2016 will be a banner year for the System on Chip (SoC) industry. For the first time we will have leading edge SoCs (Apple, Qualcomm, Samsung) on the same manufacturing process enabling a true Apples to Apples comparison. Unfortunately, how we got there is being misrepresented by the media and analysts but that is Situation Normal… Read More
Author: Daniel Nenni
Make American Semiconductor Great Again!
As I watched the GOP debate between the top 10 candidates last week I asked myself which one of those men would I pick to help the United States stay competitive in the semiconductor industry. I’m saddened to say that the only candidate even remotely qualified for that conversation in my opinion is Donald Trump. Of course I backed Ross… Read More
Is 7nm Coming to the TSMC OIP Ecosystem Forum?
This is the 5[SUP]th[/SUP] TSMC Open Innovation Platform Ecosystem Forum and it is not to be missed. Please note that the location has moved from the San Jose Convention Center to the Santa Clara Convention Center which is literally right across the street from the new Levi’s Stadium. If you haven’t been to the new stadium you really… Read More
CEVA in More than 6 Billion Chips!
One of the IP companies that I track is CEVA, the largest licensor of DSP cores. CEVA is the fifth largest IP company behind ARM, Synopsys, Imagination Technologies, and Cadence (Lattice acquired Silicon Image). CEVA is actually a combination of companies which started with the DSP Group and Parthus Technologies in 2002 and RiveriasWaves… Read More
ARM and the Law of Accelerating Returns!
ARM is one of the companies I have had professional experience with during my storied semiconductor career so I know some of their history first hand. I worked for a physical IP company that was purchased by ARM and at Virage Logic we competed against ARM head-to-head. ARM is also featured in our book “Fabless: The Transformation … Read More
A Candid Conversation with the GlobalFoundries CEO!
I did not know Dr. Sanjay Jha prior to this meeting but I certainly knew of him from his time at Qualcomm. It seemed a bit odd for me to fly to Dresden to meet a man that is based here in Silicon Valley but that made the meeting all that more interesting. Especially after finding out the German Chancellor Angela Merkel would also be visiting… Read More
Intel to Skip 10nm to Stay Ahead of TSMC and Samsung?
Quarterly earning calls are a great source of information but they can also be a source of confusion and generally it is an unhealthy combination of the two. On one hand these earning calls are to appease the financial community. On the other hand, in my opinion, these calls are also used to generate fear, uncertainty, and doubt amongst… Read More
TSMC (Apple) Update Q2 2015!
The TSMC quarterly conference call was last week and of course it stirred up quite a bit of controversy. Let me share with you my experience, observations, and opinions and maybe together we can come up with an accurate prediction for 2016. First let’s take a look at 20nm and what people now call the “Apple effect.”
Correct… Read More
Leveraging Power Reduction Techniques for MCU Based SoCs
Dolphin Integration launched a new 32-bit microcontroller, RISC-351 Zephyr, targeting low-power SoCs for IoT-like competitive markets taking into consideration three angles for optimization of power consumption: architectural, memory and software.
Architecture Angle
As a reminder, 8-bit versus 16-bit versus 32-bit… Read More
Angela Merkel Visits GlobalFoundries in Dresden!
The Chancellor of Germany visited Fab 1 in Dresden today. I did not get to speak with her personally so I will send her a message here. The fabless semiconductor industry is a force of nature. You can either harness the power or be overwhelmed by it. The United States, Taiwan, China, and South Korea have certainly figured this out. Hopefully… Read More
Rapidus, IBM, and the Billion-Dollar Silicon Sovereignty Bet