2018 was the 50th year for Intel in the semiconductor business, and their Q4 2018 conference call just happened last week, so I’ll get you all caught up on what they talked about. Bob Swan is the CFO and interim CEO, as the company continues to search for a new CEO after Brian K. was ousted for misconduct. Here’s a quick financial… Read More
A Webinar About Electrical Verification – The Invisible Bottleneck in IC DesignElectrical rule checking (ERC) is a standard part…Read More
Signal Integrity Verification Using SPICE and IBIS-AMIHigh-speed signals enable electronic systems by using memory…Read More
imec on the Benefits of ASICs and How to Seize ThemIn an era where product differentiation increasingly depends…Read More
MZ Technologies Launches Advanced Packaging Design Video SeriesIn a significant move aimed at empowering semiconductor…Read MoreWhy High-End ML Hardware Goes Custom
In a hand-waving way it’s easy to answer why any hardware goes custom (ASIC): faster, lower power, more opportunity for differentiation, sometimes cost though price isn’t always a primary factor. But I wanted to do a bit better than hand-waving, especially because these ML hardware architectures can become pretty exotic, so … Read More
Switch Design Signoff with IC Validator
The surge of network traffic at the data centers has driven to an increase in network bandwidth, doubling every 12-15 months according to a study conducted on Google’s data centers. The primary drivers to this uptick include the proliferation of cloud computing, more distributed storage architecture, emerging applications… Read More
Mathematics are Hard – That is Why AI Needs Mathematics Hardware
The field of artificial intelligence has relied on heavy inspiration from the world of natural intelligence, such as the human mind, to build working systems that can learn and act on new information based on that learning. In natural networks, neurons do the work, deciding when to fire based on huge numbers of inputs. The relationship… Read More
Accuracy of In-Chip Monitoring for Thermal Guard-banding
I remember working at Intel and viewing my first SPICE netlist for a DRAM chip, because there was this temperature statement with a number after it, so being a new college graduate I asked lots of questions, like, “What is that temperature value?”
My co-worker answered, “Oh, that’s the estimated junction… Read More
Why we will all benefit from the next space race
Until January 3, no human being had ever set eyes upon the “dark side” of the moon: the side always facing away from the Earth. It always remained a mystery. But no longer. China’s National Space Administration successfully landed a lunar lander, Chang’e-4, at South Pole-Aitken, the moon’s largest and deepest basin. Its lunar rover… Read More
ASML and Memory Loss 2019
ASML reported a more or less in line quarter as expected, coming in at EUR3.14B in revenues and EPS of EUR1.87. However, guidance was worse than most analysts were expecting with Q1 revenues expected to be EUR2.1B or down about one third.
This cut is something we have been talking about for a while as we have expected sharp memory CAPEX… Read More
Having Your Digital Cake and Eating It Too
Anybody who’s ever read the iconic MAD magazine would be familiar with the wordless Spy vs Spy cartoon. First published in January, 1961, it features two agents involved in stereotypical and comical espionage activities. One is dressed in white, and the other in black, but they are otherwise identical. A parody of the political… Read More
Intel Swaggers at CES
Intel started out as a DRAM company using planar NMOS technology, then later on added EPROM and Microprocessors to the product mix. Their CPU technology enabled the dynamic growth of the PC industry starting with the IBM PC back in 1981 and continuing all of the way to this day. They long ago dropped out of the DRAM marketplace and began… Read More
Contrarian Views on Quantum Computing
I’m not opposed to the exotic ideas which capture public attention from time to time, but I do enjoy puncturing a popular expectation demanding every novel technology be a revolutionary breakthrough. I’ve already made my small contribution to driving a stake through the heart of claims that quantum computing (QC) will replace… Read More


Quantum Computing Technologies and Challenges