The Rosetta Stone of Lithography

The Rosetta Stone of Lithography
by Paul McLellan on 11-20-2013 at 3:14 pm

At major EDA events, CEDA (the IEEE council on EDA, I guess you already know what that bit stands for) hosts a lunch and presentation for attendees and others. This week was ICCAD and the speaker was Lars Liebmann of IBM on The Escalating Design Impact of Resolution-Challenged Lithography. Lars decided to give us a whirlwind tour … Read More


ARM in Samsung 14nm FinFET

ARM in Samsung 14nm FinFET
by Paul McLellan on 10-30-2013 at 4:28 pm

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


Yes, Intel 14nm Really is Delayed…And They Lost $600M on Mobile

Yes, Intel 14nm Really is Delayed…And They Lost $600M on Mobile
by Paul McLellan on 10-15-2013 at 6:01 pm

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


Are 28nm Transistors the Cheapest…Forever?

Are 28nm Transistors the Cheapest…Forever?
by Paul McLellan on 09-17-2013 at 10:43 am

It is beginning to look as if 28nm transistors, which are the cheapest per million gates compared to any earlier process such as 45nm, may also be the cheapest per million gates compared to any later process such as 20nm.

What we know so far: FinFET seems to be difficult technology because of the 3D structure and so the novel manufacturing… Read More


The TSMC OIP Technical Paper Abstracts are up!

The TSMC OIP Technical Paper Abstracts are up!
by Daniel Nenni on 08-25-2013 at 8:10 pm

The TSMC Open Innovation Platform® (OIP) Ecosystem Forum brings TSMC’s design ecosystem member companies together to share with our customers real-case solutions for customers’ design challenges and success stories of best practice in TSMC’s design ecosystem.

More than 90% of the attendees last year said “this… Read More


Intel Is Continuing to Scale While Others Pause

Intel Is Continuing to Scale While Others Pause
by Paul McLellan on 08-09-2013 at 11:52 am

Back in May, William Holt, EVP of technology and manufacturing at Intel gave a presentation to analysts entitled Advancing Moore’s Law, Imperatives and Opportunity. A pdf of the presentation is available here. I just saw it for the first time today and I’m not sure how to get my head around it. It starts off with a lot … Read More


What is inside the iPhone5s? Samsung or TSMC?

What is inside the iPhone5s? Samsung or TSMC?
by Daniel Nenni on 06-26-2013 at 6:00 pm

As a semiconductor professional and an Apple customer I’m very interested to see what is inside the iPhone5s. Rumors are spreading, photos are leaking, creating a nice build up to the next release of the mobile device that changed the world.

Honestly, last year I was a bit disappointed with the iPhone5. Inside is the A6 SoC which uses… Read More


TSMC and Xilinx on the FinFAST Track!

TSMC and Xilinx on the FinFAST Track!
by Daniel Nenni on 06-23-2013 at 2:00 am

The power of the fabless semiconductor ecosystem never ceases to amaze me. On one hand you have the Intel backed press crowing about Intel stealing Altera from TSMC. On the other hand you have Xilinx and TSMC crowing about a new ‘one-team’ approach. If you are interested in the real story you’ve come to the right place.

“Altera’sRead More


Taiwan Semiconductor Tries To Pull A FinFAST One!

Taiwan Semiconductor Tries To Pull A FinFAST One!
by Daniel Nenni on 06-16-2013 at 7:00 pm


This completely misleading title is from a Seeking Alpha (SA) article, a stock investment version of the National Enquirer. As I mentioned inA Call to ARMs, fame and fortune seeking SA Authors make a penny per click so sensationalism sells. The article is not worth your time so I will save you the click and skip to the misguided conclusion:… Read More


TSMC ♥ Berkeley Design Automation

TSMC ♥ Berkeley Design Automation
by Daniel Nenni on 05-30-2013 at 11:00 am

As I mentioned in BDA Takes on FinFET Based Memories with AFS Mega:

Is AFS Mega real? Of course it is, I’m an SRAM guy and I worked with BDA on this product so I know. But don’t take my word for it, stay tuned for endorsements from the top SRAM suppliers around the world.

Here is the first customer endorsement from the #1 foundry.… Read More