Rethinking Differentiation


Differentiation is becoming more difficult, more time-consuming, and in some cases much more expensive for chipmakers. The traditional metrics of faster performance, lower power and less area/cost, which are leftovers from the PC era, no longer are a guarantee of success despite the fact that they are still baseline metrics for many designs. Even new metrics such as ecosystem completeness, w... » read more

Getting Paid More


Consolidation is a regular news item in the semiconductor industry, and has been for years, but most of those deals have been relatively small. What's changing is the amount of consolidation involving big companies, fueled partly by a massive M&A fund in China, partly by an arms race in preparation for the IoE, and partly by the kind of thinking that if other companies are doing it, it's dan... » read more

Fundamental Shifts In Chip Business


Shifting business models, acquisitions, minority investments and increasing uncertainty are creating fundamental shifts in the semiconductor industry that could redefine who is successful in which markets for years to come. The announcement today that [getentity id="22671" e_name="Rambus"] is developing memory controller chips, expanding its business beyond just creating IP for the memory an... » read more

Consolidation Creates Confusion


Consolidation in any industry is a sign of maturation. Diverse business models converge to the ones that really work. Supply and demand find equilibrium with a right-sized supply base. And generally, the fittest survive. The semiconductor industry is somewhere around a half-century old, so consolidation in this industry is to be expected, and we have certainly seen some consolidation of late. ... » read more

Intel Plus Altera


Since the Intel-Altera deal reached the handshake phase earlier this month, there have been a lot of theories being forwarded and a lot of questions being raised. And there have been very few answers, in part because the deal isn't finalized yet and in part because this marriage will take time to play out in the market—maybe years. But along with the GlobalFoundries-IBM pairing, this is th... » read more

Consolidation And Innovation


Consolidation is happening across the semiconductor industry, in ways that are very apparent and others that aren't so obvious. On the chipmaker side, NXP's acquisition of Freescale, Avago's acquisition of Broadcom and LSI, and Intel's acquisition of Altera are so big that they require approval by multiple governments. Less obvious are moves such as Apple's build out of its processor team, a... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


Christopher Rolland, an analyst at FBR, made a startling statement in a recent report. “At the pace of consolidation set thus far this year, 32% of all U.S. publicly traded semiconductor companies would be acquired in 2015! While this run-rate is not likely sustainable and should slow as the year progresses, we still expect ~15% consolidation rates for the remainder of this cycle (above low-t... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


In what was called a defensive measure by some, Intel has announced a definitive agreement to acquire Altera for $54 per share in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $16.7 billion. Here’s what one analyst said about the deal. “We continue to believe Intel’s pursuit of Altera–at a significant premium–was based on a defensive position, rather than the purely accretive str... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


Merger and acquisition activity continues to heat up across the semiconductor industry. On one front, Avago Technologies continues on its acquisition spree. And on another front, NXP Semiconductors is moving to spin off its RF power business. And there are other deals in the works as well, including Intel’s proposed move to buy Altera. Weston Twigg, an analyst with Pacific Crest Securities... » read more

Avago Buys Broadcom; NXP Spins Off RF Power Unit


Merger and acquisition activity continues to heat up across the semiconductor industry. On one front, Avago Technologies continues on its acquisition spree. And on another front, NXP Semiconductors is moving to spin off its RF power business. And there are other deals in the works as well, including Intel's proposed move to buy Altera. What’s driving the wave of M&A activity? The sem... » read more

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