New Intel CEO Commits to Remaining an IDM

New Intel CEO Commits to Remaining an IDM
by Robert Maire on 01-25-2021 at 6:00 am

Pat Gelsinger Intel CEO

-Intel good results had a little extra help to be great
-New CEO commits to remaining an IDM versus fabless
-Claims of strong progress on 7NM fuel optimism inside
-Outsourcing to TSMC will not go away but will increase

A good quarter but with some silicon enhancements from ICAP

Intel reported Revenues of $20B and EPS of $1.52, which… Read More


CEO Interview: Arun Iyengar of Untether AI

CEO Interview: Arun Iyengar of Untether AI
by Daniel Nenni on 01-15-2021 at 8:00 am

Arun Iyengar Chief Executive Officer

I had a chance to catch up with Arun Iyengar, CEO of Untether AI.  Untether AI recently unveiled its tsunAImi accelerator cards powered by the company’s runAI devices. Using at-memory computation, Untether AI breaks through the barriers of traditional von Neumann architectures, offering industry-leading compute density … Read More


ISS 2021 – Scotten W. Jones – Logic Leadership in the PPAC era

ISS 2021 – Scotten W. Jones – Logic Leadership in the PPAC era
by Scotten Jones on 01-15-2021 at 6:00 am

Slide3

I was asked to give a talk at the 2021 ISS conference and the following is a write up of the talk.

The title of the talk is “Logic Leadership in the PPAC era”.

The talk is broken up into three main sections:

  1. Background information explaining PPAC and Standard Cells.
  2. A node-by-node comparisons of companies running leading edge logic
Read More

The Latest in Dielectrics for Advanced Process Nodes

The Latest in Dielectrics for Advanced Process Nodes
by Tom Dillinger on 01-12-2021 at 6:00 am

new ILDs v2

Of the three types of materials used in microelectronics – i.e., semiconductors, metals, and dielectrics – the first two often get the most attention.  Yet, there is a pressing need for a rich variety of dielectric materials in device fabrication and interconnect isolation to satisfy the performance, power, and reliability … Read More


PLDA is at the Leading Edge with Advances in Both PCIe 5.0 and CXL

PLDA is at the Leading Edge with Advances in Both PCIe 5.0 and CXL
by Mike Gianfagna on 01-05-2021 at 6:00 am

PLDA is at the Leading Edge with Advances in Both PCIe 5.0 and CXL

There are significant advances in communication protocols happening all around us. The Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCIe) Gen 5 standard is delivering the needed device-to-device performance to support artificial intelligence and machine learning applications as well as cloud-based workloads. The rapidly… Read More


Optimization for pFET Nanosheet Devices

Optimization for pFET Nanosheet Devices
by Tom Dillinger on 01-04-2021 at 6:00 am

Intel flow TEM

The next transition from current FinFET devices at advanced process nodes is the “nanosheet” device, as depicted in the figure below. [1]

The FinFET provides improved gate-to-channel electrostatic control compared to a planar device, where the gate traverses three sides of the fin.  The “gate-all-around” characteristics… Read More


IEDM 2020 Starts this Weekend

IEDM 2020 Starts this Weekend
by Scotten Jones on 12-10-2020 at 6:00 am

IEDM 2020 Logo

As I have discussed before, I believe that IEDM is the premier technical conference for understanding leading edge process technologies. Beginning this coming weekend, this year’s edition of IEDM will be held virtually, and I highly recommend attending.

The conference held a press briefing last Monday. The tutorial and short… Read More


How Intel Stumbled: A Perspective from the Trenches

How Intel Stumbled: A Perspective from the Trenches
by Daniel Nenni on 12-07-2020 at 6:00 am

Stacy and Bob Intel SemiWiki

Bloomberg did an interview with my favorite semiconductor analyst Stacy Rasgon on “How the Number One U.S. Semiconductor Company Stumbled” that I found interesting. Coupled with the Q&A Bob Swan did at the Credit Suisse Annual Technology Conference I thought it would be good content for a viral blog.

Stacy RasgonRead More


CEO Interview: Tony Pialis of Alphawave IP

CEO Interview: Tony Pialis of Alphawave IP
by Daniel Nenni on 12-04-2020 at 10:00 am

Tony Pialis Alphawave on SemiWiki

Tony Pialis is a visionary entrepreneur focused on developing
technologies for next generation connectivity. In the last twenty 20 years, he has co-founded three semiconductor IP companies, all exclusively targeting connectivity IP. Tony is currently the CEO of Alphawave IP Inc, a leader in delivering multi-standard wireline… Read More


No Intel and Samsung are not passing TSMC

No Intel and Samsung are not passing TSMC
by Scotten Jones on 12-02-2020 at 6:00 am

Slide1

Seeking Alpha just published an article about Intel and Samsung passing TSMC for process leadership. The Intel part seems to be a theme with them, they have talked in the past about how Intel does bigger density improvements with each generation than the foundries but forget that the foundries are doing 5 nodes in the time it takes… Read More