Mahesh Tirupattur, EVP at low-power SERDES pioneer Analog Bits lead off the panel discussion at the recent FD-SOI Forum in Shanghai with the assertion that for anything “always on” in IoT, FD-SOI’s always better. They had a great experience porting their SERDES IP to 28nm FD-SOI (which they detailed last spring – see the ppt here… Read More
Webinar Offers View into TSMC IP Design Methodology
Standard cell and memory IP are key enablers for new process node availability. These two items must be in place early and be completely ready for a process node to scale to volume. Development of both leaves no room for error and they require the highest performance possible. Foundries are extremely focused on this and spend a lot… Read More
CEO Interview: Charlie Janac of Arteris
When Charlie Janac talks, people listen, absolutely. Charlie’s 30 year career spans EDA, IP, semiconductor equipment, nano-technology, and venture capital. For the last 11 years he has been CEO of interconnect IP provider Arteris who invented the industry’s first commercial network on chip (NoC) SoC interconnect IP… Read More
Low power physical design in the age of FinFETs
Low power is now a goal for most digital circuit designs. This is to reduce costs for packaging, cooling, and electricity; to increase battery life; and to improve performance without overheating. I talked to the experts on physical design for ultra-low power at Mentor Graphics recently about the challenges to P&R tools and… Read More
16nm HBM Implementation Presentation Highlights CoWoS During TSMC’s OIP
Once a year, during the TSMC’s Open Innovation Platform (OIP) Forum you can expect to see cutting edge technical achievements by TSMC and their partners. This year was no exception, with Open-Silicon presenting its accomplishments in implementing an HBM reference design in 16nm. It’s well understood that HBM offers huge benefits… Read More
GlobalFoundries Enhances FDSOI Roadmap with 12FDX
Last year, GlobalFoundries filled the competitive gap by offering FD-SOI technology on 22nm, offering better performance than 28nm, you may have read about the news in Semiwiki. Timing is important, as Samsung has announced FD-SOI support one year before (2014) GlobalFoundries, but for 28nm. The announcement made by GlobalFoundries… Read More
NVIDIA looks inside Parker and automotive-grade
‘Parker’ is a fascinating name for a chip designed for autonomous vehicles – more likely, the project name was pulled off a map as a bedroom community near Denver. First highlighted on the roadmap in 2013, and advertised as inside the DRIVE PX 2 platform shown at CES 2016, NVIDIA revealed some details of Parker at Hot Chips 2016.… Read More
AMD Zen and the Art of Microprocessor Maintenance
AMD is a fantastic company with highly talented people, but for some reason just hasn’t managed to put a winning streak of microprocessor architectures back-to-back. It’s frustrating to watch: they ride like mad to catch up to or even pull slightly ahead of Intel, then fall back in the pack when they have to make an extended pit stop,… Read More
MediaTek is on the Move with TSMC!
MediaTek (MTK) recently made the news for announcing their first leading edge SoC (Helio X30), a 32% increase in quarter over quarter sales, and an expected 30% increase for the year. Both of which deserve a closer look as we move into the second half of 2016 which should be very strong for MTK TSMC, and the fabless semiconductor ecosystem.… Read More
The Perfect Wearable SoC…?
Power is Everything
During Apollo 13 after the oxygen tank in the service module exploded forcing the crew to use the lunar module as a life boat to get back home, John Aaron – an incredibly gifted NASA engineer who was tasked with getting the Apollo 13 crew back home safely – flatly stated “Power is everything…we’ve… Read More
More Headwinds – CHIPS Act Chop? – Chip Equip Re-Shore? Orders Canceled & Fab Delay