Power Management ICs are a vitally important part of system design. Evidence of this is cited by a Synopsys white paper that mentions how Apple acquired a portion of PMIC developer Dialog Semiconductor that was previously their exclusive PMIC supplier. Clearly Apple had decided that PMIC design was a strategic differentiating… Read More




Semiconductor Capital Equipment Series: Introduction
Semicap is in some ways the unsung hero of American global dominance in semiconductors. The US punches above its weight in terms of market share compared to demand, but specifically in three categories. EDA, IP, and Equipment.
I hope to write about everything there can be said about semiconductors, and EDA is a place I understand… Read More
The Metaverse: A Different Perspective
The term Metaverse has been a hot topic of conversation recently, with many tech giants like Facebook and Microsoft staking claims. But what is The Metaverse?
Author Neal Stephenson is credited with coining the term “metaverse” in his 1992 science fiction novel “Snow Crash”. He envisioned lifelike… Read More
Podcast EP65: Trust But Verify – The Backstory of Applied Materials and Cornami with Wally Rhines
Dan is joined by CEO of Cormani Wally Rhines. Wally discusses the recent strategic investment in Conrami made by Applied Ventures (the venture capital arm of Applied Materials Inc.). Wally explores what type of business models and manufacturing optimization can be made possible if fully homomorphic encryption (HFE) can… Read More
Integrating Materials Solutions with Alex Yoon of Intermolecular
I had a follow-on discussion with Alex Yoon from our podcast last year. He is as a Head of Strategic and Emerging Technologies and partnerships at Intermolecular, part of EMD electronics.
Prior to joining EMD electronics, he was Senior Technical Director at Lam Research, led activities in emerging memory and novel materials … Read More
Intel Evolution of Transistor Innovation
Intel recently released an exceptional video providing an insightful chronology of MOS transistor technology. Evolution of Transistor Innovation is a five-minute audiovisual adventure, spanning 50 years of Moore’s Law. Some of the highlights are summarized below, with a few screen shot captures – the full video is definitely… Read More
Passion for Innovation – an Interview with Samtec’s Keith Guetig
There’s a lot to be said for staying power. I’ve met many people in my career who simply resonate with a company – their products, culture, and direction. People like this build an organic knowledge of the company’s products and its customers. They contribute to a culture that helps enable great companies. Keith Guetig is one such… Read More
Sondrel explains the 10 steps to model and design a complex SoC
Sondrel just released a position paper on how to model and design a complex ASIC. We have been following Sondrel for the past year and I have found their collateral to be excellent. Here is the position paper overview, a description of the new Sondrel modeling tool, the 10 steps, and of course a link to download the paper:
Overview
It… Read More
Emergency Response Getting Sexy
For 20 years the concept of emergency response has been one of the most tired, uninteresting sectors of the automotive industry. General Motors introduced OnStar automatic crash notification 26 years ago and that application has long been considered the end of the story.
The shutoff of 3G wireless networks and the resulting … Read More
Using a GPU to Speed Up PCB Layout Editing
I can remember back in the 1980s how Apollo workstations were quite popular, because they accelerated the graphics display time for EDA tools much better than competitive hardware. Fast forward to 2022 and we have the same promise of speeding up EDA tools like PCB layout editing by using a GPU. At the 58th DAC there was a session called,… Read More
Should the US Government Invest in Intel?