This is the 15th anniversary of the TSMC Open Innovation Platform (OIP). The OIP Ecosystem Forum will kick off on September 27th in Santa Clara, California and continue around the world for the next two months in person and on-line in North America, Europe, China, Japan, Taiwan, and Israel. These are THE most attended semiconductor… Read More
During my research I found an interview with Don Brooks from February 2000. It was very interesting and confirmed some of the things I knew about Don and brought up a few things I did not know. It’s an hour but it is a video of Don telling his story and is definitely worth a look. One of the things that was not mentioned however is the… Read More
Now that semiconductors are front page news and a political football, I would like to write more about how we got to where we are today to better understand where semiconductors will go tomorrow. I will start this article with a provocative quote that really made me laugh and will put some context to what I am trying to accomplish here:… Read More
Application Specific Integrated Circuits were the foundation of the semiconductor industry up until the IDMs came to power in the 1980s and 90s. Computer companies all had their own fabs, I worked in one, until start up companies like SUN Microsystems started using off the shelf chips from Motorola. SUN moved to the fabless model… Read More
Alphawave IP has agreed to acquire OpenFive, a SiFive business unit (formerly Open-Silicon) for $210m in cash. Having spent many years in the ASIC business which included working with Open-Silicon, Alphawave, and OpenFive here is my perspective on the acquisition:
This acquisition accomplishes two things: First it trims down… Read More
In the mid 1980’s, Tommy George, then President of Motorola’s Semiconductor Sector, pointed out to me that the semiconductor revenue per unit area had been a constant throughout the history of the industry including the period when germanium transistors made up a large share of semiconductor revenue. I began tracking the numbers… Read More
From our book “Mobile Unleashed”, this is a detailed history of Samsung semiconductor:
Conglomerates are the antithesis of focus, and Samsung is the quintessential chaebol. From humble beginnings in 1938 as a food exporter, Samsung endured the turmoil and aftermath of two major wars while diversifying and expanding.… Read More
The cell-based ASIC business that we know today was born in the early 1980s and was pioneered by companies like LSI Logic and VLSI Technology. Some of this history is covered in Chapter 2 of our book, “Fabless: The Transformation of the Semiconductor Industry”. The ASIC business truly changed the world. Prior to this revolution,… Read More
The Apple and Samsung relationship is an interesting one. On one hand they have co-developed some of the most innovative products on the market today (iPod, iPhone, iPad, iWatch) yet they are fierce competitors in the mobile market. Some call this type of business relationship “frenemies” others refer to the old Italian proverb… Read More
VLSI Technology, for those of you not of a certain age, was one of the companies that, along with LSI Logic, created the ASIC business. One challenge in ASIC is that the customer needs to decide which ASIC company to use (since the libraries and technologies are all different) meaning they needed to get quotes from several companies.… Read More
