Top 15 Integrating Points In The Continuum Of Verification Engines


The integration game between the different verification engines, dynamic and static, is in full swing. Jim Hogan talked about the dynamic engines that he dubbed “COVE”, and I recently pointed out a very specific adoption of COVE in my review of some customer examples at DAC 2015 in “Use Model Versatility Is Key for Emulation Returns on Investment”. Here are my top 15 integrating poin... » read more

Which Process, Material, IP?


For years chipmakers have been demanding more choices. They've finally gotten what they wished for—so many possibilities, in fact, that engineering teams of all types are having trouble wading through them. And to make matters worse, some choices now come with unexpected and often unwanted caveats. At the most advanced nodes it's a given that being able to shrink features and double patter... » read more

Moore’s Law Reset?


GlobalFoundries today took the wraps off its 22nm FD-SOI process, promising to extend Moore's Law technologically without altering the economic equation—at least for the next couple of process nodes. Subramani Kengeri, vice president of global design solutions at [getentity id="22819" comment="GlobalFoundries"], said 22nm FD-SOI will provide the same 30% improvement in PPA that has been c... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


An alliance led by IBM Research has produced the semiconductor industry’s first 7nm test chips with functioning transistors. The breakthrough, accomplished in partnership with GlobalFoundries and Samsung at SUNY Polytechnic Institute’s Colleges of Nanoscale Science and Engineering, could result in the ability to place more than 20 billion tiny switches, or transistors, on a chip. There i... » read more

Foundries Expand Planar Efforts


Competition is heating up in the leading-edge foundry business, as vendors begin to ramp up their new 16nm/14nm finFET processes. But that’s not the only action in the foundry arena. They are also expanding their efforts in the leading-edge planar market by rolling out new 28nm and 22nm processes. On one front, TSMC is offering new 28nm variants, based on bulk CMOS technology. And on an... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


Christopher Rolland, an analyst at FBR, made a startling statement in a recent report. “At the pace of consolidation set thus far this year, 32% of all U.S. publicly traded semiconductor companies would be acquired in 2015! While this run-rate is not likely sustainable and should slow as the year progresses, we still expect ~15% consolidation rates for the remainder of this cycle (above low-t... » read more

The Week In Review: Design/IoT


Tools Cadence unveiled Genus, their next-generation RTL synthesis and physical synthesis engine incorporating a multi-level massively parallel architecture and physically aware context-generation capability. Using it for their recent PowerVR GE7800 GPU, Imagination reported a 5X improvement in turnaround time versus the previous Cadence synthesis solution with no impact on power, performance... » read more

IoT Requires The Evolution Of The “New” 200mm Fab


By Bill Martin & Paul Werbaneth In April, we all celebrated the 50th anniversary of Moore’s Law. While critical for the industry, sometimes “chasing-the-latest-technology” business model is not the answer. Sometimes veering away from Moore’s Law makes more sense and is a better alternative. But, ever since the 1970’s, many product developer minds were conditioned that smaller w... » read more

The Week In Review: Design/IoT


Mergers & Acquisitions Synopsys' list of security acquisitions grew with a definitive agreement to buy certain assets of Quotium, including the interactive application security testing product Seeker and its R&D team. The acquisition builds on static analysis technology from Coverity and Codenomicon's fuzz testing and software vulnerability assessment tools. Terms of the deal have no... » read more

The Week In Review: Manufacturing


At an event, Samsung rolled out its 10nm finFET technology. The company also showed a 300mm wafer with 10nm finFET transistors. "We have silicon-based PDKs out," said Kelvin Low, senior director of foundry marketing for Samsung. Samsung plans to move into production with its 10nm finFET technology by the end of 2016, he said. IC Insights released its chip rankings in terms of sales in the fi... » read more

← Older posts Newer posts →