Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


Automotive, mobility Automaker Toyota and Texas-based electricity distributor Oncor Electric Delivery (Oncor) are embarking on a vehicle-to-grid (V2G) pilot project to explore the feasibility of transferring energy from BEVs’ batteries back to the grid. Toyota and Oncor want to better understand the interconnectivity between BEVs and utilities. The project will start testing at Oncor’s res... » read more

The March Toward Chiplets


The days of monolithic chips developed at the most advanced process nodes are rapidly dwindling. Nearly everyone working at the leading edge of design is looking toward some type of advanced packaging using discrete heterogeneous components. The challenge now is how to shift the whole chip industry into this disaggregated model. It's going to take time, effort, as well as a substantial reali... » read more

3D-IC Reliability Degrades With Increasing Temperature


The reliability of 3D-IC designs is dependent upon the ability of engineering teams to control heat, which can significantly degrade performance and accelerate circuit aging. While heat has been problematic in semiconductor design since at least 28nm, it is much more challenging to deal with inside a 3D package, where electromigration can spread to multiple chips on multiple levels. “Be... » read more

Chip Industry’s Technical Paper Roundup: Dec. 13


New technical papers added to Semiconductor Engineering’s library this week.[table id=70 /] If you have research papers you are trying to promote, we will review them to see if they are a good fit for our global audience. At a minimum, papers need to be well researched and documented, relevant to the semiconductor ecosystem, and free of marketing bias. There is no cost involved for us po... » read more

Week In Review: Manufacturing, Test


The more than 1,400 attendees at this week’s IEDM, which celebrated the 75th anniversary of the transistor, were clearly focused on making the next 75 years of semiconductors even more remarkable than the last. Intel, Samsung, TSMC, STMicroelectronics, GlobalFoundries and imec announced breakthrough devices, materials, and even integration approaches. These included: Intel showcased adva... » read more

Advanced Auto-Routing For TSMC InFO Technologies


At the recent TSMC OIP Symposium, John Park presented 'Advanced Auto-Routing for TSMC InFO Technologies.' InFO stands for "integrated fanout" and is the lower performance, lower complexity technology for advanced packaging. For details of TSMC's whole packaging portfolio, see my post TSMC OIP: 3DFabric Alliance and 3Dblox. Here's the slide TSMC presented from that presentation on InFO. As you... » read more

2D-Materials-Based Electronic Circuits (KAUST and TSMC)


A special edition article titled "Electronic Circuits made of 2D Materials" was just published by Dr. Mario Lanza, KAUST Associate Professor of Material Science and Engineering, and Iuliana Radu, corporate researcher at TSMC. This special issue covers 21 articles from leading subject matter experts, ranging from materials synthesis and their integration in micro/nano-electronic devices and c... » read more

Systematic Yield Issues Now Top Priority At Advanced Nodes


Systematic yield issues are supplanting random defects as the dominant concern in semiconductor manufacturing at the most advanced process nodes, requiring more time, effort, and cost to achieve sufficient yield. Yield is the ultimate hush hush topic in semiconductor manufacturing, but it's also the most critical because it determines how many chips can be profitably sold. "At older nodes, b... » read more

Week In Review: Design, Low Power


Tools and IP Renesas released a family of configurable clock generators with an internal crystal oscillator for PCIe and networking applications in high-end computing, wired infrastructure and data center equipment. “Timing needs can vary greatly between different applications and equipment, and often change during a product design cycle,” said Zaher Baidas, Vice President of the Timing Pr... » read more

Week In Review: Semiconductor Manufacturing, Test


Chinese memory chip maker YMTC and dozens of other Chinese entities are "at risk" of being added to a trade blacklist as soon as Dec. 6, a U.S. Commerce Department official said in prepared remarks seen by Reuters. SMIC co-CEO Zhao Haijun said on an earnings call that recent export controls from the United States will have an "adverse impact" on the company's production. The U.K. has rule... » read more

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