The Week In Review: Sept. 16

By Mark LaPedus
In June, Crucial.com teamed up with Lou Ferrigno to invite all frustrated computer users to submit a short video showing their most fearsome, frustration-filled and computer-induced roar. Each video was evaluated according to a variety of factors, including volume, enthusiasm, perceived distress, frustration, anxiety, irritation and overall hopelessness. The memory module supplier announced a winner.

Intel will close its fab in Hudson, Mass. by the end of 2014. This will result in the loss of about 700 jobs, according to reports.

SEMI announced that next year’s Semicon Europa will be held in Grenoble, France and alternate with Dresden, Germany in future years to better address pan-European opportunities and challenges.

SEMI reported that worldwide semiconductor manufacturing equipment billings reached $7.55 billion in the second quarter of 2013. The billings figure is 3% higher than the first quarter of 2013 and 27% lower than the same quarter a year ago.

Steve Ghanayem, group vice president and general manager of the Transistor and Metallization Products Group at Applied Materials, discussed the innovations taking place at the transistor level at the Deutsche Bank Technology Conference.

Soitec has licensed some of its intellectual property (IP) portfolio related to back-side illumination (BSI) technology for image sensors to TSMC.

Soitec announced its newest concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) module, featuring a record power-generating efficiency of 31.8%.

GlobalFoundries announced the official opening of its new China office in Shanghai to enhance its presence in the fastest growing market and to strengthen its commitment to better serve China-based customers and the industry.

In a move to further reduce time to market for both semiconductor and system manufacturers, Cadence Design Systems introduced the Palladium XP II Verification Computing Platform.

Silicon Labs has reduced the power consumption of its latest ARM-based microcontroller unit (MCU) by 50% using the complete Cadence mixed-signal low-power design flow.

Mentor Graphics announced full interoperability between the Tessent IJTAG chip-level IP integration product and ASSET InterTech’s ScanWorks platform for embedded instruments, which includes chip, circuit board and system-level IJTAG tools.

Renesas Electronics is using Mentor’s Tessent Hybrid TestKompress/LogicBIST solution to address safety-critical test requirements defined by the ISO 26262 standard.

Open-Silicon has used Mentor’s Tessent TestKompress product with Cell-Aware Test to improve test quality of SoC designs.

Fabless chipmaker eASIC has closed a $23.5 million funding round. The funding includes investment from Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers, Crescendo Ventures, Seagate Technology and Evergreen Partners.

II-VI has acquired the Switzerland-based semiconductor laser business of Oclaro in a transaction valued at $115 million.

The worldwide semiconductor market is expected to grow 3% from 2012 to 2013, according to ABI. Consolidation continues to be rife in the industry.