03/28/2013 

The long-expected demise of optical lithography for manufacturing ICs has been delayed again, even though the technology itself has reached a plateau with a numerical aperture of 1.35 and an exposure wavelength of 193nm. Immersion lithography is planned for the 20/22nm node, and with the continued delay of EUV, is now the plan of record for 14nm.

03/22/2013 

Over the past five years, revenue dipped and spiked from the impact of the global recession; in the five years to come, increased offshoring will detract from the growth in global demand from an improved economy.

03/22/2013 

ChipStart LLC, a provider of semiconductor intellectual property (SIP), and DELTA Microelectronics, a provider of ASIC services for the semiconductor industry, announced a new joint venture this week.

03/21/2013 

Researchers sponsored by Semiconductor Research Corporation (SRC), a university-research consortium for semiconductors and related technologies, today announced development of a modeling process designed to simulate atomic-level etching with chemicals that are effective alternatives to widely used perfluorocarbon (PFC) gases.

03/21/2013 

Zvi Or-Bach, President & CEO of MonolithIC 3D Inc. and Benjamin S. Louie of Zeno Semiconductor blog about dimensional scaling as it relates to EUV and future per transistor device cost.

03/21/2013 

Most electronic systems that power our digital life are inflexible and flat. Rigid electronic designs work for our computers and phones but not for our bodies. Humans are soft and curved. Electronic systems capable of bending, twisting, and stretching have great potential for applications in which conventional, stiff semiconductor microelectronics would not suffice.

03/20/2013 

Brion Technologies, a division of ASML, announced a major milestone today in its partnership with GLOBALFOUNDRIES. The companies are collaborating to deliver high-volume computational lithography capabilities for 28 nm and 20 nm tapeouts, while also accelerating the development of future nodes, including extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography.

03/20/2013 

PI miCos announced the release of a new 2-axis precision linear translation stage. The new MCS XY precision linear stage was designed for industrial precision motion control and surface metrology applications and combines robustness and high accuracy.

03/20/2013 

Semiconductor manufacturers, suppliers and academia to collaborate on real-world issues at SEMI event.

03/20/2013 

Wafers with a diameter of 450mm enable the micro-chip industry an increase in yield of up to 80%. This leads to an enormous increase in productivity. In order to control the product quality, these wafers receive a specific marking from the manufacturer.

03/19/2013 

Growth in the last quarter of 2012 pulled GaAs device revenue to a slight gain for 2012. The Strategy Analytics GaAs and Compound Semiconductor Technologies Service (GaAs) Insight, “GaAs Device Industry Closes up in 2012,” explores GaAs device revenue growth and trends. It also presents the revenue performance of leading GaAs device manufacturers and foundries like RFMD, Skyworks, TriQuint Semiconductor, Avago Technologies and WIN Semiconductors.

03/19/2013 

Kotura inks fab agreement; announces relationships with Mindspeed and BinOptics.

03/19/2013 

MV Products has announced that their high-capacity, modular vacuum pump inlet-exhaust traps can be stacked for semiconductor wafer fabrication processes which produce a lot of heavy particulates.

03/18/2013 

Spansion Inc., a developer flash memory solutions for embedded markets, and XMC, China’s fastest-growing 300mm semiconductor foundry, today announced an expanded partnership, to develop and manufacture Spansion 32nm NOR Flash memory. The agreement expands XMC’s current 300mm manufacturing of Spansion’s proprietary 65nm and 45nm flash memory technology.

03/18/2013 

A joint industry/academia consortium, supported by the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme, has reported the successful conclusion of a three-year project and the release of its design-synthesis tool flow and related litho-friendly cell libraries and evaluation metrics.

03/15/2013 

It’s no secret: the past five years for the IC industry have been full of challenges. From 2007-2013, the IC market grew at an average annual rate of only 2.1%. One of the speakers slated to speak at The ConFab 2013 in Las Vegas has good reason to believe the IC industry is set to emerge from this difficult cycle.

03/15/2013 

Mentor Graphics User Conference 2013 speaker line-up boasts a host of industry bigwigs, including former foundry CTO, Dr. Chenming Hu.  Hu will give the keynote address on April 25 in San Jose, California, addressing the future of FinFET.

03/15/2013 

Cisco Systems is preparing for a major shift in the industry, as the Internet of Things starts to become a reality. At an annual press event in San Jose, California this week, Cisco officials claimed that the much-anticipated IoT industry could be a $14 trillion opportunity, and they are ready to embrace the change.

03/15/2013 

OneChip Photonics this week revealed strategic, outsourcing plans to expand into new markets, with announcements of newly-established relationships with semiconductor foundry GCS and wafer supplier IQE. Both announcements related to OneChip’s bigger, strategic plan to expand its services into the high-volume DCI market.

03/14/2013 

Imec announced today the launch of its fully integrated silicon photonics platform through a cost-sharing Multi-Project Wafer (MPW) service via ePIXfab.