Chip Industry Week in Review


Samsung reportedly is hiking memory chip prices by 30% to 60% due to high demand from AI data centers and constrained supplies. Those shortages are causing ripples elsewhere. SMIC, China's largest foundry, said its customers are holding back orders for other types of semiconductor due to concerns about memory supplies. Meanwhile, interest in photonics and power semiconductors is picking up, ... » read more

Chip Industry Week In Review


GlobalFoundries plans to acquire MIPS, adding RISC-V processor IP and PPA optimization software capabilities to its foundry offerings. MIPS will continue to operate as a standalone business within GF. The deal is expected to close in the second half of 2025. The EU rolled out new general-purpose AI rules this week to limit copyright infringement, protect public safety, and require transparency... » read more

Week In Review: Semiconductor Manufacturing, Test


Restrictions on China continue to grow. The Biden Administration is considering more restrictions on selling advanced AI chips to China, according to multiple media reports. Meanwhile, the Dutch government is expected to limit the sale of manufacturing equipment. JIC Capital, the wholly owned subsidiary of Japan Investment Corporation (JIC), will purchase materials company JSR Corp. through ... » read more

Startup Funding: October 2022


Investors poured $3.5 billion into 113 startup companies in October 2022, especially new battery technology, AI hardware, and faster memory access. Battery technology dominated the fundraising in October thanks to the U.S. Department of Energy and four funding rounds that exceeded $200M. The DOE awarded sizeable grants to help 20 companies, including six startups, build out battery material ... » read more

Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


Automotive, mobility Lightyear, an automotive company based in the Netherlands, announced its solar car, the Lightyear 0, which goes into production this year. The car has a Worldwide Harmonised Light Vehicle Test Procedure (WLTP) range of 625 kilometers/388 miles and can charge itself while driving or parked, using double curved solar arrays on its roof. The daily charging adds 70 kilometers/... » read more

Week In Review: Design, Low Power


Siemens Digital Industries Software acquired Nextflow Software, a provider of advanced particle-based computational fluid dynamics (CFD) solutions. Nextflow Software will become part of the Simcenter software portfolio, providing rapid meshless CFD capabilities to accelerate the analysis of complex transient applications in the automotive, aerospace, and marine industries such as gear box lubri... » read more

Startup Funding: February 2021


In February, several startups emerge from stealth, with one company working on AI inference architectures for the data center and another trying to make lenses thinner by patterning surfaces with tiny structures. Two new Chinese companies are trying to expand the country's semiconductor design ecosystem with GPUs and interface IP. Plus, a maker of AI chips for ADAS draws another massive round t... » read more