200mm Cools Off, But Not For Long


After years of acute shortages, 200mm fab capacity is finally loosening up, but the supply/demand picture could soon change with several challenges on the horizon. 200mm fabs are older facilities with more mature processes, although they still churn out a multitude of today’s critical chips, such as analog, MEMS, RF and others. From 2016 to 2018, booming demand for these and other chips ca... » read more

Challenges Grow For 5G Packages And Modules


The shift to 5G wireless networks is driving a need for new IC packages and modules in smartphones and other systems, but this move is turning out to be harder than it looks. For one thing, the IC packages and RF modules for 5G phones are more complex and expensive than today's devices, and that gap will grow significantly in the second phase of 5G. In addition, 5G devices will require an as... » read more

Where 5G Works, And Where It Doesn’t


The rollout of 5G hype has begun. Companies are building 5G chipsets for mobile devices, and they are working on the infrastructure that will allow massive amounts of data to move freely between devices. There is little doubt that more bandwidth is required everywhere. Files are growing in size, particularly with streaming video and images and various flavors of AI and machine learning. This... » read more

Week in Review: IoT, Security, Auto


Products/Services Arteris IP reports that Bitmain licensed the Arteris Ncore Cache Coherent Interconnect intellectual property for use in its next-generation Sophon Tensor Processing Unit system-on-a-chip devices for the scalable hardware acceleration of artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms. “Our choice of interconnect IP became more important as we continued to increase t... » read more

5G Driving New Automotive Applications


5G’s increased throughput, reliability, availability, and lower latency will enable new safety-sensitive applications which are holistically known as V2X or Vehicle-to-Everything. 5G Cellular V2X (C-V2X) provides a common wireless network to support convergence of multiple applications for urban, suburban, and highway driving conditions. 5G C-V2X will enable multiple new automotive applicatio... » read more

5G OTA Test Not Ready For Production


5G is poised to dominate the wireless world, but over-the-air (OTA) testing of 5G beamforming antennas is still not ready for volume production. Beamforming is a critical element in the millimeter wave version of 5G, because of the limitations of ultra-high-frequency signals. Unlike 4G and its predecessors, millimeter wave technology will not penetrate objects, so signals need to be directed... » read more

Week in Review – IoT, Security, Auto


Products/Services Synopsys announced successful deployment of the Synopsys Yield Explorer yield learning platform for fast ramp-up of new products on Samsung's advanced finFET technology nodes. Using the secure data exchange mechanism in Yield Explorer, Samsung is able to share the data required for yield analysis, such as chip design, fab, and test, with its customers while maintaining the co... » read more

Edge Complexity To Grow For 5G


Edge computing is becoming as critical to the success of 5G as millimeter-wave technology will be to the success of the edge. In fact, it increasingly looks as if neither will succeed without the other. 5G networks won’t be able to meet 3GPP’s 4-millisecond-latency rule without some layer to deliver the data, run the applications and broker the complexities of multi-tier Internet apps ac... » read more

Week in Review: IoT, Security, Auto


Products/Services Visa agreed to acquire the token and electronic ticketing business of Rambus for $75 million in cash. The business involved is part of the Smart Card Software subsidiary of Rambus. It includes the former Bell ID mobile-payment businesses and the Ecebs smart-ticketing systems for transit providers. Meanwhile, Rambus expanded its CryptoManager Root of Trust product line. “Sec... » read more

Factoring Reliability Into Chip Manufacturing


Making chips that can last two decades is possible, even if it's developed at advanced process nodes and is subject to extreme environmental conditions, such as under the hood of a car or on top of a light pole. But doing that at the same price point as chips that go into consumer electronics, which are designed to last two to four years, is a massively complex challenge. Until a couple of y... » read more

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