Chip Industry Week In Review


Dealmaking Amkor inked a 10-year agreement with TSMC to provide advanced packaging and test services in Arizona, tying TSMC’s U.S. fab expansion to domestic OSAT capacity. Trump said in a post that Apple will partner with Intel on chip design and production in the U.S., marking a second reported win for the chipmaker this month. Intel Foundry will also reportedly manufacture 3 million... » read more

Glass Substrates Gain Momentum


As a package substrate, the benefits of glass are substantial. It's extremely flat with lower thermal expansion than organic substrates, which simplifies lithography. And that's just for starters. Warpage, a growing problem for multichip packages, is greatly reduced. Chips can be hybrid bonded to redistribution layer pads on glass. And relative to organic-core substrates, glass provides very... » read more

Chip Industry Week in Review


The Chinese Academy of Sciences unveiled a fully automated processor chip design system, claiming the potential to accelerate semiconductor development and replace human programmers. Micron Technology plans to expand its U.S. investments to approximately $150 billion in domestic memory manufacturing and $50 billion in R&D, which is $30 billion higher than previously reported. AMD laun... » read more

Chip Industry Week In Review


Chinese startup DeepSeek rattled the tech world and U.S. stock market with claims it spent just $5.6 million on compute power for its AI model compared to its billion-dollar rivals in the U.S. The announcement raised questions about U.S. investment strategies in AI infrastructure and led to an initial $600 billion selloff of NVIDIA stock. Since its launch, DeepSeek reportedly was hit by malicio... » read more

Chip Industry Week In Review


Updated for 12/20 government fundings and 12/23 for China trade investigation announcements. President Biden announced a trade investigation into "China's unfair trade practices in the semiconductor sector."  The announcement stated "PRC semiconductors often enter the U.S. market as a component of finished goods. This Section 301 investigation will examine a broad range of the PRC’s non-m... » read more

Chip Industry Week In Review


By Adam Kovac, Karen Heyman, and Liz Allan.  China introduced strict procurement guidelines aimed at blocking the use of AMD and Intel processors in government computers. Meanwhile, China urged the Netherlands to ease restrictions on deep ultraviolet (DUV) litho equipment, according to Nikkei Asia. DUV is an older technology, based on 193nm ArF lasers, but in conjunction with multi-p... » read more

Chip Industry Week In Review


By Jesse Allen, Gregory Haley, and Liz Allan Bosch, Infineon, and NXP were cleared in Germany to each acquire 10% of the European Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (ESMC), established by TSMC, solidifying the supply chain against future shortages, particularly for automotive chips. “ESMC intends to build and operate another large semiconductor factory in Dresden, in which the three Europ... » read more

Chip Industry Week In Review


By Liz Allan, Jesse Allen, and Karen Heyman Global semiconductor equipment billings dipped 2% year-over-year to US$25.8 billion in Q2, and slipped 4% compared with Q1, according to SEMI. Similarly, the top 10 semiconductor foundries reported a 1.1% quarterly-over-quarter revenue decline in Q2. A rebound is anticipated in Q3, according to TrendForce. Synopsys extended its AI-driven EDA ... » read more

Startup Funding: April 2023


Packaging was a hot spot in April, with one of the largest rounds going to a middle-end-of-line advanced packaging company. A second packaging company also drew significant funding for its focus on wafer-level packaging for CMOS image sensors. Two packaging substrate manufacturers also saw investment. Two photoresist makers also drew sizeable rounds. Both they and the packaging companies are... » read more