Big Changes In Patterning


Aki Fujimura, CEO of [getentity id="22864" comment="D2S"], sat down with Semiconductor Engineering to discuss patterning issues at 10nm and below, including mask alignment, the need for GPU acceleration, EUV's future impact on the total number of masks, and what the re-introduction of curvilinear shapes will mean for design. SE: Patterning issues are getting a lot of attention at 10nm and 7n... » read more

Battling Fab Cycle Times


The shift from planar devices to finFETs enables chipmakers to scale their processes and devices from 16nm/14nm and beyond, but the industry faces several challenges at each node. Cost and technical issues are the obvious challenges. In addition, cycle time—a key but less publicized part of the chip-scaling equation—also is increasing at every turn, creating more angst for chipmakers and... » read more

What Are FeFETs?


The memory market is going in several different directions at once. On one front, the traditional memory types, such DRAM and flash, remain the workhorse technologies in systems despite undergoing some changes in the business. Then, several vendors are readying the next-generation memory types in the market. As part of an ongoing series, Semiconductor Engineering will explore where the new a... » read more

Routing Signals At 7nm


[getperson id="11763" comment="Tobias Bjerregaard"], [getentity id="22908" e_name="Teklatech's"] CEO, discusses the challenges of designs at 7nm and beyond, including power integrity, how to reduce IR drop and timing issues, and how to improve the economics of scaling. SE: How much further can device scaling go? Bjerregaard: The way you should look at this is [getkc id="74" comment="Moore... » read more

More Degrees Of Freedom


Ever since the publication of Gordon Moore's famous observation in 1965, the semiconductor industry has been laser-focused on shrinking devices to their practical, and more recently, impractical limit. Increasing transistor density has encountered a number of problems along the way, but it also has enabled us to put computers—which once filled specially built rooms—onto the desktop firs... » read more

Not All Software Is Like Elvis


January is traditionally my look-back and outlook month. Five years ago my year-end wish had been a census of software developers, and it is fascinating how software in the context of verification has evolved since then (more on this below). Also, most years I go into my garage, dust off my collection of IEEE Spectrum print editions from January five, ten and 15 years back to assess which of th... » read more

Changing Direction In Chip Design


Andrzej Strojwas, chief technologist at PDF Solutions and professor of electrical and computer engineering at Carnegie Mellon University—and the winner of this year's Phil Kaufman Award for distinguished contributions to EDA—sat down with Semiconductor Engineering to talk about device scaling, why the semiconductor industry will begin to fragment around new architectures and packaging, and ... » read more

Performance Increasingly Tied To I/O


Speeding up input and output is becoming a cornerstone for improving performance and lowering power in SoCs and ASICs, particularly as scaling processors and adding more cores produce diminishing returns. While processors of all types continue to improve, the rate of improvement is slowing at each new node. Obtaining the expected 30% to 50% boost in performance and lower power no longer can ... » read more

2017: Manufacturing And Markets


While the industry is busy chatting about the end of Moore's Law and a maturing of the semiconductor industry, the top minds of many companies are having none of it. A slowdown in one area is just an opportunity, in another and that is reflected in the predictions for this year. As in previous years, Semiconductor Engineering will look back on these predictions at the end of the year to see ... » read more

Reflecting Back On 2016


Anyone can make a prediction, and sometimes the more outlandish they are the more they get noticed. But at the end of the year some people hit the mark while others may have been way off. Many people simply make projections based on the current trajectory of trends, while others look for the potential discontinuities that may lie ahead. Semiconductor Engineering examines the projections made... » read more

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