European Unions Media Program

01/01/1998

European Union`s Medea program

The European Union (EU) recently released details of a research program to focus European chipmaking skills in areas where EU companies are already competitive with Japan and the US. The Microelectronics Development for European Applications program, Medea, includes 45 projects and is budgeted at 2 billion Ecus (US$2.3 billion). Medea is targeted at six core areas where Europe is strong. Three are application areas - multimedia, communications, and automotive - and three cover the technologies needed to make next-generation chips - design techniques and libraries, CMOS-based technology platforms, and manufacturing technologies.

Intended to run for four years, the project began in January, 1997, but officials only recently announced the winners from among 125 proposals. National governments must match the contributions of their companies on a dollar-for-dollar basis. The most ambitious project aims to create the process equipment for 300-mm wafers, and involves some 14 EU companies. Another project, backed by Philips, SGS-Thomson, and Siemens, involves 0.25-micron CMOS technology and is aimed at system-on-a-chip applications in mobile communications and multimedia. Other projects target chipsets for modems and a single-chip product for handling smart card transactions in payment processing terminals.