02/06/2008  Agilent has sold a model 5500 atomic force microscope to the University of Northern Iowa electrical characterization and materials science studies.

02/05/2008  Feb. 5, 2008 - At this week's International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC), Texas Instruments is disclosing process and design information about its 45nm process-based 3.5G baseband and multimedia processor, which offers 55% better performance and uses 63% less power than the 65nm version.

02/05/2008  Intel CTO Justin Rattner gives WaferNEWS some insights into the development process of its "breakthrough" 256Mb phase-change memory multilevel cell device, to be revealed at this week's ISSCC. While replacing DRAM is a long ways away, "the most ardent advocates for phase-change see that potential," he said.

02/05/2008  Feb. 5, 2008 - Hynix Semiconductor plans to invest 1.5-2.0T won (US ~$1.6B) to hike production in its 300mm DRAM plant in Wuxi, China (C2 line) by about 20% to 120,000 wafers/month, increasing its product mix coming from China to 55%-60% DRAM, according to a report in the Korea Times.

02/05/2008  By Roy White, RAVE LLC, Delray Beach, FL USA

Photomask costs are a painfully visible issue in today's competitive semiconductor market. This puts substantial pressure on the profitability of photomask makers. Since the "mask makers' vacation" ended some 15 years ago, it seems every paper you read has another exorbitant estimate of future mask costs.

02/05/2008  by Debra Vogler, Senior Technical Editor, Solid State Technology
Feb. 5, 2008 - With flash process technology scaling approaching its limits, along comes Nanochip, a developer of MEMS silicon data storage chips, with a technology that does not use lithography in its manufacture. Company execs tell WaferNEWS about their planned >100GB/chipset products, which could start prototyping this year and be ready for manufacturing by 2010.

02/05/2008  Feb. 4, 2008 - At this week's International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC), Fujitsu Labs says it will show a power amplifier (PA) built with 90nm process technologies that operates at 77Ghz, realizing CMOS RF frontend circuitry with a power amplifier that integrates with baseband circuitry on a chip, for use in millimeter-wave automotive radar systems.

02/04/2008  by James Montgomery, News Editor, Solid State Technology
Feb. 4, 2008 - In war, most battles end with winners and losers, though in some cases the difference might be relative. So it was with the DRAM market during and at the end of 2007, according to data from iSuppli and Gartner. And unless the DRAM makers get their act together, a decade from now they could be faced with collective $100B investment requirements just to maintain growth trends.

02/04/2008  The AXi 940 module will perform wafer front-side inspection as part of the all-surface Explorer Inspection Cluster, a multisurface inspection system designed to provide reliable macro inspection. The AXi 940 has a redesigned software interface focused on reducing cost of ownership through improved productivity and reliability, as well as reduced dependence on human operators.

02/04/2008  The Multicore DA100 dispensing grade die attach solder paste dissipates the heat in power semiconductor devices such as rectifiers, power transistors, amplifiers, voltage regulators and other automotive and consumer packages. The paste also provides ease of removal during cleaning processes, low voiding, ease of use, and cost efficiency.

02/04/2008  Feb. 4, 2008 - Having tallied the top semiconductor manufacturers' final reporting and projections for 2008, Gartner has come to a sobering conclusion: its initial forecast of an upcoming spending slowdown, cast just six weeks ago, wasn't nearly slow enough.

02/04/2008  ; Infineon Technologies has announced it is shipping in volume RF switches that are manufactured in a CMOS-based process on silicon wafers and offer the equivalent performance of RF switches manufactured in gallium arsenide (GaAs) process technology. Infineon went on to say that, previously, CMOS-based RF switches had to be manufactured on dedicated and more expensive sapphire wafers to reach the performance of GaAs switches.

02/04/2008  ; KIC, a manufacturer of thermal process development and control products, announces that it is entering its 30th year of business within the electronics industry. Founded in 1977 by Casey Kazmierowicz, KIC entered the electronics industry with the introduction of the first continuous monitoring system for conveyorized furnaces for microcomputers.

02/03/2008  Feb. 2, 2008 - Scientists at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute say a new cheaper, quick-drying polymer could enable better performance and lower costs in both conventional photolithography processes and on-chip nanoimprint lithography. Also seemingly heavily involved in developing the technology: Applied Materials.

02/03/2008  Feb. 2, 2008 - Panasonic/Matsushita Electric Industrial and Samsung Electronics have settled patent infringement lawsuits in the US and Japan, and signed 10-year cross-licensing agreements to use the DRAM and other semiconductor technologies.

02/02/2008  Feb. 2, 2008 - Elpida Memory is significantly slowing its production of 65nm products and shifting its gaze to 50nm work ahead of schedule, anticipating tighter DRAM supplies as some firms get squeezed out of the market, according to an interview with the Nikkei Business Daily.

02/02/2008  Feb. 2, 2008 - Intel and Micron say they have jointly developed (through their "IM Flash" JV) a NAND flash chip that reads/writes data 5x faster than conventional NAND flash chips. Samples are now at OEMs and controller manufacturers, with mass production slated for 2H08.

02/01/2008  Feb. 1, 2008 - Global sales of semiconductors took their typical seasonal dip in December following their prior-months ramp-up for the holiday season, and for the full year chip sales managed to squeak out 2.5% growth, according to the latest data from the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA).

02/01/2008  Acceleware Corp. and Synopsys Inc. have released a new product that, according to the companies, enables up to 20-times faster electromagnetic simulation of optoelectronic devices such as micro image sensors based on CMOS.

02/01/2008  by Katherine Derbyshire, Contributing Editor, Solid State Technology
Feb. 1, 2008 - Recent interest in thin-film solar cells is driven in part by the high-cost limited supply of bulk polysilicon, the starting material for both integrated circuits and bulk silicon solar cells. Simply using less silicon would reduce cost, but it's not that simple. Instead, the industry is looking at thinner wafers (vs. reduced area), smaller Al contacts, and even thin-film layer transfer techniques.