 02 Jul, 2013 - Comments: 0

We’ll probably never know the full extent of the story, but it appears the board of directors at TSMC didn’t just rubber stamp Morris Chang’s title when it named him chairman and CEO last month. Chang was always chairman, but he wasn’t CEO. He had bestowed that title on Rick Tsai several years ago, who was Chang’s heir apparent. Tsai was named president of the new business develo... » read more

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