The 63^rd annual IEEE International Electron Devices Meeting (IEDM), to be held December 2-6, 2017 at the Hilton San Francisco Union Square hotel, may go down as one of the most memorable editions for the sheer variety and depth of its talks, sessions, courses and events.

Among the most-anticipated talks are presentations by Intel and Globalfoundries, which will each detail their forthcoming competing FinFET transistor technology platforms in a session on Wednesday morning. FinFET transistors are a major driver of the continuing progress of the electronics industry, and these platforms are as important for their commercial potential as they are for their technical innovations.*

Each year at the IEDM, the world’s best technologists in micro/nano/bioelectronics converge to participate in a technical program consisting of more than 220 presentations, along with other events.

“Those who attend IEDM 2017 will find much that is familiar, beginning with a technical program describing breakthroughs in areas ranging from mainstream CMOS technology to innovative nanoelectronics to medical devices. The Sunday Short Courses are also a perennial favorite because they are not only comprehensive but are also taught by accomplished world experts,” said Dr. Barbara De Salvo, Scientific Director at Leti. “But we have added some new features this year. One is a fourth Plenary session, on Wednesday morning, featuring Nobel winner Hiroshi Amano. Another is a revamped Tuesday evening panel. Not only will it focus on a topic of great interest to many people, it is designed to be more open and less formal.”

Other features of the IEDM 2017 include:

• Focus Sessions on the following topics: 3D Integration and Packaging; Modeling Challenges for Neuromorphic Computing; Nanosensors for Disease Diagnostics; and Silicon Photonics: Current Status and Perspectives.

• A vendor exhibition will be held, based on the success of last year’s event at the IEDM.
• The IEEE Magnetics Society will again host a joint poster session on MRAM (magnetic RAM) in the exhibit area. New for this year, though, is that the Society will also hold its annual MRAM Global Innovation Forum on Thursday, Dec. 7 at the same hotel, enabling IEDM attendees to participate. (Refer to the IEEE Magnetics Society website.) The forum consists of invited talks by leading experts and a panel discussion.

Here are details of some of the events that will take place at this year’s IEDM:

90-Minute Tutorials – Saturday, Dec. 2
These tutorials on emerging technologies will be presented by leading technical experts in each area, with the goal of bridging the gap between textbook-level knowledge and cutting-edge current research.

• The Evolution of Logic Transistors Toward Low Power and High Performance IoT Applications, Dr. Dae Won Ha, Samsung Electronics
• Negative Capacitance Transistors, Prof. Sayeef Salahuddin, UC Berkeley
• Fundamental, Thermal, and Energy Limits of PCM and ReRAM, Prof. Eric Pop, Stanford University
• Hardware Opportunities in Cognitive Computing: Near- and Far-Term, Dr. Geoffrey Burr, Principal Research Staff Member, IBM Research-Almaden
• 2.5D Interposers and High-Density Fanout Packaging as Enablers for Future Systems Integration, Dr. Venkatesh Sundaram, Associate Director, Georgia Tech 3D Systems Packaging Research Center
• Silicon Photonics for Next-Generation Optical Interconnects, Dr. Joris Van Campenhout, Program Director Optical I/O, Imec

Short Courses – Sunday, Dec. 3
The day-long Short Courses provide the opportunity to learn about important developments in key areas, and they enable attendees to network with the industry’s leading technologists.

Boosting Performance, Ensuring Reliability, Managing Variability in Sub-5nm CMOS, organized by Sandy Liao of Intel, will feature the following sections:

• Transistor Performance Elements for 5nm Node and Beyond, Gen Tsutsui, IBM
• Multi-Vt Engineering and Gate Performance Control for Advanced FinFET Architecture, Steve CH Hung, Applied Materials
• Sub-5nm Interconnect Trends and Opportunities, Zsolt Tokei, Imec
• Transistor Reliability: Physics, Current Status, and Future Considerations, Stephen M. Ramey, Intel
• Back End Reliability Scaling Challenges, Variation Management, and Performance Boosters for sub-5nm CMOS,Cathyrn Christiansen, Globalfoundries
• Design-Technology Co-Optimization for Beyond 5nm Node, Andy Wei, TechInsights

Merged Memory-Logic Technologies and Their Applications, organized by Kevin Zhang of TSMC, will feature the following sections:

• Embedded Non Volatile Memory for Automotive Applications, Alfonso Maurelli, STMicroelectronics
• 3D ReRAM: Crosspoint Memory Technologies, Nirmal Ramaswamy, Micron
• Ferroelectric Memory in CMOS Processes, Thomas Mikolajick, Namlab
• Embedded Memories Technology Scaling & STT-MRAM for IoT & Automotive, Danny P. Shum, Globalfoundries
• Embedded Memories for Energy-Efficient Computing, Jonathan Chang, TSMC
• Abundant-Data Computing: The N3XT 1,000X, Subhasish Mitra, Stanford University

Plenary Presentations – Monday, Dec. 4

• Driving the Future of High-Performance Computing, Lisa Su, President & CEO, AMD
• Energy-Efficient Computing and Sensing: From Silicon to the Cloud, Adrian Ionescu, Professor, EPFL
• System Scaling Innovation for Intelligent Ubiquitous Computing, Jack Sun, VP of R&D, TSMC

Plenary Presentation – Wednesday, Dec. 6

• Development of a Sustainable Smart Society by Transformative Electronics, Hiroshi Amano, Professor, Nagoya University. Dr. Amano received the 2014 Nobel Prize in Physics along with Isamu Akasaki and Shuji Nakamura for the invention of efficient blue LEDs, which sparked a revolution in innovative, energy-saving lighting. His talk will be preceded by the Focus Session on silicon photonics.

Evening Panel Session – Tuesday evening, Dec. 5

• Where will the Next Intel be Headquartered?  Moderator: Prof. Philip Wong, Stanford

Entrepreneurs Lunch
Jointly sponsored by IEDM and IEEE EDS Women in Engineering, this year’s Entrepreneurs Lunch will feature Courtney Gras, Executive Director for Launch League, a local nonprofit focused on developing a strong startup ecosystem in Ohio. The moderator will be Prof. Leda Lunardi from North Carolina State University. Gras is an engineer by training and an entrepreneur by nature. After leaving her job as a NASA power systems engineer to work for on own startup company, she discovered a passion for building startup communities and helping technology-focused companies meet their goals. Named to the Forbes ’30 Under 30′ list in 2016, among many other recognitions and awards, Gras enjoys sharing her stories of founding a cleantech company with young entrepreneurs. She speaks on entrepreneurship, women in technology and clean energy at venues such as TEDx Budapest, the Pioneers Festival, and the IEEE WIE International Women’s Leadership Conference.