TSMC Bringing EUV Into Production

TSMC Bringing EUV Into Production
by Paul McLellan on 12-08-2014 at 7:00 am

Last week was ASML’s investor day. I wasn’t there and they haven’t yet got the material posted on their website, so this is all second hand information. As you know, if you have read any of my comments on EUV, I have been dubious about whether EUV would ever work for production.

The three big problems seem to be:

  • source
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eSilicon’s IP Marketplace

eSilicon’s IP Marketplace
by Paul McLellan on 12-07-2014 at 9:00 am

eSilicon engages with customers in many different ways, from providing a full menu of design services down to simply manufacturing parts. Increasingly, they have been automating a lot of this on their website. It started with automatic quotes for MPW shuttles and more recently they have a full production quote system for parts… Read More


Synopsys Q4 Earnings

Synopsys Q4 Earnings
by Paul McLellan on 12-06-2014 at 11:02 am

Synopsys announced their earnings a couple of days ago. This is actually also the end of their fiscal year. They had quarterly earnings of $539M meaning that they did just over $2B for the year. Their guidance for fiscal 2015 is revenue between $2.185B to $2.225B. They said that about 80% of that revenue is already in backlog.

But it… Read More


Variation at IEDM

Variation at IEDM
by Paul McLellan on 12-05-2014 at 7:01 am

IEDM (technically the International Electron Devices Meeting although I’ve never heard anyone use the full name) is in a couple of weeks time, in San Francisco. It is December 15-17th at the Hilton Union Square (which is not actually at Union Square but nearby at 333 O’Farrell Street).

For the last few years on the Tuesday… Read More


3DIC in Burlingame

3DIC in Burlingame
by Paul McLellan on 12-01-2014 at 7:00 am

Every year in December is what I think of as the main 3D IC conference where you can get up to speed on all the latest. Officially it is called 3D Architectures for Semiconductor and Packaging or 3D ASIP. It is held in the Hyatt Regency in Burlingame (the one right by 101 near the airport). This year it is from December 10-12th.

The first… Read More


Rock for CASA, December 6th

Rock for CASA, December 6th
by Paul McLellan on 11-27-2014 at 7:00 am

It is the holiday season so time to get together with your friends and colleagues in EDA, IP and semiconductor at the third annual event raising money for Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) (www.casaofsantacruz.org). This is the third event that Heart of Technology has worked with CASA. CASA has local organizations and … Read More


Coverage Driven Analog Verification

Coverage Driven Analog Verification
by Paul McLellan on 11-25-2014 at 7:00 am

Ad hoc digital design verification approaches ran out of steam at least a decade ago when designs got intractably large to make it feasible to keep track of everything with pen and paper and excel. But analog design has remained largely ad hoc to this day. The designer runs spice, looks at the waveforms that come out and decide whether… Read More


Codasip and Coby and Czech

Codasip and Coby and Czech
by Paul McLellan on 11-24-2014 at 12:00 am

At ARM TechCon I ran into Coby Hanoch who has just been appointed VP worldwide sales of a comany that I’d not previously heard of called Codasip. As the name implies they supply code, and ASIPs. Well, actually IP source code and ASIP tools. The company is based in Brno (pronounced pretty much like Bruno) in the Czech republic … Read More


Global Foundries and IBM, More Details

Global Foundries and IBM, More Details
by Paul McLellan on 11-21-2014 at 7:00 am

Now that the dust has started to settle on the GlobalFoundries acquisition of IBM’s semiconductor business it is possible to look into another level of detail about what GlobalFoundries will be acquiring in the way of technology and IP. Of course, the deal hasn’t formally closed yet so this won’t all happen … Read More


Qualcomm Enters Server CPU Market

Qualcomm Enters Server CPU Market
by Paul McLellan on 11-19-2014 at 6:00 pm

Fresh from the leaked memo that Intel is merging its mobile business into its PC client group, Qualcomm is going the other way and has confirmed that it is entering the ARM server CPU market, an announcement made at its analyst day earlier today.

This is a major trend that less than a month ago I reported from the Linley microprocessor… Read More