The Week In Review: Manufacturing


Intel announced that the company’s former CEO and chairman, Andrew Grove, passed away. He was 79. Present at Intel’s 1968 founding with Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore, Grove became Intel’s president in 1979 and CEO in 1987. He served as chairman from 1997 to 2005. “We are deeply saddened by the passing of former Intel Chairman and CEO Andy Grove,” said Intel CEO Brian Krzanich, in a st... » read more

Inside The OSAT Business


Semiconductor Engineering sat down to discuss the IC-packaging industry, foundries, China and other topics with Tien Wu, chief operating officer at Taiwan's Advanced Semiconductor Engineering (ASE), the world's largest outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) vendor. What follows are excerpts of that conversation. SE: What is your overall outlook for 2016? Wu: Last year, the semi... » read more

Consolidation Hits OSAT Biz


The outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) industry is undergoing a new wave of acquisition activity that will dramatically reshape the packaging and test services markets. [getkc id="83" kc_name="OSATs"] have seen a considerable amount of consolidation over the years, but the industry needs a scorecard to keep track of the recent deals and the resulting fallout. One OSAT deal inv... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


2016 is starting off on the wrong foot. Samsung disclosed its preliminary results for the forth quarter. Samsung expects a difficult business environment in 2016, according to reports. Plus, Apple is seeing lower than expected demand. “We are lowering our March quarter iPhone units to 45M units (prior 54M) to reflect incremental softness and recent production cuts. Our sense is that iPhones a... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


South Korea’s SK Hynix led the initial charge in the development of High Bandwidth Memory (HBM), a 3D DRAM technology based on a memory stack and through-silicon vias (TSVs). SK Hynix has been shipping HBM parts in the market. Now, SK Hynix and Samsung are readying the next version of the technology, dubbed High Bandwidth Memory 2 or HMB2, according to a report from The Electronic Times of So... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


Samsung plans to make a major entry into the drone market, according to reports. “Samsung is not alone in focusing on the drone market,” said Will Strauss, president of Forward Concepts, in a research note. “At CES next month in Las Vegas, one can expect new products from drone market leader DJI, but dozens of new drone models from Parrot and many other companies. Even GoPro chip maker A... » read more

Fan-Out Packaging Gains Steam


Fan-outs are creating a buzz and gaining steam in the market at a pace far beyond what anyone would have expected even at the start of the year. The approach, which has been around for several years, is a wafer-level packaging process that enables ultra-thin, high-density packages. So why the buzz? Apple is apparently moving to [getkc id="202" kc_name="fan-out"] packaging, according to an... » read more

Packaging Wars Ahead


There has been much talk about semiconductor industry consolidation, but the shift into advanced packaging could have more far-reaching effects than all the mega-deals so far. Packaging is big business. Yole Développement has pinned the market at $30 billion, but that's only a thin slice of the pie that's in play. Companies that win the packaging deals also have a good shot of winning the m... » read more

What China Is Planning


Over the years, China has unveiled several initiatives to advance its domestic semiconductor industry. China has made some progress at each turn, although every plan has fallen short of expectations. But now, the nation is embarking on several new and bold initiatives that could alter the IC landscape. China’s new initiatives address at least three key challenges for its IC industry: 1. C... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


Looking to propel the next wave of OLED displays, Applied Materials has rolled out two new systems. The tools enable the volume production of OLED displays for both mobile products and TVs. In addition, Applied Materials has shipped an Applied TopMet roll-to-roll metal deposition system to Jindal Poly Films, a leader in PET and BOPP films for flexible packaging and labeling applications. In... » read more

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