02/08/2008 Feb. 8, 2008 - Michel Mayer, chairman and CEO of Freescale Semiconductor, is stepping aside, four years after joining the company and leading it through its spinoff from Motorola, subsequent IPO, and leveraged buyout. The company indicated that Mayer will stay on in his current role until the search for a new CEO is completed, and will remain chairman through the transition.
02/08/2008 ; STMicroelectronics reports that it has introduced the market's smallest single-chip camera sensor for mobile applications. Coupling low space requirements with advanced image processing capabilities, ST's latest 2-megapixel mobile-phone camera sensor addresses consumers' appetite for full- featured imaging solutions in ever-more popular thin-profiled handsets.
02/08/2008 EV Group, a supplier of wafer-bonding and lithography equipment, has received an order from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Bombay, for two of its MEMS-focused systems.
02/08/2008 MEMS developer Nanochip is working to address the limits of flash memory technology. The company's first products, planned for production in 2010, are expected to exceed 100GB/chipset, reaching terabytes in the future. Small Times' Debra Vogler reports.
02/07/2008 Feb. 7, 2008 - Toshiba and partner SanDisk reportedly have settled on a location in which to build their fifth NAND flash fab, sharing the ¥700B (US ~$6.58B) investment in the new facility, according to a report by the Asahi Shimbun. Mass production is slated for fiscal 2009.
02/07/2008 Feb. 7, 2008 - SanDisk says it will start shipping 16Gb multilevel NAND flash memory products built with 43nm process technologies during 2Q08, with 32Gb versions slated for later in the year. Manufacturing of the newer process node is underway at Toshiba's Yokkaichi operations near Nagoya, Japan, produced initially at Fab 4, followed by Fab 3 sometime in 2H08.
02/07/2008 ; Amkor Technology Inc. has announced that Oleg Khaykin, COO, is leaving the company to become CEO of another public company. Ken Joyce, chief administrative officer of Amkor, has been named to succeed Khaykin as COO. Joyce joined Amkor in 1997 and was CFO for more than 8 years before becoming chief administrative officer in November 2007.
02/07/2008 ; Comtech Group Inc., a provider of customized design solutions for the technology manufacturing sector in China, is forming an alliance with Freescale Semiconductor. The collaboration will focus on the use of Freescale's semiconductor technology in Comtech's customized module solutions for its OEM (original equipment manufacturing) and ODM (original design manufacturing) customers, with an initial focus on automotive electronics.
02/06/2008 Feb. 6, 2008 - Worldwide silicon wafer area shipments came in right around SEMI's revised projections in 2007, squeaking back into positive growth territory by year's end, according to the latest data from SEMI's SEMI Silicon Manufacturers Group (SMG).
02/06/2008 Feb. 6. 2008 - Test/probe-card firm FormFactor says it will trim its workforce by 14% (mostly manufacturing workers at its HQ in Livermore, CA, according to local reports), taking a charge of $4-$5M mostly in 1Q08 as it tries to fight through a soft market.
02/06/2008 Agilent has sold a model 5500 atomic force microscope to the University of Northern Iowa electrical characterization and materials science studies.
02/06/2008 Ecology Coatings Inc. has signed a letter of intent with the U.S. Automotive Partnership for Advancing Research & Technologies (USAutoPARTS) to participate in a nonprofit automotive research initiative program.
02/06/2008 Feb. 6, 2008 - At this week's International Solid State Circuit Conference (ISSCC), European R&D consortia IMEC is pushing several new converter technologies built in 90nm digital CMOS, and encouraging more participants in continuing the work. It's also showing a full-CMOS 60GHz antenna array, and a chip for small EEG machines.
02/06/2008 JEOL USA's new mobile scanning electron microscope, the CarryScope, promises imaging and analytical capabilities of conventional microscopes. It can be transported between the lab, conference room, or office for inspection of products or analysis of research samples. Special pricing is available through March 31.
02/05/2008 Feb. 5, 2008 - At this week's International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC), Texas Instruments is disclosing process and design information about its 45nm process-based 3.5G baseband and multimedia processor, which offers 55% better performance and uses 63% less power than the 65nm version.
02/05/2008 Intel CTO Justin Rattner gives WaferNEWS some insights into the development process of its "breakthrough" 256Mb phase-change memory multilevel cell device, to be revealed at this week's ISSCC. While replacing DRAM is a long ways away, "the most ardent advocates for phase-change see that potential," he said.
02/05/2008 February 4, 2008 -- /FDA/ -- The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, is requesting nearly $2.4 billion to protect and promote public health as part of the President's fiscal year (FY) 2009 budget.
02/05/2008 Feb. 5, 2008 - Hynix Semiconductor plans to invest 1.5-2.0T won (US ~$1.6B) to hike production in its 300mm DRAM plant in Wuxi, China (C2 line) by about 20% to 120,000 wafers/month, increasing its product mix coming from China to 55%-60% DRAM, according to a report in the Korea Times.
JEOL USA's new mobile scanning electron microscope, the CarryScope, promises imaging and analytical capabilities of conventional microscopes. It can be transported between the lab, conference room, or office for inspection of products or analysis of research samples. Special pricing is available through March 31.