02/03/2010 

The move to the 2Xnm NAND flash node gives Intel and Micron a big step ahead of competitors in terms of cost and pricing, an advantage they will likely ride out as profit instead of squeezing prices further, according to an analyst.

02/02/2010 

Breaking down the quarterly numbers and forecasts from top chip spenders TSMC and Samsung, analysts determine the main thrust is that the anticipated spending cycle isn't peaking in 1H10 after all, and could instead become heavier in 2H10 and spill into 2011.

01/27/2010 

After slow adoption, 2009 became "the year of the e-reader." Semico Research's Michell Prunty breaks down the rise of e-readers and the technology inside them, and what new functionalities, content, and technology are next.

01/22/2010 

ASM exec Shawn Thomas explains to SST how the company's new PowerFill process, which enables void-free filling of deep trenches with doped, epitaxial silicon, addresses needs for smaller die sizes and on-state resistance of power management devices.

01/12/2010 

After quickly moving to work down bloated inventories amid the onset of the 2009 industry slowdown, global semiconductor suppliers are seen with lean stockpiles heading into 1Q10, according to data from iSuppli Corp.

01/10/2010 

01/10/2010 

01/10/2010 

01/06/2010 

Scientists at the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) are asking industry to come up with new ways of designing integrated circuits for affordable, low-volume nanofabrication for US Department of Defense (DOD) applications.

01/04/2010 

Hui-Jung Wu, et al., from Novellus discuss process developments and mechanisms of improving electromigration reliability, a growing concern for copper interconnects at advanced technology nodes.

01/04/2010 

Toshiba and Elpida Memory are opening their wallets again to increase capacity as demand rises, and also keep pace with market-leading Samsung, according to a local report.

12/31/2009 

Silicon circuit board (SiCB) technology allows bare-die FPGAs, CPUs, and memory to be placed together on a single silicon substrate. Embedded computing modules using SiCB offer better performance than FR-4 material -- notably 22% reduced power consumption in a typical system, reports David Blaker from siXis Inc.

12/14/2009 

NEC Electronics disclosed two areas of work at the International Electron Devices Meeting (IEDM): a low-resistance copper interconnects with partially thickened local structure (PTL) to address resisitivity increases (and thus RF performance) in analog conductors, and high-threshold voltage-control gallium nitride (GaN) power transistors on a silicon substrate.

12/14/2009 

The latest semiconductor capital spending forecast from Gartner solidifies the 2009 outlook with another positive bump-up, and the firm sees the climate significantly improving for almost all sectors well into the future. Gartner research VP Dean Freeman helps SST break down some of the numbers.

12/10/2009 

SUSS MicroTec will collaborate with SEMATECH’s FEP device and reliability experts to investigate complex semiconductor probing and measurement solutions for next-generation semiconductor and emerging technologies.

12/09/2009 

Mike Mayberry, VP of Intel's technology and manufacturing group, offers SST a summary of the company's presentations at this week's International Electron Devices Meeting (IEDM) in Baltimore focused on using III-V materials in leading-edge transistors, with some record-breaking achievements in drive current and peak transconductance.

12/09/2009 

At this week's International Electronics Devices Meeting (IEDM) in Baltimore, Toshiba has disclosed a new process step that can push bulk CMOS to the 20nm node; and the first fabrication with verified stable performance of a spintronics-based MOSFET cell.

12/08/2009 

At this week's International Electron Devices Meeting (IEDM), IMEC has debuted a new GaN-on-Si double heterostructure field-effect transistor (FET) device offering low leakage and high breakdown voltage to help reduce power loss in high-power switching applications.

12/08/2009 

Scaling will continue to follow the Moore's Law pace and will continue to rely on silicon to the 11nm node and beyond, although the emergence of fully depleted devices will disrupt device architectures, predicted Ghavam Shahidi from IBM research division, in a talk at this week's International Electron Devices Meeting (IEDM).

12/07/2009 

Speaking at the International Electron Devices Meeting (IEDM) in Baltimore, IMEC’s Thomas Hoffman outlined challenges and possible options of high-k metal-gate (HKMG) transistor stack materials and processes for future device generations.