Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


National Instruments is offering free online training courses to anyone anywhere, until the end of April to help support the engineering community during COVID-19 crisis. Some instructor-led virtual training is available at reduced cost. NIWeek has been postponed this year until August 3-5, 2020. Click here for more news about how the semiconductor industry is handling COVID-19. AI, machi... » read more

Defect Evolution In Next Generation, Extreme Ultraviolet Lithography


Extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography is a promising next generation lithography technology that may succeed optical lithography at future technology nodes. EUV mask infrastructure and manufacturing of defect-free EUV mask blanks is a key near term challenge in the use of EUV lithography. Virtual fabrication is a computerized technique to perform predictive, three dimensional modeling of sem... » read more

The Long Road To Quantum Computing


Building a quantum computer is like building a cathedral. They both take a couple generations. The time frame for useful quantum computing applications that are not toy-sized is still a few years to a decade or more away. But the push is on now. Governments are racing to get their country’s quantum computing going for national security reasons. Companies such as Google and IBM are competin... » read more

Week In Review: Manufacturing, Test


Fab tools, materials and packaging Intel has recognized 37 companies for its annual suppliers’ awards. The list includes equipment, materials, packaging houses and other segments. These suppliers have collaborated with Intel to implement process improvements with good products and services. See who made the list here. ---------------------------------------- Lam Research has introduced... » read more

Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


Pervasive computing — health An injectable biosensor may someday help measure signs of influenza. DARPA (the U.S. Department of Defense’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) and digital health startup Profusa announced a study that uses Profusa’s Lumee Oxygen Platform to find ways to identify flu outbreaks, biological attacks and pandemics as much as three weeks earlier than curre... » read more

An Industry Under Siege


The coronavirus is taking a big toll on the semiconductor industry's unquenchable thirst for new information. The longer it lasts, the more the industry will have to resort to technology — some new, some old — to continue moving forward. Over the past couple weeks, conferences and trade shows have been postponed or outright canceled. Synopsys, Cadence and Intel pulled out of DVCon at the... » read more

New Architectural Issues Facing Auto Ecosystem


As chips bound for the automotive world move to small process nodes, including 5nm and below, the automotive ecosystem is wrestling with both scaling issues and challenges related to architecting safety-critical systems using fewer chips. This may sound counterintuitive, because one of the main reasons automotive chip providers are moving to smaller nodes is to reduce the number of chips in ... » read more

Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


AI/Edge The United States Department of Defense (DOD) has adopted ethical principles for using artificial intelligence in warfare that chiefly say the U.S. has to follow the laws, treaties, in use of AI in warfare. Any AI used by DOD has to be responsible, equitable, traceable, reliable and governable. “The Department will design and engineer AI capabilities to fulfill their intended functio... » read more

Chip Design Is Getting Squishy


So many variables, uncertainties and new approaches are in play today across the chip industry today that previous rules are looking rather dated. In the past, a handful of large companies or organizations set the rules for the industry and established an industry roadmap. No such roadmap exists today. And while there are efforts underway to create new roadmaps for different industries, inte... » read more

The Cost Of Programmability


Nothing comes for free, and that is certainly true for the programmable elements in an SoC. But without them we are left with very specific devices that can only be used for one fixed application and cannot be updated. Few complex devices are created that do not have many layers of programmability, but the sizing of those capabilities is becoming more important than in the past. There are... » read more

← Older posts Newer posts →