Category Archives: Confab

By Pete Singer, Editor-in-Chief

A new roadmap, the Heterogeneous Integration Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (HITRS), aims to integrate fast optical communication made possible with photonic devices with the digital crunching capabilities of CMOS.

The roadmap, announced publicly for the first time at The ConFab in June, is sponsored by IEEE Components, Packaging and Manufacturing Technology Society (CPMT), SEMI and the IEEE Electron Devices Society (EDS).

Speaking at The ConFab, Bill Bottoms, chairman and CEO of 3MT Solutions, said there were four significant issues driving change in the electronics industry that in turn drove the need for the new HITRS roadmap: 1) The approaching end of Moore’s Law scaling of CMOS, 2) Migration of data, logic and applications to the Cloud, 3) The rise of the internet of things, and 4) Consumerization of data and data access.

“CMOS scaling is reaching the end of its economic viability and, for several applications, it has already arrived. At the same time, we have migration of data, logic and applications to the cloud. That’s placing enormous pressures on the capacity of the network that can’t be met with what we’re doing today, and we have the rise of the Internet of Things,” he said. The consumerization of data and data access is something that people haven’t focused on at all, he said. “If we are not successful in doing that, the rate of growth and economic viability of our industry is going to be threatened,” Bottoms said.

These four driving forces present requirements that cannot be satisfied through scaling CMOS. “We have to have lower power, lower latency, lower cost with higher performance every time we bring out a new product or it won’t be successful,” Bottoms said. “How do we do that? The only vector that’s available to us today is to bring all of the electronics much closer together and then the distance between those system nodes has to be connected with photonics so that it operates at the speed of light and doesn’t consume much power. The only way to do this is to use heterogeneous integration and to incorporate 3D complex System-in-Package (SiP) architectures.

The HITRS is focused on exactly that, including integrating single-chip and multi­chip packaging (including substrates); integrated photonics, integrated power devices, MEMS, RF and analog mixed signal, and plasmonics. “Plasmonics have the ability to confine photonic energy to a space much smaller than wavelength,” Bottoms said. More information on the HITRS can be found at: http://cpmt.ieee.org/technology/heterogeneous-integration-roadmap.html

Bottoms said much of the technology exists today at the component level, but the challenge lies in integration. He noted today’s capabilities (Figure 1) include Interconnection (flip-chip and wire bond), antenna, molding, SMT (passives, components, connectors), passives/integrated passive devices, wafer pumping/WLP, photonics layer, embedded technology, die/package stacking and mechanical assembly (laser welding, flex bending).

Building blocks for integrated photonics.

Building blocks for integrated photonics.

“We have a large number of components, all of which have been built, proven, characterized and in no case have we yet integrated them all. We’ve integrated more and more of them, and we expect to accelerate that in the next few years,” he said.

He also said that all the components exist to make very complex photonic integrated circuits, including beam splitters, microbumps, photodetectors, optical modulators, optical buses, laser sources, active wavelength locking devices, ring modulators, waveguides, WDM (wavelength division multiplexers) filters and fiber couplers. “They all exist, they all can be built with processes that are available to us in the CMOS fab, but in no place have they been integrated into a single device. Getting that done in an effective way is one of the objectives of the HITRS roadmap,” Bottoms explained.

He also pointed to the potential of new device types (Figure 2) that are coming (or already here), including carbon nanotube memory, MEMS photonic switches, spin torque devices, plasmons in CNT waveguides, GaAs nanowire lasers (grown on silicon with waveguides embedded), and plasmonic emission sources (that employ quantum dots and plasmons).

New device types are coming.

New device types are coming.

The HITRS committee will meet for a workshop at SEMICON West in July.

Growing Conference Business at Extension Media Brings Experienced Events Producer Onboard

SAN FRANCISCO, October 28, 2015 – Extension Media announced today the addition of Sally L. Bixby as Senior Events Director for Extension Media’s fast-growing conference division. She will be based in the downtown Portland, Oregon office where Extension Media has editorial staff.

Ms. Bixby is an accomplished corporate events producer with nearly 16 years of in-depth experience in operations and marketing, holding senior staff positions in multiple events projects. To date, she has managed more than 450 business conferences in North America alone and produced several internationally as well. She brings to the role a significant track record of increasing event attendance, managing large- and small-scale budgets and driving lead generation for companies such as: AMD, Avnet, Curtiss-Wright, Intel, Kontron, MathWorks and more. Throughout her career, Ms. Bixby has cultivated relationships in the embedded systems, semiconductor and medical electronics industries, as well as academia and several professional organizations, building mutually beneficial and long-term business relationships.

“We are thrilled that Sally is leading the conference operations management team and will also be focusing her energy on growing the conference and exhibition side of our business, adding several events aimed at the embedded and growing IoT market segments as well as the semiconductor manufacturing and design market,” said Vince Ridley, president and founder of Extension Media. “Her professionalism and passion for delivering successful events will benefit both Extension Media and our clients. Sally’s attention to exceeding expected goals make her an ideal fit.”

“I look forward to expanding the conference business at Extension Media, connecting knowledgeable, responsive leaders and influencers,” said Ms. Bixby. “Recent experience creating a successful China-U.S. IoT Summit for a Fortune 100 company – that resulted in 120% of the attendee goal and a 10.5% budget savings – has me looking forward to helping our clients achieve impressive results.”

Prior to joining Extension Media, Ms. Bixby was an independent senior events producer running her own company, EventBelle Productions. In 2014 and 2015, she managed all operations, budgets and the VIP program for The ConFab, the preeminent semiconductor manufacturing conference and networking event for leaders and decision-makers addressing the economics of semiconductor manufacturing.

About Extension Media
Extension Media is a privately held company operating more than 50 B2B magazines, engineers’ guides, email newsletters, web sites and conferences that focus on high-tech industry platforms and emerging technologies such as: chip design, semiconductor and electronics manufacturing, embedded systems, software, architectures and industry standards.

Extension Media produces industry leading events including The ConFab, the Internet of Things Developers Conference (IoT DevCon) and the Multicore Developers Conference (Multicore DevCon), and publishes Embedded Systems Engineering, EECatalog.com, Embedded Intel® Solutions, EmbeddedIntel.com, Chip Design, ChipDesignMag.com, Solid State Technology, Solid-State.com and SemiMD.com.

Extension Media Contacts
Vince Ridley
[email protected]
415-255-0390
Sally L. Bixby
[email protected]
503-705-8651

Jim Feldhan

The semiconductor industry has broken the $300 billion mark. One of the major driving forces in the foundry and overall semiconductor market is the end applications. Solid State Technology is excited to have Jim Feldhan, President of Semico Research, present data and analysis from Semico’s MAP model, which provides insight into semiconductor revenues, units and wafer demand by computing, communications and consumer end markets. The data indicates that all the growth is not necessarily occurring in the advanced technology high performance processor or memory arenas.

“Innovation has created specialized applications leading to growth in product segments such as power management, MEMs sensors and RF markets,” Feldhan writes in his abstract.

Jim will address the changes that are occurring and what is needed to support future growth on June 24, 2013 at The ConFab in Las Vegas.

Jim Feldhan founded Semico Research in 1994. A 20-year veteran of the semiconductor industry, he brings his management, forecasting and modeling expertise to Semico, along with a reputation of quality research. Feldhan designed and developed the research methodologies and report structures, which are the basis for Semico’s Custom Research and Portfolio Services. Feldhan also develops Semico’s overall economic outlook as well as performing various semiconductor consulting and forecasting. With a focus on quality, Semico Research has grown to the largest semiconductor-focused consulting and research firm.

For learn more or to register for The ConFab, visit The ConFab section of our website.

Devan Iyer, director of Semiconductor Packaging in Texas Instrument’s Manufacturing Group, has joined the advisory board of The ConFab, a conference and networking event hosted by Solid State Technology and PennWell, focused on the economics of semiconductor manufacturing. As Director of TI’s worldwide semiconductor packaging operations, Dr. Mahadevan "Devan" Iyer oversees a global team that drives a process to determine the packaging design and technologies that best meet the requirements of TI’s customers in measures of miniaturization, performance, cycle time and cost.

With more than 25 years of experience in microelectronics and packaging, Iyer is a recognized authority on packaging technologies. He has published more than 180 technical publications, has 28 patents to his credit and is a frequent invited speaker at industry meetings and conferences.

The ConFab has a long history of covering advanced packaging and 3D integration, and welcomes Dr. Iyer’s insights.

In 2013, The ConFab will be held June 23-26 at The Encore at The Wynn in Las Vegas.

Liam Madden of Xilinx, Inc. has joined the advisory board of The ConFab, Solid State Technology and PennWell’s event focused on the economics of semiconductor manufacturing. Liam is corporate vice president of FPGA Development and Silicon Technology at Xilinx. He has responsibility for FPGA design, Advanced Packaging (including Stacked Silicon Interconnect) and Foundry Technology.

Madden joined Xilinx in 2008, bringing more than 25 years experience in a range of design and technology leadership positions with Digital Equipment Corp., MIPS Technologies, Inc., Microsoft Corp. (XBOX Division), and AMD. 

Madden earned a BE from the University College Dublin and a MEng from Cornell University.  He holds five patents in the area of technology and circuit design.

Xilinx has been well represented at The ConFab in recent years, with Ivo Bolsens, CTO, speaking in 2011, and, in 2012, Xin Wu, Senior Director, Silicon Technology, and Sandeep Bharathi, Vice President of Engineering.

Liam joins representatives of two of the other major fabless companies already on the advisory board: Geoffrey Yeap, VP of Technology, Qualcomm Inc., and Abraham Yee, Director Advanced Technology & Package Development, Nvidia Corporation.

The ConFab is one of the few events that specifically addresses the growing importance of the fabless-foundry supply chain, and that emphasis will continue in 2013.

In 2013, The ConFab will be held June 23-26 at The Encore at The Wynn in Las Vegas.