Foundries Face Challenges in 2016


Generally, 2015 has been a challenging year in the foundry business. For one thing, the foundry industry will register modest growth in 2015. In addition, the foundry customer base is consolidating. And on the leading edge, foundries took longer than expected to ramp up their 16nm/14nm finFET processes. So, after an eventful year in 2015, what’s in store for the foundry business in 2016? I... » read more

Chasing After Phantom Power


A lot of effort is being invested in power reduction techniques for mobile devices, where battery life is an important buying decision and power can translate into heat that can make a device uncomfortable to use. But are people willing to pay more for a device that consumes less power if it's plugged into a wall? And even if they are concerned about the power drawn during operation, what ab... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


For years, China has been trying to get a domestic IC equipment industry off the ground, but it has experienced modest success in the arena. Now, China may take a new strategy—acquire fab tool makers. In what could be a sign of things to come, China’s Beijing E-Town Dragon Semiconductor Industry Investment Center has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire U.S.-based fab tool vendor ... » read more

Laws Don’t Apply Anymore


One of the nifty things about technology is that it's always new and always being refreshed. That creates problems, though. The speed with which technology is overhauled or changed out is so much faster than the social and legal infrastructure built to support and protect the people buying it, that the two worlds are now years, if not decades, out of sync. The first whiff of this came in 198... » read more

Fan-Out Packaging Gains Steam


Fan-outs are creating a buzz and gaining steam in the market at a pace far beyond what anyone would have expected even at the start of the year. The approach, which has been around for several years, is a wafer-level packaging process that enables ultra-thin, high-density packages. So why the buzz? Apple is apparently moving to [getkc id="202" kc_name="fan-out"] packaging, according to an... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


Lam Research’s proposed move to acquire KLA-Tencor is still generating a buzz in the industry. One executive from Lam has explained the reason for the deal. Meanwhile, analysts are also weighing in. “We believe the deal itself is a positive one for Lam as it supplements its leading etch position with the market share leader in process control with significant accretion and earnings leverage... » read more

Counting By The Billions


The semiconductor industry has been on cruise control since the advent of the personal computer. By 2002, a total of 1 billion PCs had been shipped, according to Gartner, and by 2008 that number had doubled. But that was nothing compared with the smartphone. In 2014 alone, Gartner reported sales of 1.2 billion smartphones. Both of those markets will remain healthy for years to come. Despite... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


Looking to propel the next wave of OLED displays, Applied Materials has rolled out two new systems. The tools enable the volume production of OLED displays for both mobile products and TVs. In addition, Applied Materials has shipped an Applied TopMet roll-to-roll metal deposition system to Jindal Poly Films, a leader in PET and BOPP films for flexible packaging and labeling applications. In... » read more

Gaps In Performance, Power Coverage


The semiconductor industry always has used metrics to define progress, and in areas such as functional verification significant advances have been made. But so far, no effective metrics have been developed for power, performance, or other system-level concerns, which basically means that design teams have to run blind. On the plus side, the industry has migrated from the use of code coverage... » read more

Is it Hot? Ask Joules


Over the last decade it has become clear that power reduction techniques involving different parts of the chips would become more important than they had historically. In 2G cell phones everything except the real-time clock could be turned off when the phone was not in use. Pre-smartphones, a phone was either making a call (or texting, gaming, etc.) or it was off. In fact, a cell phone can’t ... » read more

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