11/17/2011 

11/17/2011 

Toppan Photomasks will expand its Shanghai manufacturing operation serving China's semiconductor industry. Costing about $20 million, the expansion will increase photomask production significantly, and enable more advanced photomasks made with feature sizes as small as 90nm.

11/17/2011 

DCG Systems introduced the OPTIFIB Viper system for circuit edit at the 22nm node. It uses a new coaxial photon-ion column to provide spot sizes 50% smaller than those of the flagship OptiFIB-IV.

11/16/2011 

Reversing its 2009 decision to close the 200mm wafer fab, Fairchild Semiconductor (NYSE:FCS) will keep open its Mountain Top, PA, facility. Moutain Top makes high-voltage and automotive semiconductor products.

11/16/2011 

Molecular Imprints Inc. will build a 450mm-capable lithography system for an undisclosed leading IC manufacturer.

11/15/2011 

AKHAN Technologies, advanced diamond electron device design company, is commercializing diamond microelectronics with a shallow n-type diamond material over silicon.

11/15/2011 

Applied Materials Inc. (Nasdaq:AMAT) presented five companies with awards for helping Applied meet its strategic business goals in 2011.

11/14/2011 

South Korean memory firm Hynix has finally settled on a buyer: SK Telecom, South Korea's biggest wireless telco, will buy a 21% stake for roughly $3B.

11/14/2011 

The Global Semiconductor Association announced nominees in several categories for its annual awards. Following are the nominees for start-up to watch, most respected companies, best-managed companies, analysts' favorites, and more.

11/11/2011 

Boston Semi Equipment LLC (BSE Group) established Boston Semi K.K. in Tokyo, Japan, for customers of its flexible financing on front-end and back-end semiconductor manufacturing equipment.

11/11/2011 

The Global Semiconductor Alliance (GSA) shares financial reports on the top three emerging semiconductor industry companies of 2011, as voted by suppliers, customers, peers, and other members of the sector.

11/11/2011 

Backside-illuminated image sensors require more precise wafer processing -- uniform extreme wafer thinning, dopant control, epitaxy growth, trench manipulation, etc. -- but the payoff in image quality is significant. Researchers at imec experimented with different wafer fab technologies to make a record BSI sensor. They also consider new architectures/packaging techniques for this technology.

11/10/2011 

In 2010, Texas Instruments Inc. (TI) took the largest market share for industrial electronics semiconductors, according to a new IHS iSuppli Industrial Electronics Market Tracker report.

11/09/2011 

Novellus Systems (NASDAQ:NVLS) debuted ceramic hard mask (CHM) materials for use in sub-22nm patterning applications. The CHM materials reportedly improve performance over TiN hard masks, and with easier integration onto the fab floor.

11/09/2011 

NIST and the University of Virginia have demonstrated that electron microscope beams can be used to move around nanoscale objects, raising the possibility of positioning and assembling nanoelectronics.

11/09/2011 

TSMC's Board of Directors approved additional capital expenditures for advanced semiconductor manufacturing technologies and more 12" wafer capacity. The company also nailed down its R&D and 2012 capex budgets.

11/09/2011 

SiOnyx, Inc. was awarded a multiphase contract from the US Department of Defense to develop next generation sensing technologies for detecting laser light in targeting systems.

11/09/2011 

Plasma-Therm LLC sold a multi-chamber VERSALINE etch and deposition system to a leading North American wireless compound semiconductor manufacturer.

11/09/2011 

Deca Technologies, a new company backed by Cypress Semiconductor and SunPower, will combine solar wafer manufacturing methods with semiconductor manufacturing support to create wafer-level chipscale packaging (WLCSP) derivatives.

11/08/2011 

Chalmers University of Technology received the majority of a new Swedish research grant of SEK40 million to study graphene. The financing comes from the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation.