It is important to note that the System On Chip (SoC) revolution that is currently driving mobile electronics has one very important enabling technology and that is Semiconductor Intellectual Property. Where would we be without the commercial IP market segment? Computers and phones would still be on our desks for one thing, and… Read More
Can Intel Compete in the IoT?
Kevin Ashton, a British technology pioneer, is credited for the term “The Internet of Things” to describe an ecosystem where the Internet is connected to the physical world via ubiquitous sensors. Simply stated: rather than humans creating content for the internet IoT devices create the content. To be clear, this… Read More
GlobalFoundries and ARM
GlobalFoundries had several interesting things at the ARM TechCon last week. Firstly, GlobalFoundries won the best in show award in the chip design category recognizing the best-in-class technologies introduced since the last TechCon.
Earlier in the summer GlobalFoundries and ARM announced the ARM Cortex-A12 processor,… Read More
Fabless: The Transformation of the Semiconductor Industry
As I have mentioned before, Paul McLellan and I are writing a book on the history of the fabless semiconductor industry. There is a preview available HERE, it will initially be sold as an e-book on SemiWiki and put into print early next year. Working with Paul McLellan and Beth Martin on this was an amazing experience. The research,… Read More
Intel is Killing the Environment!
If I had to sum up opening day at ARM TechCon 2013 in one word it would be “crowded”. More than twice as many people attended as last year with 6,500 preregistered. The opening keynote was “The New Style of IT” pimping the HP Moonshot systems, but it could have just as easily been called “Why Intel Stock is Dead Money”,… Read More
ARM in Samsung 14nm FinFET
I am at ARM TechCon today. One interesting presentation was made jointly between Samsung, Cadence and ARM themselves about developing physical libraries (ARM), a tool flow (Cadence) and test chips (Samsung). It was titled Samsung ARM and Cadence collaborate on the silicon-proven world first 14-nm FinFET Cortex-A7 ARM CPU and… Read More
The Alternative to FinFET: FD-SOI
Everywhere you turn these days you find FinFETs. Intel has had them since 22nm (they use the word Tri-gate but it is the same as what the world calls FinFET) and TSMC will have them at 16nm. So why FinFET? And is there an alternative?
The reason that regular bulk planar transistors have run out of steam is that the channel area underneath… Read More
Pigs Fly. Altera Goes with ARM on Intel 14nm
Altera announced in February that they would be using Intel as a foundry at 14nm. Historically they have used TSMC. Then in June they announced the Stratix 10 family of FPGAs that they would build on the Intel process. At the Globalpress summit in May I asked Vince Hu about their processor strategy. Here is what I wrote about itat the… Read More
TSMC Continues To Fire On All Cylinders
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation is the world’s leading semiconductor foundry by revenue and, by extension, profitability. While I am deeply saddened that current CEO Morris Chang will be retiring (again) shortly, I am hopeful that his successor will be able to continue the legacy of foundry industry leadership… Read More
Yes, Intel 14nm Really is Delayed…And They Lost $600M on Mobile
Intel server profits are growing, which isn’t a big suprise. But mobile losses are high. Although the amount lost by the Other Intel Architecture Group had a loss of $606M, that is actually down slightly from Q2 but up a lot from last year when they lost “only” $235M. This group includes Atom, the Infineon Wireless… Read More
Bluetooth 6.0 Channel Sounding is Here