Ultra-Thin Substrate Assembly Challenges For Advanced Flip Chip Package


Advanced semiconductor packaging requirements for higher and faster performance in a thinner and smaller form factor continues to grow for mobile, network and consumer devices. While the increase in device input/output (I/O) count is driven by the famous “Moore’s Law”, the packaging industry is experiencing opposing trends for more complex packaging solutions while the expected cost targe... » read more

Wireless Test: Too Many Protocols


Testing wireless communications is getting far more difficult as more markets begin adding wireless communications and standards groups push to improve the speed, power and security of existing protocols. There is already a long list of protocols, and it's growing further as new communications technologies are added into the mix. With the addition of 5G, the new 802.11ax standard, and other ... » read more

Intel Inside The Package


Mark Bohr, senior fellow and director of process architecture and integration at Intel, sat down with Semiconductor Engineering to discuss the growing importance of multi-chip integration in a package, the growing emphasis on heterogeneity, and what to expect at 7nm and 5nm. What follows are excerpts of that interview. SE: There’s a move toward more heterogeneity in designs. Intel clearly ... » read more

The Rise Of Parallelism


Parallel computing is an idea whose time has finally come, but not for the obvious reasons. Parallelism is a computer science concept that is older Moore's Law. In fact, it first appeared in print in a 1958 IBM research memo, in which John Cocke, a mathematician, and Daniel Slotnick, a computer scientist, discussed parallelism in numerical calculations. That was followed eight years later by... » read more

The Evolution Of EUV


EUV systems are beginning to ship to large foundries in volume, setting the stage for one of the biggest leaps in technology the semiconductor industry has ever witnessed. ASML has emerged as the sole supplier in this market, but it has taken an entire ecosystem to develop EUV. It has taken billions of dollars of investment by ASML, along with enormous cash infusions by Intel and TSMC, contr... » read more

Moore’s Law: A Status Report


Moore's Law has been synonymous with "smaller, faster, cheaper" for the past 52 years, but increasingly it is viewed as just one of a number of options—some competing, some complementary—as the chip industry begins zeroing in on specific market needs. This does not make [getkc id="74" comment="Moore's Law"] any less relevant. The number of companies racing from 16/14nm to 7nm is higher t... » read more

The Hunt For A Low-Power PHY


Physics has been on the side of chipmakers throughout most of the lifetime of [getkc id="74" comment="Moore's Law"], but when dealing with the world outside the chip, physics is working against them. Pushing data at ever-faster rates through boards and systems consumes increasing amounts of power, but the power budget for chips has not been increasing. Could chips be constrained by their int... » read more

Time For New Rules


Is Moore's Law dead? Brigadier General Paul Fredenburgh, commandant of the Dwight D. Eisenhower School for National Security and Resource Strategy, asked that question to four industry CEOs last week while visiting Silicon Valley with some of his students. He received four highly nuanced, if not different, answers. Left to right: Lip-Bu Tan, Cadence; Wally Rhines, Mentor Graphics; Simon Se... » read more

IoT Security Risks Grow


Semiconductor Engineering sat down to discuss security issues with Asaf Shen, vice president of marketing for security IP in [getentity id="22186" e_name="ARM's"] Systems & Software Group; Timothy Dry, principal staff marketing manager for the Industrial IoT segment at [getentity id="22819" comment="GlobalFoundries"]; Chowdary Yanamadala, senior vice president of business development at Cha... » read more

When Will It Be Done?


Design teams have done remarkably well in getting chips out the door on time, despite growing complexity at each new node and an increase in the number of features and IP blocks that need to be integrated into designs. There has been plenty of grumbling, along with dire warnings about the future of Moore's Law and the impact of industry consolidation. The reality, though, is that the volume ... » read more

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