Five years ago Uber nearly singlehandedly wiped out the prospect of a self-driving car industry with the inept management of its autonomous vehicle testing in Phoenix which led to a fatal crash. The massive misstep instantly vaporized tens of billions of dollars of Uber’s market cap and sent the company’s robotaxi development… Read More





AI in Verification – A Cadence Perspective
AI is everywhere or so it seems, though often promoted with insufficient detail to understand methods. I now look for substance, not trade secrets but how exactly they using AI. Matt Graham (Product Engineering Group Director at Cadence) gave a good and substantive tutorial pitch at DVCon, with real examples of goal-centric optimization… Read More
Mapping SysML to Hardware Architecture
The Systems Modeling Language (SysML) is used by systems engineers that want to specify, analyze, design, verify and validate a specific system. SysML started out as an open-source project, and it’s a subset of the Unified Modeling Language (UML). Mirabilis Design has a tool called VisualSim Architect that imports your… Read More
Full-Stack, AI-driven EDA Suite for Chipmakers
Semiconductor technology is among the most complex of technologies and the semiconductor industry is among the most demanding of industries. Yet the ecosystem has delivered incredible advances over the last six decades from which the world has benefitted tremendously. Yes, of course, the markets want that break-neck speed… Read More
Podcast EP150: How Zentera Addresses Development Security with Mike Ichiriu
Dan is joined by Michael Ichiriu, Vice President of Marketing at Zentera Systems. Prior to Zentera Mike was a senior executive at NetLogic Microsystems where he played a critical role in shaping the company’s corporate and product strategy. While there, he built the applications engineering team, and helped lead the organization… Read More
Chiplets, is now their time?
Chiplets appeared on SemiWiki in 2020 and have been a top trending keyword ever since. The question is not IF chiplets will disrupt the semiconductor industry, the question is WHEN? I certainly have voiced my opinion on this (pro chiplet) but let’s hear it from the experts. There was a live panel recently sponsored by Silicon Catalyst… Read More
Securing Memory Interfaces
News of hackers breaking into systems is becoming common place these days. While many of the breaches reported to date may have been due to security flaws in software, vulnerabilities exist in hardware too. As a result, the topic of security is getting increased attention within the semiconductor industry around system-on-chip… Read More
Adaptive Clock Technology for Real-Time Droop Response
In integrated circuit terminology, a droop is the voltage drop that happens in a circuit. This is a well-known phenomenon and can happen due to the following reasons. The power supply falls below the operating range for which a chip was designed for, resulting in a droop. More current is drawn by the conductive elements than they … Read More
Automotive Lone Bright Spot
Automotive appears to be about the only bright spot in the semiconductor market for 2023. Forecasts for the overall semiconductor market range from a decline of 4% to a decline of 20%. Semiconductor companies generally have bleak outlooks for the start of 2023, citing excess inventories ad weak end market demand. The chart below… Read More
Advanced electro-thermal simulation sees deeper inside chips
Heat and semiconductor reliability exist in an inversely proportional relationship. Before the breaking point at the thermal junction temperature rating, every 10°C rise in steady-state temperature cuts predicted MOSFET life in half. Yet, heat densities rise as devices plunge into harsher environments like smartphones,… Read More
Should the US Government Invest in Intel?