Chip Industry Week In Review

By Jesse Allen, Karen Heyman, and Liz Allan

AMD took the covers off new AI accelerators for training and inferencing of large language model and high-performance computing workloads. In its announcement, AMD focused heavily on performance leadership in the commercial AI processor space through a combination of architectural changes, better software efficiency, along with some improvements in power consumption.

ASM will invest €300 million (~US$323 million) over five years to design and construct a new site on more than 20 acres in Scottsdale, Arizona, focusing on technology development, research, design and engineering capabilities, and pilot manufacturing capacities.

Global semiconductor revenue is expected to grow 16.8% in 2024, for a total of $624 billion, reports Gartner. Gartner expects the full 2023 year to show a 10.9% drop to $534 billion. Much of that is tied to the memory market, which is forecast to record a 38.8% decline in 2023. However, the memory market is expected to rebound next year with 66.3% growth.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed a jury’s 2021 verdict that Intel infringed one VLSI patent, and sent the case back to Texas for a new trial to determine how much Intel owes for infringing a second VLSI patent. The original award was $2.18 billion, one of the largest in the history of U.S. patent law, according to Reuters.

At the Reagan National Defense Forum, U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo said if companies redesign a chip around a particular export restriction and it enables China to do AI, “I’m going to control it the very next day,” reports BNN Bloomberg. NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang said he still hopes to supply high-end processors to China, reports the Wall St. Journal.

SEMI announced the SEMI Leadership Accelerator to foster industry growth by helping to cultivate the next generation of leaders.

Quick links to more news:

Manufacturing and Test
Design and Power
Security
Pervasive Computing and AI
Automotive
In-Depth Reports
Events

Manufacturing and Test

The semiconductor industry will grow by 6% to 8% per year through 2030, at which time it will hit the $1 trillion annual revenue mark, reports McKinsey. The consulting firm also noted that to reach targets, fab efficiency can be achieved through equipment recovery, planned maintenance, and parts management. In line with those growth predictions, the top 10 foundries grew 7.9% quarter over quarter in Q3 2023, with a continued upward trend expected for Q4, reports TrendForce.

Meanwhile, the global wide bandgap semiconductor market was valued at $1.6 billion in 2022 and is estimated to reach $5.4 billion by 2032 at a CAGR of 13.2% from 2023 to 2032, reports Allied Market Research. In contrast, the semiconductor wet chemicals market contracted slightly in 2023, but it is expected to rebound by 6% in 2024, reports TECHCET.

Advantest launched three new memory test products designed to target NAND Flash and non-volatile memory (NVM) devices.

Siemens and Samsung Foundry announced a new PDK compatible with Calibre DesignEnhancer that aims to speed the place-and-route process for designs using Samsung’s latest process nodes. In addition, Siemens AG and Intel announced they will collaborate on driving digitalization and sustainability of microelectronics manufacturing.

Schneider Electric announced that Google, ASM, and HP joined its Catalyze program, aiming to accelerate access to renewable energy across the global semiconductor value chain.

Japanese printing and materials group Toppan Holdings plans to retool an iPhone display factory to supply products to the chip industry.

Design and Power

Ansys’ RaptorX on-chip electromagnetic solution was certified for accurately modeling high-speed signals and devices with Samsung‘s 8nm LN08LPP low-power manufacturing process.

Zero ASIC revealed a high-performance open-source framework for communication between RTL simulations, FPGA emulations, Python, and C++.

RS Group selected Siemens’ circuit simulation technology to power its DesignSpark Circuit Simulator, a cloud native environment for designing, modeling, simulating, and analyzing electronic/mechatronic circuits and systems.

Rigetti Computing unveiled its first commercially available quantum processing unit (QPU). The QPU includes a 9-qubit chip that features tunable couplers for fast 2-qubit operations and a 5-qubit chip for testing single-qubit operations.

IBM unveiled its 133-qubit processor, Heron, which uses a newly built architecture to improve error reduction five-fold over its predecessor. IBM also updated its roadmap, prioritizing improvements in gate operations to scale with quality towards advanced error-corrected systems.

Researchers working on DARPA’s Optimization with Noisy Intermediate-Scale Quantum (ONISQ) devices program created a quantum circuit with around 48 error-correcting logical qubits using arrays of “noisy” physical Rydberg qubits, which they say is the highest number to date. Harvard, MIT, QuEra Computing, Caltech, and Princeton are members of the group.

Agile Analog and sureCore are teaming up to implement a cryogenic control ASIC on the GlobalFoundries 22FDX process, as part of an Innovate UK project.

JEDEC published the Compression Attached Memory Module (CAMM2) Common Standard.

Security

Rambus released a quantum-safe engine (QSE) for integration into hardware security elements in ASICs, SoCs, and FPGAs.

Synopsys published its annual Building Security In Maturity Model (BSIMM) report, analyzing software security practices across 130 organizations. It found that automated security technology is growing rapidly, which is propagating the “shift everywhere” philosophy of performing security tests throughout the entire software development life cycle.

MITRE Engenuity announced that its 2024 Embedded Capture the Flag (eCTF) competition will focus on health care device security and its Healthcare Lab explores how cybersecurity intersects with increasingly technology-reliant clinical settings.

Researchers at Texas A&M University and Technische Universitat Darmstadt developed a novel dynamic and adaptive decision-making framework that uses multi-armed bandit (MAB) algorithms to fuzz processors.

Cisco announced its AI Assistant for Security, a generative AI-powered assistant that helps with complex tasks, saves time, and eliminates errors and misconfigurations.

SiLC Technologies announced its machine vision tool, Eyeonic Vision Sensor, has a new detection range of two kilometers (1.2 miles). The FMCW-based lidar system is suited to applications requiring advanced warning and detailed environmental understanding, such as perimeter security and drone detection systems.

Keysight Technologies won an $18.5 million U.S. Air Force contract to integrate and deliver two Electronic Warfare Threat Simulator (EWTS) systems that create and analyze high-density environments for testing and evaluating systems used for electromagnetic spectrum operations.

The U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued a memorandum regarding the Federal Information Security Modernization Act of 2014 (FISMA), including a section on the Internet of Things (IoT): “Agencies must have a clear understanding of the devices connected within their information systems to gauge cybersecurity risk to their missions and operations.”

The European Union Agency for Cybersecurity (ENISA) reported that warfare and geopolitics are fueling denial-of-service (DoS) attacks, and that 66% of such attacks are politically motivated.

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), National Security Agency (NSA), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and international partners published a joint guide, as part of the Secure by Design campaign, to address the critical issue of memory safety vulnerabilities in programming languages. CISA also advised of an Adobe ColdFusion vulnerability and issued other alerts.

Pervasive Computing and AI

In space news, Space Machines used Siemens Xcelerator as a Service to develop an Orbital Servicing Vehicle for in-space transportation and logistics; DARPA announced members of its LunA-10 program will design new integrated system-level solutions spanning multiple lunar services, including communications, navigation, and robotics; and Rochester Institute of Technology built a training device and monitoring tool to help make extended space travel healthier for astronauts by integrating game design, exercise science, and wearable technology.

Fig. 1: Space Machines Optimus orbital servicing vehicle. Source: Siemens

Researchers from the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) in Japan, Eindhoven University of Technology, and the University of L’Aquila demonstrated a record-breaking data-rate of 22.9 petabits per second using only a single optical fiber, more than doubling their previous world record of 10.66 petabits per second.

Renesas released motor driver ICs for sensorless, brushless DC (BLDC) motor applications that enable full torque at zero speed.

Infineon introduced three tools: A 12 A and 20 A synchronous buck regulator family with fast constant on-time (COT) architecture, targeting server, AI, datacom, telecom, and storage markets; a machine learning (ML) solution that can be deployed onto existing microcontroller (MCU) hardware, such as PSoC 6; and the CoolMOS S7T product family with an integrated temperature sensor, best suited for solid-state relay (SSR) applications.

Cadence Molecular Sciences will provide OpenEye’s molecular design software to power the open-science AI-driven structure-enabled antiviral platform (ASAP) Discovery Consortium to help rapidly develop antivirals to prevent future pandemics.

Google launched its AI model, Gemini, built to be multimodal so it can generalize, understand, and operate across different types of information including text, code, audio, image, and video.

Google DeepMind demonstrated a method for generating cultural transmission in AI agents, which succeeded at real-time imitation of a human in novel contexts without using any pre-collected human data.

IBM and Meta launched a global AI Alliance with over 50 founding members to advance open, safe, and responsible AI. Its multiple objectives include fostering a vibrant AI hardware accelerator ecosystem.

Elon Musk’s xAI is looking to raise $1 billion, according to a SEC filing.

ETH Zurich and EPFL launched a Swiss AI Initiative for the development and implementation of transparent and reliable AI.

MIT and ETH Zurich researchers used machine learning to speed up the time that mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) solvers perform optimizations by between 30% and 70%, without any drop in accuracy.

Automotive

When driven at a constant highway speed of 70 mph, some EVs fell up to 50 miles short of their advertised ranges, while others exceeded their advertised ranges by up to 70 miles, according to tests by Consumer Reports.

Toshiba and Rohm will collaborate to manufacture power semiconductors to strengthen their position in high-demand components for electric vehicles (EVs), reports Nikkei Asia.

Intrinsic ID released a hardware-based root-of-trust solution for semiconductors in the automotive market that must meet stringent functional safety standards.

Porsche Engineering and research partners are seeking to enhance the data available for simulating automated driving systems’ (ADS) reactions in critical situations, reports SAE.

At Toyota Motor Europe’s (TME) 2023 Kenshiki event, the company presented an expanded line-up of future battery electric and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles and said it will achieve 100% CO2 reduction in new vehicle sales in 2035, and full carbon neutrality in value chain and logistics by 2040.

In France, Symbio, a joint venture between Forvia, Michelin, and Stellantis, inaugurated its first Gigafactory. The JV will supply Stellantis with fuel cells so it can extend its hydrogen offerings with large-size vans, Ram pickups, and heavy-duty trucks for the North American market.

Falling prices of lithium, cobalt, and nickel led to a constant downward trend in battery cell prices, reports TrendForce. In November, prices of Chinese EV battery cells dropped by about 3.5% month over month, consumer LCO fell by 2.5%, and storage-type cells by 6.8%.

In-Depth Reports

New stories by the Semiconductor Engineering team this week:

• Dealing with cyberthreats is becoming an integral part of chip and system design, and far more expensive and complex.
• Inferencing and some training are being pushed to smaller devices as AI spreads to new applications.
• In the latest startup funding report, 59 companies raised $1.7 billion with quantum computing drawing significant attention.

Special Reports:

• AI accelerator architectures are poised for big changes as AI begins shifting toward the edge.
• New auto architectures promise faster communications and lower costs, but not everything will change quickly.

Events

Find upcoming chip industry events here, including:

Upcoming webinars are here, including ISO/SAE 21434 cybersecurity, quantum safe cryptography, simulation and more.

Further Reading and Newsletters

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