Reducing Risk In The Semiconductor Supply Chain


Companies that were hit with chip shortages during the pandemic are changing their strategies to prevent future problems, deploying a combination of supply chain mapping, second sourcing, and digital transformation. Those shortages caused a $200 billion loss for automotive manufacturers, and the disruptions were far more widespread, in many cases lasting for years. Companies of all sorts wer... » read more

Recent Earthquakes Highlight Risk To Semiconductor Manufacturing Sites


On July 4, 2019, southern California experienced a 6.4 magnitude earthquake followed by a 7.1 earthquake the next day. Both earthquakes occurred near the town of Ridgecrest, but they were not related to the San Andreas fault, an 800-mile fault zone in California where two tectonic plates meet. The San Andreas fault is generally considered to be where “the big one” could occur in California,... » read more

Blog Review: July 17


Mentor's John McMillan takes a look at the three general classes that have been established by IPC-2221B to reflect progressive increases in sophistication, functional performance requirements, and testing/inspection frequency for PCBs. Synopsys' Dinesh Siwal and Thenmozhy Kaliyamurthy point out the new features and improvements in DisplayPort 2.0, including greater speeds, better power effi... » read more

Earthquake Proof Your Software Development


In this blog we tend to focus on the benefits and opportunities that arise when using virtual prototyping. However, in real life we well know that any situation bears not only opportunities but also risks. I was reminded of this by the recent earthquake disaster in Kumamoto Japan. Having lived in the most earthquake prone areas in the world for the past 10 years, I know firsthand how easy it is... » read more

Fabs At Risk


By Adrienne Downey There are hundreds of semiconductor fabs spread all over the world. The trend over the past several years has been one of consolidation into several main manufacturing centers in the Asia/Pacific region, the United States, and Europe. Unfortunately for the industry, many of these fabs are located in areas prone to earthquakes. Some locations are also at an added risk of dama... » read more