Larry Ellison resigning as CEO of Oracle caught me by surprise. I definitely did not see that one coming. Talk about the end of an era, as a 30+ year Silicon Valley veteran there have been quite a few industry icons that stand out amongst the others: Dave Packard, Bill Hewlett, Gordon Moore, Andy Grove, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, and Larry… Read More
Pole Pole All the Way to the Top
We made it! I have stood on the highest point in Africa, Uhuru Peak of Kilimanjaro.
Obviously this blog entry is totally off-topic. If you want to read about semiconductors and stuff, you can skip it.
So how do you get to the top of a nearly 20,000’ mountain? Slowly.
Slowly on two different levels. The first level is giving your body time… Read More
Humans Need Not Apply!
With four children entering the job market I have a very simple piece of advice: DO NOT RUN FROM TECHNOLOGY, EMBRACE IT! Smartphones are now a “natural” part of modern life. We work on them, we play on them, we shop with them, we socialize with them, even risk our lives using them. Come on, every single person with a smartphone has used… Read More
Kilimanjaro
For several weeks I have been trying to put out one blog per day rather than being like London buses where there are none for ages and then three come along at once. Or SFMuni buses for that matter. This week has been more of the same. Well, OK, I skipped labor day because…labor day. All you IC types will be busy eating chips not designing… Read More
EDA Ice Bucket Challenge!
In case you have not heard, the Ice Bucket Challenge is a social media program aiming to increase the awareness of ALS (Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis AKA Lou Gehrig’s Disease). One of our neighbors recently passed away as a result of ALS so this challenge is dedicated to Barbara Letts. After hearing about the challenge my daughter… Read More
Vlang – Opportunities Galore for Productivity & Performance
Yes, verification technologies are open to innovation for improved productivity and performance in the face of ever growing SoC/IP design sizes and complexities. There is not much scope left in processor speed to improve, other than multi-core processors in servers which again need software properly architected to be thread-able… Read More
Wanna start something new? Try this…
Often I have been asked by students, researchers and buddying young entrepreneurs about sources of funds for new technology development and innovation. When I came across this wonderful opportunity which has a global appeal, I couldn’t resist myself bringing it to the notice of a wider audience. I admire nVIDIA supporting research… Read More
IBM thinks neural nets in chip with 4K cores
Neural networks have been the darlings of researchers since the 1940s, but have eluded practical hardware implementations on all but a small scale, or an enormous one given how many processing elements and interconnects are needed. To make significant brain-like decisions, one needs at least several thousand fairly capable… Read More
The Carrington Event
Back in the pre-SemiWiki days when I had the EdaGrafitti blog I wrote about the Carrington event. This was a solar storm in 1859 that lasted for several days. On September 1st there was a coronal mass ejection (CME) traveling directly towards earth. Normally such an event would take several days to reach earth but an earlier ejection… Read More
It’s not a fiction, it’s about to turn into reality
Often I used to wonder why a search engine company would invest so heavily and indulge into stuff like smartphones, home automation devices, servers and many other exotic, innovative things they are doing internally and externally. But when I connect the dots, I find that this company in on certain massive missions which, if accomplished… Read More
More Headwinds – CHIPS Act Chop? – Chip Equip Re-Shore? Orders Canceled & Fab Delay