I have to admit I, thus far, have been the ultimate Bitcoin cynic. Watching the price go from $2 in the fall of 2011 to $1132 in December 2013 was dizzying. It seemed reminiscent of Dutch tulip mania. A bitcoin that is not backed by anything physical such as gold, or by a government, strikes me as only slightly less valuable than a tulip.… Read More
The RISC-V and Open-Source Functional Verification ChallengeMost of the RISC-V action at the end…Read More
Sarcina Democratizes 2.5D Package Design with Bump Pitch Transformers2.5D package design is rapidly finding its stride…Read More
Addressing Reliability and Safety of Power Modules for Electric VehiclesAs electric vehicles (EVs) gain widespread adoption, safety,…Read More
Shaping Tomorrow’s Semiconductor Technology IEDM 2024Anyone who has read my articles about IEDM…Read More
SI and PI Update from Cadence on Sigrity XSignal Integrity (SI) and Power Integrity (PI) issues…Read More
MIMO, Always On, 3D Imaging and Computer Vision…
You can read all these articles in the latest CEVA Newsletter, if you didn’t read it first in Semiwiki! The blog describing the “Maximum Likelihood MIMO Implementation” is certainly going deep technically, as it introduce a complex Digital Signal Processing technique, Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO). MIMO is just like… Read More
The Grand Folly of India’s Foundry Plans
At the beginning of the year, New Delhi’s outgoing government launched an initiative purported to drive the nation’s technology independence and reduce the current account deficit on electronics imports. The initiative describes a partnership between New Delhi and two industrial consortiums for the building of semiconductor… Read More
Sonics and Qualcomm Make a Deal
Some background. Sonics has been in the network-on-chip (NoC) business for a long time. Nearly 18 years years. When Arteris launched their products, Sonics figured Arteris were infringing Sonics’s patents and in 2011 brought a complaint against them. Details are here. Arteris looked at a couple of their own patents (if… Read More
The Great 28nm Debacle!
40nm was a big node while I was Director of Foundries at the IP company Virage Logic which was later acquired by Synopsys. 40nm was big because the top fabless companies multi-sourced designs from one foundry to another with relative ease to get the best wafer prices. It was also the node where some of the big IDMs went fab-lite moving… Read More
Coventor Brings More Accuracy & Performance into Design of MEMS Devices
Although MEMS devices in various forms are now found in most electronic devices, predominantly in mobile, automotive, aerospace and many other applications, their major revolution, I believe, is yet to happen. We are seeing rapid innovation in MEMS reflected by their improvements in precision, performance, size reduction,… Read More
Fantasy Tech-Ball and the Intel Rumor Wire
Reading Intel analysis lately has been a lot like reading fantasy baseball analysis. Intel should buy Altera. Intel should waive Atom. Intel should fab for Apple. All of those have a near-zero probability of happening IMHO, and yet pundits continue to pitch their version of alternate reality, dealing away product lines and strategies… Read More
An Approach to Clock Domain Crossing for SoC Designs
Blogger Pawan Fangaria wrote about Clock Domain Crossing(CDC) a few weeks ago, and so I followed up tonight and watched a webinarabout CDC presented by Ravindra Anejaof Atrenta. An RTL design engineer would ultimately want a CDC verification tool that offers:
- Fast throughput and thoroughness
- Ability to debug and fix the source
Solar Leases, How to Not Get Gouged by PG&E
This post will be of primary interest to California residents.
If you haven’t looked closely at your PG&E bill, this may ruin your day. If you live in a house larger than a cracker box, and actually use your lights and air conditioning, the rates you pay are exorbitant. If you live in WA you’ll be paying .06-.08 per … Read More
July 4th Fireworks
It was July 4th yesterday. Fireworks. I didn’t go down to the waterfront to see them in San Francisco this year, I was in a “place” (that might possibly have served beer) having fun. But it reminded me of this a couple of years ago. On July 4th 2012 the San Diego fireworks display, one of the biggest in the world, detonated… Read More
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