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Hogan University: Second Semester

Hogan University: Second Semester
by Paul McLellan on 09-11-2012 at 7:37 pm

The next event in the Jim Hogan Emerging Companies series (organized by the EDAC Emerging Companies Committee) will be on 17th October at Cadence (I’m guessing in building 5 but I’m sure there will be signs). The specific topic this time will be How to Raise Money and How Not to Spend it. The evening will focus on different… Read More


Fabless Semiconductor Ecosystem Update 2012

Fabless Semiconductor Ecosystem Update 2012
by Daniel Nenni on 09-11-2012 at 6:00 pm

Just a reminder, the semiconductor industry is doing quite well thanks to the fabless semiconductor ecosystem. TSMC, my economic bellwether, reported another great month with a 32% increase over August 2011 and a 16% increase over January-August 2011. TSMC is forecasting Q3 at a 7% increase over Q2, which was an amazing 21% increase… Read More


Micron ReRAM Patent Alert

Micron ReRAM Patent Alert
by Ed McKernan on 09-11-2012 at 3:16 pm


Micron recently was awarded patents related to ReRAM. As everyone knows, patents are the lifeblood of technology based industries and the memory business is no different. But what can you learn from a patent? In the first of a series of Blogs, Christie Marrian moderator of the ReRAM-Forum asks that question in the context of patents… Read More


Interface IP (USB, PCIe, SATA, HDMI, MIPI, DDRn,…) Survey : the Introduction

Interface IP (USB, PCIe, SATA, HDMI, MIPI, DDRn,…) Survey : the Introduction
by Eric Esteve on 09-11-2012 at 10:00 am

The need to exchange larger and larger amount of data from system to the external world, or internally into an application, has pushed for the standardization of interconnect protocol. This allows interconnecting different Integrated Circuits (IC) coming from different vendors. Some protocols have been defined to best fit… Read More


17th Si2 Conference – October 9 – Santa Clara, CA

17th Si2 Conference – October 9 – Santa Clara, CA
by Daniel Nenni on 09-11-2012 at 8:30 am

This conference will begin with a keynote address by my good friend Jim Hogan, EDA industry pioneer and venture capitalist. Jim has worked in the semiconductor design and manufacturing industry for more than 35 years and is very candid about his experience and vision for the future of EDA. This keynote and Q&A alone is worth … Read More


Verifying Finite State Machines

Verifying Finite State Machines
by Paul McLellan on 09-10-2012 at 2:05 pm

Finite state machines (FSMs) are a very convenient way of describing certain kinds of behavior. But like any other aspect of design, it is important to get everything right. Since finite state machines have been formally studied, there is a lot of knowledge about the types of bugs that a finite state machine might exhibit.

When flipflops… Read More


A Brief History of Tensilica

A Brief History of Tensilica
by Daniel Nenni on 09-08-2012 at 7:00 pm

In the late 1990s, a change was going on in chip design. Companies had moved to system-on-chip design, which incorporated a general-purpose control processor plus blocks of logic (often called RTL) to do the hard tasks that the general-purpose processor couldn’t handle.

These blocks of logic were becoming a huge problem because… Read More


Intel’s Haswell and the Tablet PC Dilemma

Intel’s Haswell and the Tablet PC Dilemma
by Ed McKernan on 09-07-2012 at 12:26 pm

Paul Otellini’s greatest fear in his chase to have Intel win the Smartphone and Tablet space is that he opens the door to significant ASP declines in his current PC business. This is the Innovator’s Dilemma writ large. In 2011, Intel’s PC business (excluding servers) was $36B at an average ASP of $100. Within that model is an Ultra … Read More


A brief history of Interface IP, the 4th version of IPNEST Survey

A brief history of Interface IP, the 4th version of IPNEST Survey
by Eric Esteve on 09-07-2012 at 5:17 am

The industry is moving extremely fast to change the “old” way to interconnect devices using parallel bus, to the most efficient approach based on High Speed Serial Interconnect (HSSI) protocols. The use of HSSI has become the preferred solution compared with the use of parallel busses for new products developed … Read More


Have You Ever Heard of the Carrington Event? Will Your Chips Survive Another?

Have You Ever Heard of the Carrington Event? Will Your Chips Survive Another?
by Paul McLellan on 09-06-2012 at 9:07 pm

In one of those odd coincidences, I was having dinner with a friend last week and somehow the Carrington Event came up. Then I read a a piece in EETimesabout whether electrical storms could cause problems in the near future. Even that piece didn’t mention the Carrington Event so I guess George Leopold, the author, hasn’t… Read More