Category Archives: Device Architecture

Littelfuse, Inc. (NASDAQ:LFUS) today announced the completion of its acquisition of IXYS Corporation (NASDAQ:IXYS). IXYS is a global pioneer in the power semiconductor market with a focus on medium- to high-voltage power semiconductors across the industrial, communications, consumer and medical device markets.

“Today marks a significant step forward in our company strategy to accelerate growth within the power control and industrial OEM markets,” said Dave Heinzmann, President and Chief Executive Officer of Littelfuse. “The combination of our companies brings together a broad power semiconductor portfolio, complementary technology expertise and a strong talent pool.”

The transaction is expected to be immediately accretive to adjusted EPS. Littelfuse expects to achieve more than $30 million of annualized cost savings within the first two years after closing. The combination is also expected to create significant revenue synergy opportunities longer term, given the companies’ complementary offerings and combined customer base.

In conjunction with the close of the transaction, IXYS founder Dr. Nathan Zommer has been appointed to the Littelfuse Board of Directors, increasing the size of the board to nine members.

With today’s transaction close, each former IXYS stockholder is entitled to receive, per IXYS share held immediately prior to the closing, either $23.00 in cash or 0.1265 of a share of Littelfuse common stock. In total, 50% of IXYS stock was converted into the cash consideration and 50% into the stock consideration.

Sales of analog ICs are expected to show the strongest growth rate among major integrated circuit market categories during the next five years, according to IC Insights’ new 2018 McClean Report, which becomes available this month.  The McClean Report forecasts that revenues for analog products—including both general purpose and application-specific devices—will increase by a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6.6% to $74.8 billion in 2022 from $54.5 billion in 2017.

The 2018 McClean Report separates the total IC market into four major product categories: analog, logic, memory, and microcomponents.  Figure 1 shows the forecasted 2017-2022 CAGRs of these product categories compared to the projected total IC market annual growth rate of 5.1% during the five-year period.

Figure 1

Figure 1

Analog ICs, the fastest growing major product category in the forecast, are a necessity within both very advanced systems and low-budget applications.  Components like power management analog devices help regulate power usage to keep devices running cooler and ultimately to help extend battery life in cellphones and other mobile/battery operated systems. The power management market is forecast to grow 8% in 2018 after increasing 12% in 2017.

In 2018, the automotive—application-specific analog market is forecast to increase 15% to be the fastest growing analog IC category, and the third-fastest growing of 33 IC product categories classified by WSTS. The growth of autonomous and electric vehicles and more electronic systems on board all new cars are expected to keep demand robust for automotive analog devices.

Communications and consumer applications continue to represent the biggest end-use applications for signal conversion analog ICs.  Signal conversion components (data converters, mixed-signal devices, etc.) are forecast to continue on fast-track growth with double-digit sales gains expected in three of the next five years.

After an extraordinary 58% sales spike in 2017, the memory market is forecast to return to more “normal” growth through the forecast.  The memory market is forecast to increase by a CAGR of 5.2% through 2022. New capacity for flash memory and, to a lesser extent for DRAM, should bring some relief from fast-rising ASPs and result in better supply-demand balance for these devices to support newer applications such as enterprise solid-state drives (SSDs), augmented and virtual reality, graphics, artificial intelligence, and other complex, real-time workload functions.

Meanwhile, growth in the microcomponent market (forecast CAGR of 3.9%) has cooled significantly due to weak shipments of standard PCs (desktops and notebooks).  Tablet sales have also slowed and weighed down total microcomponent sales. With the exception of the 32-bit MCU market, annual sales gains in most microcomponent segments are forecast to remain in the low- to mid single digit range through 2022.

IC Insights forecasts the total IC market will increase by a CAGR of 5.1% from 2017-2022.  Following the 22% increase in 2017, the total IC market is forecast to grow 8% in 2018 to $393.9 billion and then continue on an upward trend to reach $466.8 billion in 2022, the final year of the forecast.

Worldwide semiconductor revenue totalled $419.7 billion in 2017, a 22.2 percent increase from 2016, according to preliminary results by Gartner, Inc. Undersupply helped drive 64 percent revenue growth in the memory market, which accounted for 31 percent of total semiconductor revenue in 2017.

“The largest memory supplier, Samsung Electronics, gained the most market share and took the No. 1 position from Intel — the first time Intel has been toppled since 1992,” said Andrew Norwood, research vice president at Gartner. “Memory accounted for more than two-thirds of all semiconductor revenue growth in 2017, and became the largest semiconductor category.”

The key driver behind the booming memory revenue was higher prices due to a supply shortage. NAND flash prices increased year over year for the first time ever, up 17 percent, while DRAM prices rose 44 percent.

Equipment companies could not absorb these price increases so passed them onto consumers, making everything from PCs to smartphones more expensive in 2017.

Other major memory vendors, including SK Hynix and Micron Technology, also performed strongly in 2017 and rose in the rankings (see Table 1).

 

2017 Rank

2016 Rank

Vendor

2017 Revenue

2017 Market Share (%)

2016 Revenue

2016-2017 Growth (%)

1

2

Samsung Electronics

61,215

14.6

40,104

52.6

2

1

Intel

57,712

13.8

54,091

6.7

3

4

SK Hynix

26,309

6.3

14,700

79.0

4

6

Micron Technology

23,062

5.5

12,950

78.1

5

3

Qualcomm

17,063

4.1

15,415

10.7

6

5

Broadcom

15,490

3.7

13,223

17.1

7

7

Texas Instruments

13,806

3.3

11,901

16.0

8

8

Toshiba

12,813

3.1

9,918

29.2

9

17

Western Digital

9,181

2.2

4,170

120.2

10

9

NXP

8,651

2.1

9,306

-7.0

Others

174,418

41.6

157,736

10.6

Total Market

419,720

100.0

343,514

22.2

Source: Gartner (January 2018)

Second-placed Intel grew its revenue 6.7 percent in 2017, driven by 6 percent growth in data center processor revenue due to demand from cloud and communications service providers. Intel’s PC processor revenue grew more slowly at 1.9 percent, but average PC prices are on the rise again after years of decline following the market’s shift from traditional desktops toward two-in-one and ultramobile devices.

The current rankings may not last long, however, “Samsung’s lead is literally built on sand, in the form of memory silicon,” said Mr. Norwood. “Memory pricing will weaken in 2018, initially for NAND flash and then DRAM in 2019 as China increases its memory production capacity. We then expect Samsung to lose a lot of the revenue gains it has made.”

2017 was a relatively quiet year for mergers and acquisitions. Qualcomm’s acquisition of NXP was one big deal that was expected to close in 2017, but did not. Qualcomm still plans to complete the deal in 2018, but this has now been complicated by Broadcom’s attempted takeover of Qualcomm.

“The combined revenues of Broadcom, Qualcomm and NXP were $41.2 billion in 2017 — a total beaten only by Samsung and Intel,” said Mr. Norwood. “If Broadcom can finalize this double acquisition and Samsung’s memory revenue falls as forecast, then Samsung could slip to third place during the next memory downturn in 2019.”

Luc Van den Hove, president and CEO of imec

Luc Van den Hove, president and CEO of imec

SEMI today announced that Luc Van den hove, president and CEO of imec, has been selected as the 2018 recipient of the SEMI Sales and Marketing Excellence Award, inspired by Bob Graham. He will be honored for outstanding achievement in semiconductor equipment and materials marketing during ceremonies at ISS 2018 on January 17 in Half Moon Bay, California.

Van den hove will receive the 21st SEMI Sales and Marketing Excellence Award for his contributions and leadership in consortia that made the imec model of collaborative research using pooled infrastructure self-sustaining. The model enables companies of all sizes and position in the value chain to participate in collaborative research that advances industry technology.

Inspired by the power of technology to improve lives, Van den hove transformed research from its focus on participation cost to an emphasis on collaboration to produce greater value. Under his leadership, imec brings together brilliant minds from established companies, startups and academia worldwide to work in a creative and stimulating environment with imec serving as their trusted partner. imec’s international research and development drives innovations in nanoelectronics and digital technologies by leveraging its world-class infrastructure and local and global ecosystem of diverse partners to accelerate progress towards a connected, sustainable future. Van den hove joined imec in 1984 and has led the technology innovation hub since 2009.

“Luc Van den hove is recognized both for his innovative marketing leadership and his resolve to deepen industry collaboration for the common good. Today, SEMI and its membership honor Van den hove for his contributions to the success of the semiconductor manufacturing industry,” said Ajit Manocha, president and CEO of SEMI.

The SEMI Sales and Marketing Excellence Award was inspired by the late Bob Graham, the distinguished semiconductor industry leader, who was a member of the founding team of Intel. Graham also helped establish industry-leading companies such as Applied Materials and Novellus Systems. The Award was established to honor individuals for the creation and/or implementation of marketing programs that enhance customer satisfaction and further the growth of the semiconductor equipment and materials industry.

Eligible candidates are nominated by their industry peers and selected after due diligence by an award committee. Previous recipients of this SEMI award include: Toshio Maruyama (2017), Jim Bowen (2016), Terry (Tetsuro) Higashi (2015), Winfried Kaiser (2014), Joung Cho (JC) Kim (2013), G. Dan Hutcheson (2012), Franz Janker (2011), Martin van den Brink (2010), Peter Hanley (2009), Richard Hong (2008), Richard E. Dyck (2007), Aubrey (Bill) C. Tobey (2006), Archie Hwang (2005), Edward Braun (2004), Shigeru (Steve) Nakayama (2003), Jerry Hutcheson and Ed Segal (2002), Jim Healy and Barry Rapozo (2001), and Art Zafiropoulo (2000).

By David W. Price, Douglas G. Sutherland and Jay Rathert

Author’s Note: The Process Watch series explores key concepts about process control—defect inspection, metrology and data analysis—for the semiconductor industry. This article is the first in a five-part series on semiconductors in the automotive industry. In this article, we introduce some of the challenges involved in the automotive supply chain. Future articles in the series will address specific process control solutions to those challenges.

In the 1950s less than 1% of the total cost of manufacturing a car was comprised of electronics. Today that cost can be more than 35% of the total and it is expected to increase to 50% by the year 2030.1 The rapid increase in the use of electronics in the automotive industry has been driven by four main areas:

  1. Systems monitoring and control (electronic fuel injection, gas-electric hybrids, etc.)
  2. Safety (anti-lock brakes, air bags, etc.)
  3. Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (lane departure warning, parking assist, blind spot monitoring, adaptive cruise control, etc.)
  4. Convenience (satellite navigation, infotainment, etc.)

Semiconductor components are at the core of the electronics integrated in cars, and depending on the make and model, a modern car may require as many as 8000 chips.2 This number will only increase as autonomous driving gains popularity – additional electronic subsystems with their underlying ICs will power the sensors, radar and AI needed for driverless cars.

With over 88 million cars and light trucks produced every year,3 each with thousands of chips, the influence of the automotive industry on semiconductor manufacturing is starting to take hold. There is one simple fact about these thousands of chips found in a car: they cannot fail. Reliability is absolutely critical for automotive semiconductor components. Any chip that fails in the field can result in costly warranty repairs and recalls, can damage the image of the automaker’s brand – or at the extreme, can result in personal injury or even loss of life.

If the average car contains 5000 chips and the automaker produces 25,000 cars per day, then even a chip failure rate at the parts per million (ppm) level will result in more than 125 cars per day that experience reliability issues as a result of chip quality. With semiconductors as the top issue on automakers’ failure Pareto,4 Tier 1 automotive system suppliers are now demanding parts per billion (ppb) levels of semiconductor quality with an increasing trend toward a maximum number of “total allowable failure events” regardless of volume. Current methods for finding reliability failures are overly dependent on test and burn-in, and as a result, the quality targets are missed by orders of magnitude. Increasingly, challenging audit standards are pushing for reliability failures to be found at their source in the fab, where costs of discovery and corrective action are the lowest. To enter this growing market segment – or simply maintain share – IC manufacturers must aggressively address this inflection in chip reliability requirements.

Fortunately for semiconductor manufacturers, chip reliability is highly correlated to something they know very well: random defectivity.5 In fact, for a well-designed process and product, early-life chip reliability issues (extrinsic reliability) are dominated by random defectivity.6-12 A killer defect (one that impacts yield) is a defect that causes the device to fail at time t = 0 (final test). A latent defect (one that impacts chip reliability) is a defect that causes the device to fail at t > 0 (after burn-in). The relationship between killer defects (yield) and latent defects (reliability) stems from the observation that the same defect types that impact yield also impact reliability. The two are distinguished primarily by their size and where they occur on the device structure. Figure 1 shows examples of killer and latent defects that result in open and short circuits.

Figure 1

Figure 1. The same defect types that impact yield also affect reliability. They are distinguished primarily by their size and where they occur on the device’s pattern structure.

The relationship between yield and reliability defects is not limited to a few specific defect types; any defect type that can cause yield loss is also a reliability concern. Failure analysis indicates that the majority of reliability defects are, in fact, process-related defects that originate in the fab. Because yield and reliability defects share the same root cause, increasing yield (by reducing yield-related defects) will have the additional benefit of improving reliability.

The yellow line in figure 2 shows a typical yield curve. If we only consider chip yield, then at some point, further investment in this process may not be cost-effective and thus the yield tends to level off as time progresses. The blue dashed line in figure 2 shows the curve for the same fab making the same product. However, if they want to supply the automotive industry then they must also account for the costs of poor reliability. In this case further investment is warranted to drive down defect density even further, which will both increase yield and deliver the improved reliability required for automotive suppliers.

Figure 2. Yield curves (Yield versus Time) for different fab types. The yellow line is for non-automotive fabs where the major consideration is fab profitability. At some point the yield is high enough that it is no longer practical to continue trying to drive down defectivity. The blue dashed line is the yield curve that also factors in reliability. For IC products used in the automotive supply chain additional investment must be made to ensure high reliability, which is strongly correlated to yield.

Figure 2. Yield curves (Yield versus Time) for different fab types. The yellow line is for non-automotive fabs where the major consideration is fab profitability. At some point the yield is high enough that it is no longer practical to continue trying to drive down defectivity. The blue dashed line is the yield curve that also factors in reliability. For IC products used in the automotive supply chain additional investment must be made to ensure high reliability, which is strongly correlated to yield.

The change from being a consumer-grade chip supplier to an automotive supplier requires a paradigm shift at the fab management level. Successful semiconductor manufacturers who supply the automotive industry have long adopted the following strategy: The best way to reduce the possibility of latent (reliability) defects is to reduce the fab’s overall random defectivity levels. This means having a world class defect reduction strategy:

  1. Higher baseline yields
  2. Lower incidence of excursions
  3. When excursions do occur, quickly find and fix them inline
  4. Ink out suspicious die using die-level screening

 

These and other strategies will be addressed in forthcoming articles in this Process Watch automotive series.

 

About the Authors:

 

Dr. David W. Price and Jay Rathert are Senior Directors at KLA-Tencor Corp. Dr. Douglas Sutherland is a Principal Scientist at KLA-Tencor Corp. Over the last 15 years, they have worked directly with over 50 semiconductor IC manufacturers to help them optimize their overall process control strategy for a variety of specific markets, including automotive reliability, legacy fab cost and risk optimization, and advanced design rule time-to-market BKMs. The Process Watch series of articles attempts to summarize some of the universal lessons they have observed through these engagements.

 

References:

 

  1. https://www.statista.com/statistics/277931/automotive-electronics-cost-as-a-share-of-total-car-cost-worldwide/
  2. Senftleben and Froehlich, Aspects of Semiconductor Quality from an OEM Perspective, April 2017.
  3. http://www.businessinsider.com/2016-was-a-record-breaking-year-for-global-car-sales-and-it-was-almost-entirely-driven-by-china-2017-1
  4. https://www.consumerreports.org/car-reliability-owner-satisfaction/consumer-reports-car-reliability-survey-2017/
  5. Price and Sutherland, “Process Watch: The Most Expensive Defect, Part 2,” Solid State Technology, July 2015.
  6. Riordan et al., “Microprocessor Reliability Performance as a Function of Die Location for a .25um, Five Layer Metal CMOS Logic Process,” 37th Annual International Reliability Physics Symposium Proceedings (1999): 1-11. http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/RELPHY.1999.761584
  7. Barnett et al., “Extending Integrated-Circuit Yield Models to Estimate Early-Life Reliability,” IEEE Transactions on Reliability, Vol. 52, No. 3., 2003.
  8. Shirley, “A Defect Model of Reliability,” 33rd Annual International Reliability Symposium, Las Vegas, NV, 1995.
  9. Kim et al., “On the Relationship of Semiconductor Yield and Reliability,” IEEE Transactions on Semiconductor Manufacturing, Vol. 18, No. 3, 2005.
  10. Roesch, “Reliability Experience,” Published lecture #12 for Quality and Reliability Engineering ECE 510 at Portland State University, 2013. http://web.cecs.pdx.edu/~cgshirl/Quality%20and%20Reliability%20Engineering.htm
  11. Shirley and Johnson, “Defect Models of Yield and Reliability,” Published lecture #13 for Quality and Reliability Engineering ECE 510 course at Portland State University, 2013. http://web.cecs.pdx.edu/~cgshirl/Quality%20and%20Reliability%20Engineering.htm
  12. Kuper et al., “Relation between Yield and Reliability of Integrated Circuits: Experimental results and Application to Continuous Early Failure Rate Reduction Programs,” Proceedings of the International Reliability Physics Symposium (1996): 17-21.

By Emir Demircan, Senior Manager Advocacy and Public Policy, SEMI Europe

Electronic manufacturing is becoming cool to today’s youth. STEM skills are hot in the global job market – though the number of females pursuing a STEM education continues to lag. Work-based learning is key to mastering new technologies. And the electronics industry needs a global talent pipeline more than ever.

These were key highlights from a SEMI Member Forum in December that brought together industry representatives and students in Dresden to weigh in on job-skills challenges facing the electronics manufacturers and solutions for the industry to consider. Here are the takeaways:

1) Electronics is much more than manufacturing

For many years, working in the manufacturing industry was not an appealing prospect for millennials. This picture is certainly changing. The pivotal role of electronics manufacturing in helping solve grand societal challenges in areas such as the environment, healthcare and urban mobility is reaffirmed by countries around the world. Electronics is the lifeblood of game-changing technologies such as autonomous driving, AI, IoT, and VR/AR, enticing more young employees into careers in research, design, technology development, production, cyber security and international business, and in disciplines ranging from engineering and data analytics to software development and cyber security.

What’s more, the drudgery of many factory jobs is disappearing thanks to automation, digitization and robotization. According to CEDEFOP, the European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training, low-skilled jobs in electro-engineering and machine operations/assembly in the European Union (EU) is projected to decrease 6.98 percent and 2.03 percent, respectively, between 2015 and 2025.

In parallel, the industry will need more high-skilled workers. For instance, within the same period, CEDEFOP forecasts a 12.51 percent increase in jobs for EU researchers and engineers. Soft skills will see high demand too. As the electronics industry continues to globalize and drive the integration of vertical technologies, workers proficient in communicating in an international environment, leading multicultural teams, developing tailor-made solutions and making data-driven decisions will see higher demand.

2) STEM skills will remain under the spotlight

Continuous innovation is the oxygen of the electronics manufacturing industry, powering the development of highly customized solutions by workers with technical expertise in chemistry, materials, design, mechanics, production and many other fields. In addition, capabilities such as smart manufacturing require workers with growing technical sophistication in areas such as software, information and communications technology (ICT) and data analytics, stiffening the challenge the electronics industry faces in finding skilled workers. Little wonder that employers in Europe struggle to build a workforce with the right technical expertise. The findings of the study “Encouraging STEM Studies for the Labour Market” conducted by the European Parliament underscores the difficulty of hiring enough workers with adequate STEM skills:

  • The proportion of STEM students is not rising at the European level and the underrepresentation of women persists.
  • Businesses are expected to produce about 7 million new STEM jobs, an uptick of 8 percent, between 2013 and 2025 in Europe.

3) The women-in-tech gap is becoming more persistent 

The global manufacturing industry suffers from strikingly low female participation in STEM education and careers. According to UNSECO, in Europe and North America, the number of female graduates in STEM is generally low. For instance, women make up just 19 percent of engineers in Germany and the U.S. The European Parliament study confirms that STEM employment remains stubbornly male-dominated, with women filling just 24 percent of science and engineering jobs and 15 percent of science and engineering associate positions in Europe. According to an article by Guardian, a mere 16 percent of computer science undergraduates in the United Kingdom and the U.S. are female. This yawning gender gap is a deep concern for electronics manufacturing companies in Europe, hampering innovation in a sector that relies heavily on diversity and inclusion and shrinks the talent pipeline critical to remaining competitive.

4) Coping with new technologies: work-based learning is the key

The evolution of the electronics industry since the 1980s has been swift. PCs emerged largely as islands of communication, then became networked. Networking bred the proliferation of social platforms and mobile devices and, today, is giving rise to IoT. Education curricula in Europe, however, have not matured at the same pace, opening a gap between the worlds of industry and education and imposing a formidable school-to-work transition for many young graduates. Work-based learning, which helps students develop the knowledge and practical job skills needed by business, is one solution. The industry reports that work-based learning is vital to remaining competitive in the long run. Innovative dual-learning programmes, apprenticeships and industrial master’s and doctorates are shining examples that are already paying off in some parts of Europe. Such work-based learning models can be extended as a common pillar of education in Europe.

5) A global industry needs a global talent pipeline

The electronics value chain workforce needs an international and multicultural talent pipeline, chiefly spanning the U.S., Europe and Asia. However, many European manufacturers, in particular small and medium enterprises (SMEs), report that building an international workforce remains a challenge due to employment and immigration law barriers as well as cultural and linguistic differences. The EU’s Blue Card initiative, designed to facilitate hiring beyond Europe, is a step in the right direction. Nevertheless, with the exception of Germany, EU member states have made little or no use of the EU Blue Card scheme.

SEMI drives sector-wide initiatives on workforce development

Understanding the urgency, SEMI is accelerating its workforce development activities at global level. Contributing to this initiative, the SEMI talent pipeline Forum in Dresden served as an effective platform for the industry to share its challenges and opportunities with students at various education levels. Led by industry representatives, the sessions enabled the exchange of workforce-development best practices and paved the way for further collaboration among industry, academia and government in Europe. For example, in the Career Café session, students networked with hiring managers. Other workforce development initiatives include:

To help position the skills challenges faced by SEMI members high on the public policy agenda, SEMI in 2017 joined several policy groups including Digital Skills and Jobs Coalition and Expert Group on High-Tech Skills. Last year SEMI also launched Women in Tech, an initiative that convenes industry leaders to help increase female representation in the sector. SEMI also educates its members about key EU resources such as the Blue Card and Digital Opportunity Internship programmes aimed at hiring international talent. In 2018, SEMI will reach out to even more young people through its High Tech U programme to raise awareness of careers in electronics. SEMICON Europa 2018 will host dedicated talent pipeline sessions to help the industry tackle its skills challenges. ISS Europe 2018 sessions on Gaining, Training and Retaining World Class Talent will disseminate best practices to the wider industry. Also this year, SEMI Europe plans to start a new advisory group, “Workforce 4.0,” dedicated to bringing together human resources leaders in the sector to give the electronics manufacturing industry a stronger voice on workforce development.

 

ON Semiconductor (Nasdaq: ON) has announced a strategic collaboration with ConvenientPower Systems (CPS) whereby CPS will design, develop and market in-vehicle wireless charging solutions using ON Semiconductor’s NCV6500 application dedicated, power management controller.

The combined initiative is based around a single architecture that is scalable for multiple devices and coils to 15 W. A novel and patented technique for Foreign Object Detection (FOD) ensures safe operation, while the broad charging field provides a true “drop-and-charge” experience for users.

ON Semiconductor’s NCV6500 power management controller provides the essential building block for inductive charging that is compliant with both Qi and PMA standards. Operating from a single 5 V supply, the NCV6500 includes five differential and single-ended operational amplifiers, as well as two comparators with hysteresis and deglitch.

Based upon full NMOS H-bridge drivers, the NCV6500 has on-chip clock generation, including phase shifting and duty cycle control. The device also incorporates significant and important protection features such as coil voltage sense, bridge current sense, and over voltage and over current protection.

Commenting on the announcement, Majid Kafi, Senior Director and General Manager of System Power Solutions at ON Semiconductor, said: “ON Semiconductor has invested heavily in wireless charging, especially in multi-protocol solutions around the 15 W sweet spot within this market. Through this collaboration with CPS we will merge our significant energy efficiency expertise and strength in ASICs with CPS’s system knowledge to provide a total solution that is very firmly focused on meeting the exacting needs of the automotive sector. More than just an ASIC, our solution will combine best-in-class FOD, authentication and firmware support.”

“Integration of in-vehicle wireless power requires a proven track record of technology innovation and safety performance,” said Camille Tang, President, ConvenientPower Systems. “We are delighted that together with ON Semiconductor’s leadership in chip technology, production and distribution, we accelerate further integration and optimization of automotive wireless charging platform performance.”

Combined coil module (Qi) simulation and preliminary sampling, as well as a comprehensive evaluation board, are expected to be available from January 2018 to further simplify the rapid development of wireless charging applications.

A demonstration of the NCV6500 wireless charging technology will be available at ON Semiconductor’s demo room (Venetian 3302) at the 2018 Consumer Electronics Show, January 9–12 in Las Vegas, NV.

Arrow Electronics, Inc. (NYSE:ARW) announced today the successful completion of its acquisition of eInfochips, one of the world’s largest design and managed services companies.

eInfochips is headquartered in San Jose, Calif., with locations in India and Europe, and has 1,500 IoT solution architects, engineers, and software development resources globally. eInfochips’ breadth of capabilities spans chip design, to product and IoT solution delivery, and across many industries, from retail and consumer, to industrial automation, healthcare, and aerospace.

Arrow Electronics (www.arrow.com) is a global provider of products, services and solutions to industrial and commercial users of electronic components and enterprise computing solutions. Arrow serves as a supply channel partner for more than 125,000 original equipment manufacturers, contract manufacturers and commercial customers through a global network of more than 465 locations in 90 countries.

GLOBALFOUNDRIES and STMicroelectronics (NYSE: STM) today announced that ST has selected GF’s 22nm FD-SOI (22FDX) technology platform to support its next-generation of processor solutions for industrial and consumer applications.

After deploying the industry’s first 28nm FD-SOI technology platform, ST is extending its commitment and roadmap by adopting GF’s production-ready 22FDX process and ecosystem to deliver second-generation FD-SOI solutions for the intelligent systems of tomorrow.

“FD-SOI is ideally suited for cost-sensitive applications requiring significant processing and connectivity capabilities at lower power consumption,” said Joël Hartmann, Executive Vice President, Digital Front-End Manufacturing and Technology, STMicroelectronics. “The cost-effective performance and best-in-class energy efficiency benefits of GF’s 22FDX platform, coupled with ST’s extensive design experience and IP base in FD-SOI, will enable our customers with unparalleled value for power, performance and cost. We are relying on GF’s Dresden site for manufacturing products using this technology.”

“ST has established a strong track record with FD-SOI technology,” said Alain Mutricy, senior vice president of product management at GF. “The addition of GF’s 22FDX platform, coupled with ST’s long history of pioneering new technologies and products, will enable the two companies to deliver differentiated FD-SOI products at the 22nm node.”

As a complementary path to FinFETs, GF’s versatile FDX platform offers the ability to integrate digital, analog, and RF functions onto a single chip, which allows customers to design intelligent and fully-integrated system solutions. The technology is uniquely suited for chips that require performance on demand and energy efficiency at the lowest solution cost, making it ideal for a broad range of applications, from intelligent clients and wireless connectivity to artificial intelligence and smart vehicles.

Semtech Corporation (Nasdaq:SMTC), a supplier of high performance analog and mixed-signal semiconductors and advanced algorithms, announced its next generation LoRa devices and wireless radio frequency (RF) technology (LoRa Technology) chipsets enabling innovative LPWAN use cases for consumers with its advanced technology. Addressing the need for cost-effective and reliable sensor-to-cloud connectivity in any type of RF environment, the new features and capabilities will significantly improve the performance and capability of Internet of Things (IoT) sensor applications that demand ultra-low power, small form factor and long range wireless connectivity with a shortened product development cycle.

The next generation LoRa radios extends Semtech’s link budget by 20% with a 50% reduction in receiver current (4.5 mA) and a high power +22 dBm option. This extends battery life of LoRa-based sensors up to 30%, which reduces the frequency of battery replacement. The extended connectivity range, with the ability to reach deep indoor and outdoor sensor locations, will create new markets as different types of verticals integrate LoRa Technology in their IoT applications including healthcare and pharmaceuticals, media and advertising, logistics/shipping, and asset tracking.

In addition, the new platform has a command interface that simplifies radio configuration and shortens the development cycle, needing only 10 lines of code to transmit or receive a packet, which will allow users to focus on applications. The small footprint, 45% less than the current generation, is highly configurable to meet different application requirements utilizing the global LoRaWAN open standard. The chipsets also supports FSK modulation to allow compatibility with legacy protocols that are migrating to the LoRaWAN™ open protocol for all the performance benefits LoRa Technology provides.

“LPWAN IoT applications are going through a massive transformation, shifting from trials to large deployments in smart cities, buildings, healthcare, logistics, and agriculture,” said Marc Pegulu, Vice President and General Manager for Semtech’s Wireless and Sensing Products Group. “LoRa Technology enables an infinite amount of IoT use cases as Semtech pushes for the last mile of connectivity and reinforces its position as the defacto platform for LPWAN.”