In a world where Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) and Application Specific Standard Products (ASSPs) are dominating every conceivable application, greater attention is being applied to their long term reliability. These chips are being built on smaller lithographies, running at higher speeds, dissipating… Read More
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Simple Analog ASIC Solves Thermal Analysis Problems
Webinar: How IoT Designs Driven by Cost Power Security
SoCs being developed for the fast growth Internet-of-Things market will sell for and operate on a small fraction of the power of mobile devices’ chips. More importantly, IoT SoCs will be far more vulnerable to hacker attacks than the much better protected chips in portable devices. As a result, designers developing SoCs targeting… Read More
Webinar: Electronics in Space or Avionics
I talked to Derek Kimpton of Silvaco today. He turns out to be a fellow Brit. He is presenting a webinar on total dose that is of interest to anyone creating chips that will go into space (primarily satellites), or near space (primarily avionics in planes). Pretty much everyone knows at least the basics of single-event-effects (SEE)… Read More
Silvaco TCAD Webinar
TCAD is a somewhat specialized area since not that many people design semiconductor processes compared to the number who design chips. Bit without TCAD there would be no chips. One area where the two domains intersect is that of SEE, where neutrons (mainly) can cause a flop or a memory bit to change. Since we live on a radioactive planet… Read More
TCAD to SPICE
Power devices have historically been made from silicon (Si), which has reached the limit of electric power loss reduction. With the superior physical and electrical properties of silicon carbide (SiC), we can expect to see a significant expansion in the amount of electric power conversion of electrical equipment as well as reduced… Read More
Silvaco News: Silicon Valley, China and Korea
Silvaco is one of the sponsors of the GSA Executive Forum to be held over in VC Land at the Rosewood Sand Hill on September 10th. Note that it starts at 11.45am with a networking lunch.
- The featured keynote speakers are Fareed Zakariah and Rana Faroohar, both of CNN. Rana is also Senior Managing Editor of Time.
- The first panel session
Single Event Upsets
Do you know what a SEE is? It stands for single event upset. We live on a radioactive planet which is also bombarded with cosmic rays, so particles are bombarding our chips. The materials used in packaging also can create particles that cause problems, even the solder. Reliability and aging has been an area that has not been at the forefront… Read More
Teach Yourself Silvaco
In the dim and distant past, if you wanted to learn how to use a particular EDA tool then you would go on a training course. This would often be multiple days and often a significant dollar investment too. For most EDA companies, that option still exists and the big 3 have quite extensive training catalogs.
But nowadays it is often easier… Read More
Mounir Hahad Rejoins Silvaco
Mounir Hahad just joined Silvaco as VP engineering. And when I say joined I really mean rejoined. I had a call with him to find out how that happened.
Mounir studied in France for a PhD in computer science on numerical computing. In 1995 the then-director of TCAD at Silvaco called him up having read some of his published papers. Silvaco… Read More
Simulation of Novel TFT Devices
Traditionally logic devices built on top of thin-film-transistors (TFTs) have used one type of device, either an NMOS a-Si: TFT (hydrogenated amorphous silicon) or a PMOS organic device. Recently a-Si:H and pentacene PMOS TFTs have been integrated into complementary logic structures similar to CMOS. This, in turn, creates… Read More
Basilisk at Hot Chips 2025 Presented Ominous Challenge to IP/EDA Status Quo