Upturn Seen For Silicon Wafer Market


After a downturn in 2019, the silicon wafer market is expected to rebound in 2020. 2021 looks even better for silicon wafers. Silicon wafers are a fundamental part of the semiconductor business. Every chipmaker needs to buy them in one size or another. Silicon wafer vendors produce and sell bare or raw silicon wafers to chipmakers, who in turn process them into chips. The silicon wafer ma... » read more

From FinFETs To Gate-All-Around


When they were first commercialized at the 22 nm node, finFETs represented a revolutionary change to the way we build transistors, the tiny switches in the “brains” of a chip. As compared to prior planar transistors, the fin, contacted on three sides by the gate, provides much better control of the channel formed within the fin. But, finFETs are already reaching the end of their utility as... » read more

IC Integrity Of Edge-Computing Processors: Meeting The Demands Of AI


If you ask most people, they would say that we’re living in an age of artificial intelligence (AI). But the reality is that we’re just getting started. The age of artificial intelligence is still in its infancy. So many of aspects of our lives involve technology but we’re still having to feed that technology or manually operate that technology in order get the results we want. Autonomous ... » read more

Establishing A Special Interest Group On Common Hardware Weaknesses


It seems like almost every week yet another hardware security vulnerability is announced. Just last week a team of researchers disclosed a new attack called “Platypus”, an acronym for "Power Leakage Attacks: Targeting Your Protected User Secrets.” This is another attack exploiting the simple fact that hardware sits below the conventional security abstractions and finding a vulnerability i... » read more

Who’s Got The Hot Potato?


In COVID-19 times, gathering a few friends in a circle and playing “hot potato” may sound like a dream. For car manufacturers and the automotive electronics supply chain, handling the cybersecurity hot potato is not quite a nightmare but certainly not a fun game. Companies like Volkswagen, Fiat, and Ford have much expertise in managing a complex supply chain and post-sale support. Most car ... » read more

High Throughput Noise Measurements


Flicker noise and random telegraph noise (RTN) testing can take a long time, especially when measuring down to frequencies of 1 Hz or below. Sweep times up to 30 min at a single temperature are common. And standard data collection for device models requires DUT data at multiple temperatures on small pads. To lower Cost of Test (CoT), and significantly increase on-wafer test throughput, a... » read more

Benefits Of Outsourcing Yield Management Software


Microchip is a longtime yieldHUB customer. We work with a number of divisions worldwide. We spoke to Kasia Metlička-Sawicka, an Engineering Release Supervisor, Senior Engineer II-Product in Microchip Ireland to find out why she likes using our system. What do you do? I’m an Engineering Release supervisor/Senior Product Engineer. I oversee the engineering release group of technicians... » read more

ResNet-50 Does Not Predict Inference Throughput For MegaPixel Neural Network Models


Customers are considering applications for AI inference and want to evaluate multiple inference accelerators. As we discussed last month, TOPS do NOT correlate with inference throughput and you should use real neural network models to benchmark accelerators. So is ResNet-50 a good benchmark for evaluating relative performance of inference accelerators? If your application is going to p... » read more

Embedded Processor Requirements And OS Choice


For each embedded product, software developers need to consider whether they need an operating system; and if so, what type of an OS. Operating systems vary considerably, from real-time operating systems with a very small memory footprint to general-purpose OSes such as Linux with a rich set of features. Choosing a proper type of operating system for your product – and consequently w... » read more

What’s Ahead For Chips & Equipment?


It’s been a topsy-turvy year in the semiconductor industry. 2020 was supposed to be a strong year. Then, the coronavirus outbreak hit. Countries implemented various measures to mitigate the outbreak, such as stay-at-home orders and store closures. Economic turmoil and job losses soon followed. Earlier in the year, the chip market looked bleak. Now, business appears to be strong. To gain... » read more

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