Mixed Messages Complicate Mixed-Signal


Several years ago, analog and mixed signal (AMS) content hit a wall. Its contribution to first-time chip failure doubled, and there is no evidence that anything has improved dramatically since then. Some see that the problem is likely to get worse due to issues associated with advanced nodes, while others see hope for improvement coming from AI or chiplets. Fig. 1: Cause of ASIC respins. S... » read more

Distributing Intelligence Inside Multi-Die Assemblies


The shift from SoCs to multi-die assemblies requires more and smarter controllers to be distributed throughout a package in order to ensure optimal performance, signal integrity, and no downtime. In planar SoCs, many of these kinds of functions are often managed by a single CPU or MCU. But as logic increasingly is decomposed into chiplets, connected to each other and memories by TSVs, hybrid... » read more

Security Vulnerabilities Difficult To Detect In Verification Flow


As designs grow in complexity and size, the landscape for potential hackers to infiltrate a chip at any point in either the design or verification flow increases commensurately. Long considered to be a “safe” aspect of the design process, verification now must be a focus of chip developers from a security perspective. This also means the concept of trust has never been higher, and the tr... » read more

Blog Review: June 25


Siemens’ John McMillan provides a detailed overview of 3D-IC technology and heterogeneous integration, from the market trends driving its adoption to the design, verification, and manufacturing challenges involved. Synopsys’ Gunnar Braun and Stewart Williams check out how cloud-based development practices and virtual prototypes can enable earlier and more efficient testing and validation... » read more

EDA’s Top Execs Map Out An AI-Driven Future


Artificial intelligence is permeating the entire semiconductor ecosystem, forcing fundamental changes in AI chips, the design tools used to create them, and the methodologies used to ensure they will work reliably. This is a global race that will redefine nearly every domain over the next decade. In presentations and interviews over the past several months, top EDA executives converged on th... » read more

Chip Industry Week in Review


Texas Instruments will invest more than $60 billion to build and expand seven semiconductor fabs in Texas and Utah, supporting more than 60,000 U.S. jobs. Chinese automakers — including SAIC Motor, Changan, Great Wall Motor, BYD, Li Auto and Geely — are aiming to launch new models with 100% homemade chips, some as early as 2026, reports Nikkei Asia. Marvell introduced 2nm custom SRAM ... » read more

Power Delivery Challenges For AI Chips


As artificial intelligence (AI) workloads grow larger and more complex, the various processing elements being developed to process all that data are demanding unprecedented levels of power. But delivering this power efficiently and reliably, without degrading signal integrity or introducing thermal bottlenecks, has created some of the toughest design and manufacturing challenges in semiconducto... » read more

Improving Fab Engineering Efficiency With Autonomous Data Analytics


During my earlier career as a process integration engineer, one of my primary responsibilities was to find yield enhancement opportunities by investigating underlying relationships between bin failures and process parameters within the fab. While performing this analysis, there were many impediments to identifying relationships among different data types: sort maps, electrical test maps, parame... » read more

Are Larger Reticle Sizes On The Horizon?


Making high-NA EUV lithography work will take a manufacturing-worthy approach to stitching together circuits or a wholesale change to larger masks. Circuit stitching between the exposure fields is challenging the design, yield and manufacturability of the high-NA (0.55) EUV transition. The alternative is a radical change from 6x6-inch to 6x11-inch masks that would eliminate stitching, but it... » read more

Can You Build A Known-Good Multi-Die System?


Semiconductor Engineering sat down to discuss the challenges of designing and testing multi-die systems, including how to ensure they will work as expected, with Bill Mullen, Ansys fellow; John Ferguson, senior director of product management at Siemens EDA; Chris Mueth, senior director of new markets and strategic initiatives at Keysight; Albert Zeng, senior engineering group director at Cadenc... » read more

← Older posts