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EUV Masks

EUV Masks
by Paul McLellan on 07-17-2012 at 11:00 pm

This is really the second part to this blog about the challenges of EUV lithography. The next speaker was Franklin Kalk who is CTO of Toppan Photomasks. He too emphasized that we can make almost arbitrarily small features but more and more masks are required (not, that I suspect, he would complain being in the mask business). For EUV… Read More


Design-to-Silicon Platform Workshops!

Design-to-Silicon Platform Workshops!
by Daniel Nenni on 07-17-2012 at 7:30 pm

Have you seen the latest design rule manuals? At 28nm and 20nm design sign-off is no longer just DRC and LVS. These basic components of physical verification are being augmented by an expansive set of yield analysis and critical feature identification capabilities, as well as layout enhancements, printability, and performance… Read More


3D Thermal Analysis

3D Thermal Analysis
by Paul McLellan on 07-17-2012 at 11:32 am

Matt Elmore of ANSYS/Apache has an interesting blog posting about thermal analysis in 3D integrated circuits. With both technical and economic challenges at process nodes as we push below 28nm, increasingly product groups are looking towards through-silicon-via (TSV) based approaches as a way of keeping Moore’s law… Read More


An Approach to 20nm IC Design

An Approach to 20nm IC Design
by Daniel Payne on 07-17-2012 at 10:10 am

Last month at DAC I learned how IBM, Cadence, ARM, GLOBALFOUNDRIES and Samsung approach the challenges of SoC design, EDA design and fabrication at the 20nm node. Today I followed up by reading a white paper on 20nm IC design challenges authored by Cadence, a welcome relief to the previous marketing mantra of EDA 360.

Here’s… Read More


Laker Analog Prototyping

Laker Analog Prototyping
by Paul McLellan on 07-16-2012 at 6:18 pm

Over the years many attempts have been made to increase the level of automation in analog design. Most of these have not been especially successful. Probably part of the reason was inadequate technology but also there is an attitude that “real” analog designers design polygons on the bare silicon. I think two things… Read More


Qualcomm’s Moment to Re-Align Globally

Qualcomm’s Moment to Re-Align Globally
by Ed McKernan on 07-16-2012 at 6:00 pm

Qualcomm has a nice problem to have: too much demand for its Snapdragon and 4G LTE baseband parts. How Qualcomm realigns its manufacturing strategy around this problem will determine whether or not they can breakaway from the ARM camp and go toe to toe with Intel. Last week Malcolm Penn claimed TSMC was too big to fail. Really? The … Read More


Extreme Ultra Violet (EUV)

Extreme Ultra Violet (EUV)
by Paul McLellan on 07-15-2012 at 8:15 pm

EUV is the great hope for avoiding having to go to triple (and more) patterning if we have to stick with 193nm light. There were several presentations at Semicon about the status of EUV. Here I’ll discuss the issues with EUV lithography and in a separate post discuss the issues about making masks for EUV.

It is probably worth … Read More


How has 20nm Changed the Semiconductor Ecosystem?

How has 20nm Changed the Semiconductor Ecosystem?
by Daniel Nenni on 07-15-2012 at 7:30 pm


What does mango beer have to do with semiconductor design and manufacturing? At a table of beer drinkers from around the world I would have never thought fruity beer would pass a taste test, not even close. As it turns out, the mango beer is very good! Same goes for 20nm planar devices. “Will not work”, “Will not yield”, “Will not scale”,… Read More


Scoreboards and Results Predictors in UVM

Scoreboards and Results Predictors in UVM
by Daniel Nenni on 07-15-2012 at 10:56 am

If verification is the art of determining that your design works correctly under all specified conditions, then it is imperative that we are able to create an environment that can tell you if this is truly the case.

Scoreboards are verification components that determine that the DUT is working correctly, including ensuring that… Read More


Silicon on Insulator (SOI)

Silicon on Insulator (SOI)
by Paul McLellan on 07-14-2012 at 5:51 pm

I attended a panel session followed by a party during Semicon to celebrate Soitec’s 20th birthday. Officially it was titled An Insider’s Look at the Future of Mobile Technologies. But in reality it was a look at the future possibilities for SOI.

Silicon on Insulator (SOI) has been a sort of bastard child of semiconductor.… Read More