Making Chips Run Faster


For all the talk about low power, the real focus of most chipmakers is still performance. The reality is that OEMs might be willing to sacrifice increasing performance for longer battery life, but they will rarely lower performance to reach that goal. This is more obvious for some applications than others. A machine monitor probably isn’t the place where performance will make much of a dif... » read more

Design For IoT


In our already mind-bogglingly connected world where you can control your BMW with a Samsung smartwatch or monitor and pay your parking meter with a credit card on your smartphone, the semiconductor design community is mulling over the opportunities from design kits to embedded software as far as the best ways to equip design teams for the [getkc id="76" comment="Internet of Things"] (IoT) era.... » read more

Heterogeneous Multi-Processing Solution


With an increasing need for higher performance in mobile devices, the battery capacity must be increased accordingly, which is not easy because of the small size of mobile devices. Therefore, the demand for better power efficiency of mobile devices, which im- plies lower power consumption and higher performance is becoming critical. Recently, big.LITTLE architecture was intro- duced to fulfill ... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


Tesla Motors plans to build a new 35-GWh, lithium-ion cell production facility for its electric vehicles. It sounds like a good idea. But the factory will bring about only a modest reduction in battery costs, and could create significant overcapacity in the arena, according to Lux Research. “The Gigafactory will only reduce the Tesla Model 3’s cost by $2,800, not enough to sway the success ... » read more

Malicious Code In The IoT


Fundamentally, malicious code families are initially comprised of one or more distinct malicious code samples. For clarity, malicious code is, globally used as an umbrella term for all types of malevolent program code. However, for this article, the term is being applied to static code and not morphing codes, which were discussed in a previous article. This discussion focuses on the type of mal... » read more

What Happened To Next-Gen Lithography?


Chipmakers continue to march down the process technology curve. Using today’s optical lithography and multiple patterning, the semiconductor industry is scaling its leading-edge devices far beyond what was once considered possible. The question is how far can the industry extend 193nm immersion [getkc id="80" comment="lithography"] and multiple patterning before these technologies become t... » read more

The Week In Review: Design


Earnings Mentor Graphics reported revenues of $260.2 million, non-GAAP earnings per share of $0.23, and GAAP earnings per share of $0.13 for the company’s fiscal second quarter ended July 31. “System design strength, particularly with automotive customers, drove the second quarter with earnings solidly beating guidance,” said Walden C. Rhines, chairman and CEO of the company, in a stat... » read more

Ready To Pounce


A series of inflection points at 16/14nm and beyond is having a rather unusual effect on the semiconductor industry. Rather than forge ahead with the next nodes to gain an edge and early lead over rivals—the standard formula for success over the past five decades—the entire supply chain is poised on the edge, waiting for someone to make the first move before they take action. The problem... » read more

Manufacturing Bits: Aug. 19


28nm brain chips DARPA-funded researchers have developed a 28nm chip that mimics the brain. The low-power chip is inspired by the neuronal structure of the brain. Designed by researchers at IBM under DARPA’s Systems of Neuromorphic Adaptive Plastic Scalable Electronics (SyNAPSE) program, the chip consists of 5.4 billion transistors. Built on Samsung’s 28nm foundry process, the chip has ... » read more

What’s Next For Memory?


Apple, Samsung and others are developing the next wave of smartphones and tablets. OEMs want to integrate new memory schemes that provide more bandwidth at lower power. But there are some challenges in the arena that are prompting memory makers to rethink their mobile DRAM roadmaps. The conventional wisdom was that memory makers would ship mobile DRAMs based on the new LPDDR4 interface stand... » read more

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