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ARM POPs Another One!

ARM POPs Another One!
by Daniel Nenni on 02-11-2016 at 4:00 pm

ARM announced a new POP deal with UMC 28nm last week. POP stands for Processor Optimized Package meaning physical IP libraries (logic and memory) are customized for ARM processor cores and mainstream EDA tools creating a platform for optimized chip design. POP is a much bigger deal than most people realize so let’s get into a little… Read More


Fastest SoC time-to-success: emulators, or FPGA-based prototypes?

Fastest SoC time-to-success: emulators, or FPGA-based prototypes?
by Don Dingee on 02-11-2016 at 12:00 pm

Hardware emulators and FPGA-based prototyping systems are descendants of the same ancestor. The Quickturn Systems Rapid Prototype Machine (RPM) introduced in May 1988 brought an array of Xilinx XC3090 FPGAs to emulate designs with hundreds of thousands of gates. From there, hardware emulators and FPGA-based prototyping … Read More


Top Ten Insights on the EDA and Semiconductor Industry

Top Ten Insights on the EDA and Semiconductor Industry
by Tom Dillinger on 02-11-2016 at 7:00 am

I recently had the opportunity to chat with Anirudh Devgan, senior vice president and general manager at Cadence, who leads the Digital and Signoff Group. We discussed recent product development initiatives at Cadence, and talked about future EDA and semiconductor market opportunities. His insights and comments were keen … Read More


Positive pointers from Samsung, GF, Renesas, NXP/Freescale, ST, Soitec – so will 2016 be the year of FD-SOI?

Positive pointers from Samsung, GF, Renesas, NXP/Freescale, ST, Soitec – so will 2016 be the year of FD-SOI?
by Adele Hars on 02-10-2016 at 4:00 pm

A little over a month into 2016 and we already have a raft of FD-SOI news from Samsung, GlobalFoundries, NXP/Freescale, Renesas and more. Quite a bit of it came out of the recent SOI Consortium forum in Tokyo. Many of the presentations are now available on the SOI Consortium website (click here to see what’s there) – but keep checking… Read More


Semiconductor, Oil, and GDP – Correlated? What’s Expected?

Semiconductor, Oil, and GDP – Correlated? What’s Expected?
by Pawan Fangaria on 02-10-2016 at 7:00 am

In last 3 decades of semiconductor market, the largest growth in IC sales was at 33% in 2010. At that time global recession had started due to financial crisis and in 2009 oil prices fell more than 30%. It appeared that oil prices were negatively correlated with semiconductor market growth. Today again there is another sharp decline… Read More


Smart Phones and the Chinese Marketplace

Smart Phones and the Chinese Marketplace
by Daniel Payne on 02-10-2016 at 6:00 am

My first mobile phone was from Motorola and it was fondly called the “brick phone” because of its crude shape. That phone helped me be more efficient while living and working in Silicon Valley, because long commute times in the car were common. At one time Motorola was the best-selling mobile phone brand in the world,… Read More


Quantum Computing – A Quick Review

Quantum Computing – A Quick Review
by Bernard Murphy on 02-09-2016 at 4:00 pm

This topic comes up periodically but for me had always been one of those things I’d get around to understanding better someday. A recent blog in SemiWiki got me looking a little harder and determined to write a blog to get this out of my system, if for no other reason than getting rid of excess tabs on my browser. So here’s my quick review.… Read More


India: Transcending Transportation Transformation

India: Transcending Transportation Transformation
by Roger C. Lanctot on 02-09-2016 at 12:00 pm

Dr. Werner Heisenberg’s “uncertainty principle” states that the more precisely the position of some particle is determined, the less precisely its momentum can be known and vice versa. Transportation is the same way. The more we study the current state of transportation the less precisely we understand … Read More


Internet of Things : Realizing Business Value through Platforms, Data Analytics & Visualization

Internet of Things : Realizing Business Value through Platforms, Data Analytics & Visualization
by Pranay Prakash on 02-09-2016 at 7:00 am

Over the past few years of being immersed in the Internet of Things (IoT), I have found that customers have very specific problems they are trying to solve; e.g. gaining energy efficiency, early fault detection or remote diagnosis and maintenance of equipment. Decisions are driven by the need to reduce Operational Expenditure… Read More