tag: Intel

Week In Review: Manufacturing, Design, Test
By Mark LaPedus - 21 Feb, 2014 - Comments: 0

Reports have surfaced that IBM’s semiconductor unit is on the block, and there has been discussion about the reasons and the aftermath. Sources say there are at least two potential buyers for the unit—Samsung and TowerJazz. Apparently, the talks between IBM-Samsung and IBM-TowerJazz have been going on for some time. Multiple sources believe that Samsung is interested in buying IBM’s advan... » read more

The Search For The Next Transistor
By Mark LaPedus - 20 Feb, 2014 - Comments: 3

In the near term, the leading-edge chip roadmap looks fairly clear. Chips based on today’s finFETs and planar fully depleted silicon-on-insulator (FDSOI) technologies are expected to scale down to the 10nm node. But then, the CMOS roadmap becomes foggy at 7nm and beyond. The industry has been exploring a number of next-generation transistor candidates, but suddenly, a few technologies are ... » read more

Looking Beyond Moore’s Law
By Mark LaPedus - 20 Feb, 2014 - Comments: 2

For decades, chip scaling has followed a simple linear curve. In this curve, the transistor gate-pitch scales at 0.7x every two years. This is the driving force behind Moore’s Law, which states that the number of transistors per chip roughly doubles every two years. But starting at the 16nm/14nm node, there is a change taking place in chip scaling. According to a chart from Imec, there are... » read more

Are Processors Running Out Of Steam?
By Ed Sperling - 14 Feb, 2014 - Comments: 4

In 2004, Intel introduced a new line of Pentium chips that ran at 3.6GHz. Fast forward to today, and the company’s i7 processors run at 3.5GHz with a Turbo Boost to 3.9GHz. There have been many improvements in the meantime. There is more cache and dramatically faster access to data stored in that cache. And there are more cores with improved coherency between them. But the big problem is p... » read more

ATE Platform Strategy Gains Ground
By Kenji Tsuda - 10 Feb, 2014 - Comments: 0

More than a decade ago, at the urging of Intel, the ATE industry set out to reduce the cost of test in the digital chip market. Backed by companies such as Intel, Motorola, Renesas, Advantest and others, they formed an ATE consortium to make this all work. The aim of the consortium was to devise an "open architecture" for ATE. This would enable the development of third-party plug-and-play m... » read more

Week In Review: Manufacturing, Design, Test
By Mark LaPedus - 07 Feb, 2014 - Comments: 0

This is no surprise, but it could be the end of an era. IBM is exploring a sale of its semiconductor business, according to FT.com. A survey, conducted by Harris Interactive on behalf of Crucial.com, revealed that when asked to choose between these two specific types of men, 84% of women who prefer to be involved with men prefer their male love interest to be "super handy" with computers an... » read more

The Next Big Threat: System Security
By Ed Sperling - 31 Jan, 2014 - Comments: 0

No SoC ever will be totally secure, and no technology will stop experienced thieves who really want to get into a device. But chipmakers and IP companies are examining ways to at least make it more difficult—and at least in theory, far less lucrative. One big change, of course, is that a connected electronic ecosystem has made location irrelevant. In the past, crime was limited to where th... » read more

What’s After CMOS?
By Mark LaPedus - 24 Jan, 2014 - Comments: 3

Chipmakers continue to scale the CMOS transistor to finer geometries, but the question is for how much longer. The current thinking is that the CMOS transistor could scale at least to the 3nm node in the 2021 timeframe. And then, CMOS could run out of gas, prompting the need for a new switch technology. So what’s after the CMOS-based transistor? Carbon nanotubes and graphene get the most a... » read more

The Week In Review: System-Level Design
By Ed Sperling - 24 Jan, 2014 - Comments: 0

India's reliance on technology has created a huge demand for software in the country. IDC expects the market for enterprise software in India to grow 19%, and the market for collaborative applications to grow 13.5%. Growth is continuing across all business markets, turning India into a huge consumer of software rather than just a creator. The enterprise software market in India is dominated by ... » read more

Waiting For Next-Generation Lithography
By Mark LaPedus - 23 Jan, 2014 - Comments: 2

Nearly 30 years ago, optical lithography was supposed to hit the wall at the magical 1 micron barrier, prompting the need for a new patterning technology such as direct-write electron beam and X-ray lithography. At that time, however, the industry was able to push optical lithography for volume chip production at the 1-micron node and beyond. This, in turn, effectively killed direct-write e-... » read more

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