The familiar maxim that “time is money” certainly typifies our semiconductor industry where the mass production of chips, boards and systems helps to power our global economy and ever-increasing standard of living. The foundries that manufacture chips have to ensure that the process technology is in fact producing… Read More



An Steegen ISS Talk and Interview – Patterning Options for Advanced Nodes
At the ISS Conference in January, An Steegen EVP of Semiconductor Technology & Systems at imec gave a talk entitled “Patterning Options for Advanced Technology Nodes”. I was present for her talk and had the opportunity to have a follow up interview with An.… Read More
Simulation done Faster
When it comes to functional verification of large designs, huge progress is being made in emulation and FPGA-based prototyping (about which I’ll have more to say in follow-on blogs), but simulation still dominates verification activity, all the way from IP verification to gate-level signoff. For many, while it is much slower… Read More
Prototyping: Sooner, Easier, Congruent
DVCon 2017 is a big week for Cadence verification announcements. They just released their Xcelium simulation acceleration product (on which I have another blog) and they have also released their latest and greatest prototyping solution in the Protium S1. This is new hardware based on Virtex UltraScale FPGAs on Cadence-designed… Read More
EUV is NOT Ready for 7nm!
The annual SPIE Advanced Lithography Conference kicked off last night with vendor sponsored networking events and such. SPIE is the international society for optics and photonics but this year SPIE Advanced Lithography is all about the highly anticipated EUV technology. Scotten Jones and I are at SPIE so expect more detailed… Read More
CTO Interview: Jeff Galloway of Silicon Creations
It is clear that IP companies play an important role in modern semiconductor design, in fact, I would say that they are imperative. Founded in 2006, Silicon Creations is one of those imperative IP companies that provide silicon proven IP to customers big and small around the world. To follow-up on our conversation with Silicon Creations… Read More
Webinar: FPGA Prototyping and ASIC Design
When you think about working with an ASIC service provider like Open-Silicon, you probably think about handling all the architecture, design and verification/validation in your shop, handing over a netlist and some other collateral, then the ASIC services provider takes responsibility for implementation and manufacturing.… Read More
Strong pickup in semiconductors in 2017
World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) is an organization of semiconductor companies created to collect market data. The members of WSTS also meet twice per year to develop forecasts for the semiconductor market. The “forecast by committee” approach of WSTS usually results in conservative forecasts. However, WSTS called… Read More
OEMs Lead the Way on Self Driving Tech
It’s never a good sign when car makers are called before Congress. It’s almost as bad as being asked to visit the President. But last week the meeting didn’t involve allegations or investigations. It was just an occasion for a friendly chat regarding “Self-Driving Cars: Road to Deployment.”
IEEE… Read More
Another Live Event at Samsung!
Last week Samsung hosted the GSA Silicon Valley “State of the Industry” Meet-up which was well attended by the semiconductor elite, myself included. The agenda started with an update on the semiconductor industry outlook followed by deep dives into Automotive, IoT, Artificial Intelligence, and Cybersecurity all of which are… Read More
Should the US Government Invest in Intel?