03/17/2005  March 17, 2005 - Therma-Wave Inc. has announced that a leading Taiwanese DRAM semiconductor manufacturer has selected multiple Therma-Wave metrology solutions for use in its 300mm factory. The multimillion dollar order includes multiple Opti-Probe 7341 thin film metrology tools with real-time, critical-dimension capability for use in 90nm technology node production, extendible to 65nm development work. The order also includes a Therma-Probe 630XP tool for ion implant metrology.

03/15/2005  (March 15, 2005) Cleveland — Keithley Instruments has received a repeat multiple-system order for its S680 DC/RF Parametric Test Systems from Icheon, Korea-based Hynix Semiconductor Inc.

03/10/2005 

03/09/2005 

03/01/2005  Having been involved in the iNEMI roadmaps, recent workshops organized by the NNI, SRC and NSF, and discussions with semiconductor and packaging folk, it’s apparent that the semiconductor folks have figured out what’s going to happen in the next 10 years.

02/16/2005  February 16, 2005 - Samsung Electronics said Tuesday it will launch what it claims is the world's first commercial production of 70nm design rule-applied 4-gigabit NAND flash memory chips next month, reported the Korea Times. The chip vendor will also kick-start its first 300mm wafer flash memory production line in July.

02/15/2005  By Paula Doe, Contributing Editor

After all these years of hype, vertical interconnects are finally starting to replace horizontal connections in real products. Infineon is directly connecting security controller chips on top of memory chips in smart cards.

02/09/2005  February 9, 2005 - Mattson Technology Inc. has received orders for its Helios RTP system from a Taiwanese memory manufacturer to be put in its recently constructed 300mm fab in Hsin Chu. The Helios systems, scheduled to begin shipment in FH05, will be used to manufacture sub-100nm devices, including SDRAMs and DDR SDRAMs.

02/08/2005  February 8, 2005 - Toshiba Corp. and SanDisk Corp. have unveiled an 8Gbit NAND flash memory chip fabricated with 70nm process technologies, with read speeds of 60MB/sec, 40% faster than the previous generation.

02/08/2005  February 8, 2005 - A group of chipmakers have banded together to streamline system-level memory validation and test by defining a single board-level interface standard for using various memory devices on multiple development platforms.

01/25/2005 

01/21/2005  Youm Huh, MagnaChip Semiconductor Ltd., Cheongju, Korea

October marked the official launch of MagnaChip Semiconductor Ltd., South Korea's $1 billion semiconductor company and a milestone for the Korean chip industry. MagnaChip is the first major Korean integrated device manufacturer (IDM) to focus solely on value-added, nonmemory semiconductor products. Competing in such sectors is critical for continued advancement and profitability of Korea's semiconductor industry.

01/21/2005  High-volume production of standard devices that have a long lifetime, such as DRAMs, continues to move towards Southeast Asia. However, in other regions there is a growing need for very flexible "minifabs" that can be rapidly and economically set up to make low-volume products that have very short lifetimes.

01/21/2005  Marco Mora, SMIC, Shanghai, China

Not long ago, China's leading-edge IC manufacturing capability lagged behind the rest of the world by two or more generations. However, in part due to new wafer fab investments and the Chinese government's efforts to promote the domestic semiconductor industry's development through strategic long-term planning and supportive policies, the past decade has seen China gaining ground rapidly in terms of technology and IC manufacturing capabilities.

01/21/2005  Brian Dance, Contributing Editor (Europe) Illustrating the need to ensure European technological and industrial competitiveness in the nanoelectronic sector as essential for industrial and economic growth, the MEDEA+ (Microelectronics Development for European Applications) annual forum in Paris (Nov. 23-24) revealed successes of many pan-European collaborative projects carried out under its umbrella.

01/17/2005  January 17, 2005 - Hynix Semiconductor and Taiwan's ProMOS Technologies have finally signed a strategic alliance agreement to jointly produce DRAM chips using 300mm wafer processing technology, according to the Korea Times. Under the agreement, Hynix will share its DRAM semiconductor processing technology and ProMOS will provide foundry service at its 300mm wafer plant in Taiwan.

01/14/2005  January 14, 2005 - Samsung Electronics Co. said Thursday it has begun shipping its multichip packages to Japanese electronics giant Sony Corp. for use in PlayStation Portable game consoles, reports Asia Pulse Pte.

01/13/2005 

01/11/2005  January 11, 2005 - Samsung Electronics yesterday announced it has developed chip packaging technology that enables it to stack eight bare memory chips in an ultra-slim single multichip package (MCP), said the Korea Times. The company's MCP technology integrates combinations of eight flash memory and random access memory (RAM) chips into a tiny 11 x 14 x 1.4mm chip package.

01/04/2005  By Dr. Paula Doe, Contributing Editor
After all these years of hype, vertical interconnects are finally starting to replace horizontal connections in real products. Infineon is directly connecting security controller chips on top of memory chips in smart cards. Mattel's new Juice Box* media player for kids uses Matrix Semiconductor's built up layers of programmable ROM for its videos on memory cards. And Tezzaron....