Back in May of 2020 I published some comparisons of the cost to run a TSMC fab in Arizona versus their fabs in Taiwan. I found the fab operating cost based on the country-to-country difference to only be 3.4% higher in the US and then I found an additional 3.8% because of the smaller fab scale. Since that time, I have continued to encounter… Read More
ESD Alliance Reports Double-Digit Growth – The Hits Just Keep Coming
The latest Electronic Design Market Data report was just published. The headline announces continued substantial growth for the sector: Electronic System Design Industry Logs Double-Digit Q2 2021 Year-Over-Year Revenue Growth, ESD Alliance Reports. While not quite the record-breaking growth reported last quarter, the… Read More
Hardware Data Acceleration for Semiconductor Design
This blog is a follow-on piece to an earlier one titled NetApp’s ONTAP Enables Engineering Productivity Boost. If you have not had an opportunity to read that blog, please do so for context. Using real life examples, it showcases how customers could improve real-world design engineering productivity as much as 10%.
For the … Read More
CEO Interview: Mike Wishart of Efabless
Mike Wishart has a storied career in investment banking and technology. His resume includes stints at Smith Barney, Lehman Brothers and Goldman Sachs after his Stanford MBA. He has served as a director at Brooktree, Spansion, Cypress and now Knowles. Mike is also a venture partner at Tyche Partners, a venture capital firm focused… Read More
Semiconductors – Limiting Factors; Supply Chain & Talent- Will Limit Stock Upside
– If chips are “as good as it gets” so are the stock prices
– Are we at a near term ceiling that stocks have bounced off of?
– If growth slows do valuations also slow?
– Are we in a holding pattern waiting for a down cycle?
Second order derivative investing
As we have said many times in the past, investors… Read More
The Semiconductor Shortage False Narrative!
The semiconductor shortage has really caught the world’s attention. Friends and family who don’t really know what a semiconductor is now ask me to explain it. This is great news for the semiconductor industry for different reasons which I will discuss here. We can also discuss the downside risks.
First, let’s look at a bit of semiconductor… Read More
Verification Completion: When is enough enough? Part I
Verification is a complex task that takes the majority of time and effort in chip design. Veriest shares customer views on what this means. We are an ASIC services company, and we have the opportunity to work on multiple projects and methodologies, interfacing with different experts.
In this “Verification Talks”… Read More
Auto Semiconductor Shortage Worsens
The shortage of semiconductors for automotive applications is getting worse. Recent statements from major automakers:
- General Motors significantly cut production at eight North American plants earlier this month due to the semiconductor shortage. GM expects North American vehicle production in the second half of the year
Verification IP vs Testbench
Anyone can create a testbench[TB] and verify the design, but it can’t be simply reused as a verification IP [VIP]. So I would like to address in this article: What is VIP? How can we build a high-quality VIP? How can we verify the VIP? What else can we do to make the VIP unique and commercially more valuable?
Most of the module/IP level … Read More
Webinar: PICMG COM-HPC® – New Open Standard for High Performance Compute Modules
The subject of this webinar is focused on the new COM-HPC standard from PICMG, a nonprofit consortium of companies and organizations that collaboratively develop open standards for high performance telecommunications, military, industrial, and general-purpose embedded computing applications. A computer-on-module … Read More
TSMC N3 Process Technology Wiki