Chip Industry Week In Review


Amkor will provide turnkey advanced packaging and test services to TSMC in Amkor's planned facility in Peoria, Arizona, in a deal announced on Thursday. The companies jointly specified the packaging technologies, such as TSMC’s Integrated Fan-Out (InFO) and Chip on Wafer on Substrate (CoWoS). President Biden signed into law a bill that exempts some semiconductor projects funded by the U.S.... » read more

New Materials Are in High Demand


Materials suppliers are responding to the intense pressures to improve power, performance, scaling, and cost issues, which follows a long timeline from synthesis to development and high volume manufacturing in fabs. The advances in machine learning help present a wide field of candidates, which engineers then narrow to potential use. When building standard logic semiconductor chips, the prim... » read more

Why Small Fab And Assembly Houses Are Thriving


High-volume products get more than their fair share of attention in the semiconductor world, but most chips don't fit into that category. While a few huge fabs and offshore assembly and test (OSAT) houses process enormous volumes of chips, small fabs and packaging lines serve for lower volumes, specialized technology, and prototyping. “There are companies that run literally one lot of 25 w... » read more

Money Pours Into New Fabs And Facilities


Fabs, packaging, test and assembly, and R&D all drew major funding in 2023. Companies poured money into offshore locations, such as India and Malaysia, to access a larger workforce and lower costs, while also partnering with governments to secure domestic supply chains amid ongoing geopolitical turmoil. Looking ahead, artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing, and data applications... » read more

Chip Industry Week In Review


By Jesse Allen, Susan Rambo, and Liz Allan The U.S. government will invest about $3 billion for the National Advanced Packaging Manufacturing Program (NAPMP), including an advanced packaging piloting facility to help U.S. manufacturers adopt new technology and workforce training programs. It also will provide funding for projects concentrating on materials and substrates; equipment, tools, ... » read more

Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


The head of the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), Jennifer Homendy, voiced concern about the impact of heavier electric vehicles (EVs) will have in crashes with smaller cars with internal combustion engines (ICEs). Homendy compared the weight of the GMC Hummer and the Ford F-150’s EV to ICE version and found the EVs are 2,000 to 6,000 pounds heavier. The extra weight in EVs is... » read more