If you look back at the beginning of the ASIC business you will see that it was really a critical time in the semiconductor industry. It all began in the 1980s which coincidentally is when I started my career in Silicon Valley. General purpose integrated circuits ruled the market, forcing system designers to cobble together off-the-shelf… Read More




Army of Engineers on Site Only Masks Weakness
Hardware emulation was conceived in the 1980s to address a design verification crisis looming on the horizon. In those days, the largest digital designs were stressing the limits of the software-based, gate-level simulator that was the mainstream tool for the task.
It was anticipated and confirmed in short notice that adopting… Read More
SRAM Optimization for 14nm and 28nm FDSOI
I’ve done SRAM and DRAM design before as a circuit designer from 1978-1986, but in 2016 there are so many more challenges to using 28nm and 14nm on FDSOI technology. One way to keep abreast of SRAM design is to read conference papers, so I just finished a paper from authors at STMicroelectronics and MunEDA presented at the IEEE… Read More
According with ST, SiC Power Devices will Accelerate Automotive Electrification
Silicon Carbide (SiC) is a very interesting material. If you find in nature the mineral moissanite, it will be only minute quantities in certain types of meteorite. The moissanite physical properties are very similar to these of diamond, in term of density and abrasive power. In the semiconductor industry, SiC is characterized… Read More
DAC 2016 – Register Now
DAC is again going to be in Austin (reason enough to go), from June 6[SUP]th[/SUP]-8[SUP]th[/SUP] for the main event. A number of events caught my eye:
- Monday AM – custom hardware for algorithmic trading. If you want to know more about FinTech (technology for finance) this could be for you
- Another Monday morning session on Linux
Apple Smart Home Artificial Intelligence Insights from Patents
US 20160132030 illustrate a smart home system for automating operation of the smart home devices (e.g., thermostats, lighting devices, household appliances, etc.) based on aggregation of individual user routines.
User mobile devices and smart home devices can incorporate pattern detection logic to identify patterns in … Read More
Future Connected Cars 2016
There are times when a speaker for a large corporation clearly breaks from the cold corporate talking points and suggests something that you just know his managers will consider cringe-worthy. Haden Kirkpatrick, described on the event agenda of the Future Connected Car event in Santa Clara as “director of strategy and … Read More
When will Internet of Things really arrive?
A lot of ink has been spilled regarding the impending tsunami of Internet Of Things (IOTs). It is certainly an interesting topic, and not just for geeks. As the next generation computing platform, IOT will see an explosion of connected device (wearables, intelligent refrigerators, smart thermostats, etc.), currently estimated… Read More
The Emerging Importance of Parallel SPICE
SPICE simulation is the workhorse tool for custom circuit timing validation and electrical analysis. As the complexity of blocks and macros has increased in advanced process nodes — especially with post-layout extraction parasitic elements annotated to the circuit netlist — the model size and simulation throughput… Read More
ARM Server Update (NFV)
There has been a lot of buzz in the industry over the last several years about ARM Holdings’ and its partners’ plans to go after the datacenter market with a particular focus on servers. Companies like Advanced Micro Devices, Applied Micro Circuits Corp. (AppliedMicro), Cavium, and Qualcomm, are now in various stages of product… Read More
Should Intel be Split in Half?