Chip Industry Week In Review

By The SE Staff - 03 Apr, 2026 - Comments: 0

Deals IBM and Arm are collaborating on a new dual‑architecture hardware aimed at enterprise AI and data-intensive workloads, using virtualization to boost reliability, security, scalability, and software compatibility. The goal, according to an IBM spokesperson, is to deliver side-by-side deployments of S390x-Linux and Arm-Linux virtual machines in a single kernel-based hypervisor. Nv... » read more

Chiplets 2026: Where Are We Today?

By Barry Pangrle - 24 Feb, 2026 - Comments: 0

Jim Handy of Objective Analysis and Jawad Nasrullah from Palo Alto Electron kicked off last week's Chiplet Summit with predictions about where the chiplet market is headed and why chiplets are needed to accelerate AI. Handy noted that in the 1990s, multi-chip modules (MCMs) led to mid-'90s multi-chip packages (MCPs), and then progressed to NAND flash stacking, stacked die, big chips (e.g., X... » read more

Is There Still a Future for Hard Disk Drives?

By Barry Pangrle - 04 Aug, 2025 - Comments: 1

The capacity for solid state drives (SSDs) keeps going up while the price per terabyte keeps falling, sometimes raising questions about the future for hard disk drives (HDDs). Will the cost of SSDs per TB eventually become so low that they will totally displace HDDs? I decided to ask a couple of experts in the field, Jim Handy from Objective Analysis and Tom Coughlin of Coughlin Associates. ... » read more

SRAM Scaling Issues, And What Comes Next

By Karen Heyman - 15 Feb, 2024 - Comments: 0

The inability of SRAM to scale has challenged power and performance goals forcing the design ecosystem to come up with strategies that range from hardware innovations to re-thinking design layouts. At the same time, despite the age of its initial design and its current scaling limitations, SRAM has become the workhorse memory for AI. SRAM, and its slightly younger cousin DRAM, have always co... » read more

DRAM Choices Are Suddenly Much More Complicated

By Ed Sperling - 13 Nov, 2023 - Comments: 0

Chipmakers are beginning to incorporate multiple types and flavors of DRAM in the same advanced package, setting the stage for increasingly distributed memory but significantly more complex designs. Despite years of predictions that DRAM would be replaced by other types of memory, it remains an essential component in nearly all computing. Rather than fading away, its footprint is increasing,... » read more

MRAM Getting More Attention At Smallest Nodes

By Karen Heyman - 10 Aug, 2023 - Comments: 2

Magneto-resistive RAM (MRAM) appears to be gaining traction at the most advanced nodes, in part because of recent improvements in the memory itself and in part because new markets require solutions for which MRAM may be uniquely qualified. There are still plenty of skeptics when it comes to MRAM, and lots of potential competitors. That has limited MRAM to a niche role over the past couple de... » read more

HBM’s Future: Necessary But Expensive

By Karen Heyman - 20 Jul, 2023 - Comments: 0

High-bandwidth memory (HBM) is becoming the memory of choice for hyperscalers, but there are still questions about its ultimate fate in the mainstream marketplace. While it’s well-established in data centers, with usage growing due to the demands of AI/ML, wider adoption is inhibited by drawbacks inherent in its basic design. On the one hand, HBM offers a compact 2.5D form factor that enables... » read more

Is There A Limit To The Number of Layers In 3D-NAND?

By Karen Heyman - 24 Aug, 2022 - Comments: 1

Memory vendors are racing to add more layers to 3D NAND, a competitive market driven by the explosion in data and the need for higher-capacity solid state drives and faster access time. Micron already is filling orders for 232-layer NAND, and not to be outdone, SK Hynix announced that it will begin volume manufacturing 238-layer 512Gb triple level cell (TLC) 4D NAND in the first half of next... » read more

CXL and OMI: Competing or Complementary?

By Bryon Moyer - 23 Mar, 2022 - Comments: 1

System designers are looking at any ideas they can find to increase memory bandwidth and capacity, focusing on everything from improvements in memory to new types of memory. But higher-level architectural changes can help to fulfill both needs, even as memory types are abstracted away from CPUs. Two new protocols are helping to make this possible, CXL and OMI. But there is a looming question... » read more

Week In Review: Manufacturing, Test

By Mark LaPedus - 19 Nov, 2021 - Comments: 0

Chipmakers China’s Tsinghua Unigroup is in trouble. The group is the parent company of China’s YMTC, a 3D NAND supplier, and other chip ventures. It is close to moving into bankruptcy proceedings. Now, a consortium led by Alibaba has emerged as the frontrunner to take over Tsinghua Unigroup, according to a report from Bloomberg. That deal would keep the company afloat, the report said. ... » read more

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tag: Objective-Analysis

Chip Industry Week In Review

Chiplets 2026: Where Are We Today?

Is There Still a Future for Hard Disk Drives?

SRAM Scaling Issues, And What Comes Next

DRAM Choices Are Suddenly Much More Complicated

MRAM Getting More Attention At Smallest Nodes

HBM’s Future: Necessary But Expensive

Is There A Limit To The Number of Layers In 3D-NAND?

CXL and OMI: Competing or Complementary?

Week In Review: Manufacturing, Test

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