Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


Automotive A fire at a Renesas fab may put a further squeeze on the supply of automotive chips, according to an Associated Press story. The fire in Naka Factory (located in Japan in Hitachinaka, Ibaraki Prefecture) was caused by plating equipment igniting within the first floor of the N3 Building and was extinguished the same day it started on March 19th, according to a press release. “The c... » read more

Week In Review: Design, Low Power


Companies Pearl Semiconductor launched to provide low and ultra-low noise timing products. “Pearl is a timing company developing resonator-agnostic solutions. We work with quartz crystals, MEMS resonators or whatever achieves superior performance,” said Ayman Ahmed, CEO of Pearl Semiconductor. “Current and future automotive applications demand low noise and a wide operating temperatur... » read more

Aging Analysis Common Model Interface Gains Momentum


By Greg Curtis, Ahmed Ramadan, Ninad Pimparkar, and Jung-Suk Goo In February 2019, Siemens EDA wrote an article1 entitled “The Time Is Now for a Common Model Interface”. Since that time, we have continued to see increasing demand for aging analysis, not only in the traditional automotive space, but also in other areas of technology design, such as mobile communication and IoT application... » read more

Week In Review: Manufacturing, Test


Government policy For the last four years, the U.S. and China have been embroiled in a trade war, especially on the technology front. The U.S. has implemented a number of export control measures and tariffs in the arena. But there might be a thawing in the tense relationship between the two superpowers. “Reports surfaced Thursday indicating the China Semiconductor Industry Association (CSIA)... » read more

MRAM Evolves In Multiple Directions


Magnetoresistive RAM (MRAM) is one of several new non-volatile memory technologies targeting broad commercial availability, but designing MRAM into chips and systems isn't as simple as adding other types of memory. MRAM isn’t an all-things-for-all-applications technology. It needs to be tuned for its intended purpose. MRAMs targeting flash will not do as well targeting SRAMs, and vice vers... » read more

Cloud Vs. On-Premise Analytics


The immense and growing volume of data generated in chip manufacturing is forcing chipmakers to rethink where to process and store that data. For fabs and OSATs, this decision is not one to be taken lightly. The proprietary nature of yield, performance, and other data, and corporate policies to retain tight control of that data, have so far limited outsourcing to the cloud. But as the amount... » read more

Making Sense Of New Edge-Inference Architectures


New edge-inference machine-learning architectures have been arriving at an astounding rate over the last year. Making sense of them all is a challenge. To begin with, not all ML architectures are alike. One of the complicating factors in understanding the different machine-learning architectures is the nomenclature used to describe them. You’ll see terms like “sea-of-MACs,” “systolic... » read more

Week In Review: Design, Low Power


Analog Devices acquired the wireless assets of Comcores. Analog Devices plans to continue to evolve the wireless technology and participate in the O-RAN forum. Teams based in Denmark and Poland, including Comcores founder and former CEO, Thomas Noergaard, will join ADI. Comcores will retain its other lines of intellectual property and digital systems business, Chip-to-Chip and Ethernet Systems ... » read more

Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


Aerospace The NASA's Mars Perseverance Rover, which landed safely on Mars this week, has some new autonomous systems. The landing craft flew autonomously to find a good landing spot. When on the ground, the rover can drive in an autonomous traverse mode. Also autonomous is the small helicopter, the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter, being tested on Mars. The helicopter can fly up to 90 seconds autonom... » read more

FeFETs Bring Promise And Challenges


Ferroelectric FETs (FeFETs) and memory (FeRAM) are generating high levels of interest in the research community. Based on a physical mechanism that hasn’t yet been commercially exploited, they join the other interesting new physics ideas that are in various stages of commercialization. “FeRAM is very promising, but it's like all promising memory technologies — it takes a while to get b... » read more

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