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Leti, a technology research institute of CEA Tech, announced that Emmanuel Sabonnadiere has been named CEO, succeeding Marie-Noelle Semeria.

Emmanuel SABONNADIERE P_ Jayet-CEA-010Sabonnadiere, who has more than 25 years of executive leadership experience in a variety of large technology environments, joins Leti from CEA Tech, where he led the industrial-partnership program. He brings a strong background in new-technology development with broad private-sector expertise in operational excellence, team building and guiding multicultural organizations in business transformation in Europe and globally.

As Leti’s chief executive officer, Sabonnadiere leads the activities of one of Europe’s largest micro- and nanotechnologies research institutes, which employs approximately 1,900 scientists and engineers, has a portfolio of 2,700 patents and has launched more than 60 startups.

“Success in today’s demanding international digital landscape requires a combination of deep technological expertise, advanced platforms, a commitment to customer and partner success and a shared excitement and agility about the new opportunities,” Sabonnadiere said. “This is where Leti is today, and I am very excited to join this world-class team to develop the solutions that will bring digital innovations to the benefit of leading technology companies around the world.”

Prior to joining CEA, Sabonnadiere was CEO of the Philips Lighting’s Business Group Professional in Amsterdam. From 2008 to 2014, he was CEO and chairman of General Cable Europe in Barcelona, and from 2005 to 2008 he served as CEO of NKM Noell in Wurzburg, Germany. Before that, he served as vice president of Alstom T&D for five years. Early in his career, he held multiple positions at Schneider Electric, including managing director of development for equipment units.

During his career, he has designed and implemented strategic plans for process optimization, product redesign-to-costs, market repositioning and system development.

Sabonnadiere holds a Ph.D. degree in physics from the Ecole Centrale de Lyon, an MBA degree from Ecole Supérieure des Affaires de Grenoble and an engineering degree in information technology from the Université Technologie Compiègne.

Sabonnadiere is a fully qualified instructor at the ski school in Les Ménuires, and member of the advisory board of IAC.

Cadence Design Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ: CDNS) today announced that Anirudh Devgan, executive vice president and general manager of the Digital & Signoff Group and the System & Verification Group, has been appointed president of Cadence, effective immediately.

Dr. Devgan will report to Lip-Bu Tan, Cadence chief executive officer. Together, they will further the company’s System Design Enablement strategy by accelerating the momentum in the core electronic design automation (EDA) business and delivering to the expanding needs of its growing customer base.

As Cadence’s President, Dr. Devgan will oversee Cadence’s EDA products, including the digital implementation and signoff, functional verification, custom IC design, PCB and packaging businesses. Additionally, he will be responsible for the corporate strategy, marketing ­and business development functions.

“This is an exciting time for Cadence, and Anirudh will play a key leadership role as we capture opportunities that are being driven by groundbreaking trends in high-performance and edge computing, automotive electronics and machine learning, among others,” said Lip-Bu Tan, CEO of Cadence. “Anirudh is a visionary and an innovator and a strong team leader with broad operational experience. Both Cadence and its customers will benefit from his enhanced role. I am delighted to partner with him to further our System Design Enablement strategy by accelerating the strong momentum in our existing businesses and by expanding into new areas. The Cadence Board and management team join me in congratulating Anirudh on his promotion.”

“It is an honor to step into the role of president as Cadence continues to execute well across all areas of our business,” said Anirudh Devgan. “I look forward to working closely with Lip-Bu and my talented colleagues to accelerate our momentum and drive further growth.”

Anirudh Devgan is a 25-year industry veteran. Prior to joining Cadence in 2012, he was at Magma Design Automation, Inc. for seven years where he was general manager of the Custom Design Business Unit. He also spent 12 years at IBM in a variety of technical and management roles. He received numerous awards there, including the IBM Outstanding Innovation award. Dr. Devgan is an IEEE Fellow and has numerous research papers and patents. He received a Bachelor of Technology degree in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, and M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer engineering from Carnegie Mellon University.

Kateeva, a developer of OLED production equipment solutions, today appointed Dr. Homer Antoniadis to the newly created role of Executive Vice President of Technology. With decades of technical and executive leadership in OLED displays and printed electronics, Dr. Antoniadis will drive the company’s technology development programs, and help customers optimize Kateeva’s YIELDjet systems for their OLED mass-production lines.

“Homer is among the early pioneers that brought OLED-enabled products into the mainstream,” said Kateeva’s President and COO, Dr. Conor Madigan. “A skilled technologist, he is particularly knowledgeable in OLED and printed electronics, with a talent for developing and productizing breakthrough technologies. His technical expertise will help us continue driving forward our applications programs in thin film encapsulation and RGB pixel deposition, and his broad technology vision will help ensure that Kateeva’s existing and new applications pipeline remains robust and focused on meeting our customers’ current and future needs. We’re thrilled to welcome Homer on board.”

“At Kateeva, I can fulfill my ambition to proliferate OLED technology while working with extraordinarily talented technologists,” said Dr. Antoniadis. “I’m excited to take a leadership role at the company.”

Dr. Antoniadis joins Kateeva from DuPont Silicon Valley Technology Center, where he served as CTO of the DuPont Photovoltaic Solutions Group following the company’s acquisition of Innovalight in 2011. Previously, he was CTO and VP of Engineering at Innovalight, a developer of silicon inks for the photovoltaic industry.

Before Innovalight, he held positions with Osram Opto Semiconductors, Hewlett-Packard Labs, and Xerox. At Osram, he led the worldwide OLED product development efforts, bringing a variety of display products from  R&D through engineering and into production. In addition, he raised funds and directed the company’s Department of Energy (DOE) Lighting Award program. Prior to Osram, he steered HP Labs’ OLED program to accomplishments that earned international recognition.

Widely recognized as an authority in the OLED and photovoltaics fields, Dr. Antoniadis is a frequent lecturer and conference chair at leading industry events. He served on the board of the International Photovoltaic Quality Assurance Task Force, as well as the PV Cell Tech Conference. In 2016, he was appointed to the National Research Energy Laboratory (NREL) External Advisory Council, and in March 2017, he was awarded the title of NextFlex Fellow.

Dr. Antoniadis has more than 70 publications in OLED displays, polymer materials, crystalline and amorphous silicon photovoltaics, and is a named inventor on more than 30 issued U.S. patents.

A native of Greece, he received his B.S. in physics from Ioannina University in Greece, and his M.S. and Ph.D. in physics from Syracuse University.

YIELDjet is a trademark of Kateeva, Inc.

InfinityQS International, Inc. (InfinityQS), the global authority on data-driven manufacturing quality, announces TEL NEXX, a metallization solutions provider to chip designers and manufacturers, is using its software to modernize shop floor data collection and quality control. Moving from a manual, paper-based system to an accessible database, the company has installed InfinityQS’ Quality Intelligence solution ProFicient on tablets for shop floor operators to directly enter data. This has improved the accuracy and timeliness of data capture and enabled rapid response to production issues. With access to historical data at the management level, TEL NEXX can also identify opportunities for quality and process improvements.

Brian Hart, Manufacturing Engineer, TEL NEXX, said, “ProFicient has made accessing a history for each product easy. As our database grows, we can extract information to drive continuous improvement projects and eliminate bottlenecks. What’s more, moving from a paper-based system to an accessible database has made us more efficient. As the projects and operators advance, we only expect to move faster and faster—with the same integrity.”

Historically, TEL NEXX collected data almost entirely manually, which required operators to duplicate data-entry steps by recording data on paper and then entering them into spreadsheets. These processes were time consuming and required rechecking to avoid errors. But now, operators are entering data once into ProFicient, and the data immediately becomes available for managers and administrators to review and provide feedback in real time. Direct data entry has also improved morale on the shop floor, with operators seeing the importance of data collection and taking greater ownership of the work.

Michael Lyle, President and CEO, InfinityQS, said, “When manufacturers rely on manual data entry, it creates inefficiencies that prevent them from responding to variations and other shop floor issues properly and in a timely manner. Instead, modern technologies are available that can create visibility for organizations into their quality data. This transparency enables them to not only make prompt corrections to ensure problems don’t compound, but also perform proactive analysis for continuous improvement.”

To support operator adoption, Hart is leading an incremental rollout of ProFicient and also gradually integrating the solution with TEL NEXX’s existing shop-floor systems. Notably, within just weeks of deploying ProFicient, Hart was able to detect equipment settings that had been inadvertently altered from the original specifications and in a few hours make adjustments so that the machine operated correctly moving forward.

SkyWater Technology Foundry announces that it has been assigned the Specialty Foundry customer relationships from Cypress Semiconductor Corporation. The customer relationships were already being serviced within SkyWater’s 200mm semiconductor wafer manufacturing facility when purchased from Cypress earlier this year. Through the transaction, SkyWater assumes ownership of Cypress’ current embedded Specialty Foundry customer engagements and adds associated business management personnel.

“This transaction builds upon the concept of a Technology Foundry, which enables customers to design, build, and scale their products by simplifying the realization of complex technologies through access to semiconductor technology, experienced personnel and volume manufacturing capabilities,” said SkyWater Chairman of the Board Gary Obermiller. “The addition of the Specialty Foundry customers is synergistic with our pure-play Technology Foundry model; customers come to us with their ideas and we transform them into practice through the application of our differentiated semiconductor technology and operational expertise.”

The Technology Foundry Business model enables customers to design and optimize their product concepts. In tandem with SkyWater’s advanced wafer manufacturing facility, customers are able to prototype and rapidly scale to production volumes, all inside of a high-yield production fab.

“The Specialty Foundry Business was created in 2008 with the vision of providing advanced development access to a high-volume production-scale fab, building on the site’s proven track record of success in bringing new technologies to production,” said Michael Moore, executive vice president of Sales and Marketing at SkyWater. “It’s in our DNA. We’ve been doing development work at this site for decades, right alongside production.  This move is a natural next step for the company and our customers.  We have successfully diversified the customer base this way, by serving new and unique markets that are poised for rapid growth.”

As part of the assignment, which closed October 2, SkyWater will now have direct responsibility for all Specialty Foundry Business customers, eliminating the prior Cypress interface. Because of the existing working relationship between all parties, there will be a seamless transition for all current projects; the same team will continue working with all existing customers, the only difference being that they are now SkyWater employees.

Within SkyWater’s manufacturing facility there are a wide variety of unique technologies currently being developed and manufactured – from superconducting quantum computers to advanced technology Readout IC’s (ROIC), MEMS-based infrared imagers, DNA sequencing and fabrication platforms, and photonic integrated circuit (PIC) devices.

According to SkyWater’s Senior Director of Sales Brad Ferguson, “These types of Technology engagements just start with a simple conversation about our capabilities, and once Customers see the potential of our Technology Foundry solution, they realize this is the right place to transform their concepts into a manufactured product.”

SkyWater is a U.S.-based technology foundry specializing in the development and manufacturing of a wide variety of semiconductor based solutions.

The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) today announced the SIA Board of Directors has elected Matt Murphy, president and CEO of Marvell Semiconductor, Inc. (NASDAQ: MRVL), as its 2018 Chair and Sanjay Mehrotra, president and CEO of Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ: MU), as its 2018 Vice Chair.

SIA Matt Murphy headshot

“It is a great pleasure to welcome Matt Murphy as SIA’s 2018 Chair and Sanjay Mehrotra as SIA’s Vice Chair,” said John Neuffer, SIA President and CEO. “Matt is a strong leader, an industry veteran, and an outstanding champion for SIA and our industry. An engineer by trade, Sanjay is a mainstay in our industry and a respected voice on semiconductor technology. Together, their skills and accomplishments will be a major asset to advancing SIA’s priorities in Washingtonand around the world.”

Murphy has led Marvell since joining the company in July 2016, and serves as a member of the company’s board of directors. Since that time, he has led the company’s turnaround and reestablished Marvell as a leading innovator in storage and networking technology.

Prior to joining Marvell, Murphy spent over two decades at Maxim Integrated, most recently as Executive Vice President of Business Units and Sales & Marketing, overseeing all product development and go-to-market activities. Previously, Murphy managed the company’s Communications & Automotive Solutions Group, led Worldwide Sales & Marketing, and served in a range of other business unit management positions.

“Few technologies have impacted the modern world more than semiconductors, and we’re now entering an era that promises even greater change,” said Murphy. “However, progress isn’t guaranteed unless the United States does more to support research, boost competitiveness, and promote global trade. As 2018 SIA Chair, I look forward to working with my colleagues to champion these priorities.”

Mehrotra joined Micron in May 2017, after a long and distinguished career at SanDisk Corporation where he led the company from a start-up in 1988 until its eventual sale in 2016. In addition to being a SanDisk co-founder, Mr. Mehrotra served as its President and CEO from 2011 to 2016, overseeing its growth to a Fortune 500 company.

Prior to SanDisk, Mr. Mehrotra held design engineering positions at Integrated Device Technology, Inc., SEEQ Technology and Intel Corporation. Mehrotra earned both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering and computer science from the University of California, Berkeley. He holds more than 70 patents and has published articles on nonvolatile memory design and flash memory systems.

“Semiconductor technology has revolutionized our society and transformed our economy,” said Mehrotra. “The success of our industry is driven, in part, by our unity of purpose. Working together through SIA, we can ensure continued U.S. leadership in semiconductor manufacturing, design, and research. I look forward to helping lead that effort as 2018 SIA Vice Chair.”

For the first time ever, SEMICON Southeast Asia (SEMICON SEA), the region’s premier gathering of the industry connecting people, products, technologies and solutions across the electronics manufacturing supply chain, will be held in Kuala Lumpur. Taking place 8 to 10 May 2018, the conference will debut in the newly constructed Malaysia International Trade and Exhibition Centre (MITEC). With more than 85 percent of the exhibition space already sold, SEMICON SEA 2018 will represent companies from Southeast Asia, China, Taiwan, Europe and the U.S.  More than 300 companies will exhibit and as many as 8,000 visitors from 15 countries are expected to participate in SEMICON SEA. Organised by SEMI, SEMICON SEA 2018 theme will be “Think Smart Make Smart.”

The Southeast Asia region is a world-class electronics manufacturing hub with end-to-end R&D capabilities, and SEMICON SEA 2018 is the comprehensive platform for the electronics industry in the region. The event will feature three themed pavilions, five country pavilions, keynote presentations, and forums that will address critical trending topics within the semiconductor eco-system. The show will connect decision makers from the industry, demonstrate the most advanced products, and provide the most up-to-date market and technology trends.

Ng Kai Fai, president of SEMI Southeast Asia says, “The growth of SEMICON Southeast Asia is attributed to the rapid expansion and robust growth of the Electrical & Electronics (E&E) sector across Southeast Asia, with companies emerging as world leaders in mobile, automotive, medical and Internet of Things (IoT) supply chains. As one of the high-growth markets in the region, Malaysia contributes 44 percent of the total manufacturing output and 26 percent of the total Gross Domestic Product of the region and is forecasted to generate approximately US$ 382 billion in exports in 2018.”

Over the past three years, SEMICON SEA has become the annual gathering of the full regional supply chain. SEMICON SEA 2018 will feature a supplier search programme to encourage cross-border business matching as well as a technology start-up platform which will bring together Southeast Asia technology entrepreneurial resources. In conjunction with SEMICON SEA 2018, this event will also include the SEMICON University Programme which aims to encourage and promote STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) interest amongst young talent and will also include a job fair.

SUNY Polytechnic Institute (SUNY Poly) is hosting the 11th IEEE Nanotechnology Symposium at its world-class Albany NanoTech Complex on Wednesday, November 15, from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., with support from sponsors IEEE and the Electron Devices Society, as well as from donors IBM and GlobalFoundries.

The symposium will feature keynotes and presentations on topics from computational health, silicon photonics, spintronics, and packaging to advances in quantum computing devices and architecture. In addition, a number of technical leaders will be recognized with awards for their contributions toward the introduction of copper (Cu) interconnects to the semiconductor industry, including Dr. Dan Edelstein, IBM Fellow and one of the pioneers of this advancement.

In addition to the award recipients from IBM and GlobalFoundries, guests of honor include:

  • Mukesh Khare (Vice President, Semiconductor Technology Research, IBM);
  • Bahgat Sammakia (Interim President, SUNY Poly);
  • T.C. Chen (Vice President Science & Technology, IBM Fellow, IBM);
  • Bijan Davari (Vice President, Next Generation Computing Systems and Technology, IBM Fellow, IBM);
  • George Gomba (Vice President, Technology Research, GLOBALFOUNDRIES);
  • Thomas N. Theis (Executive Director, Columbia Nano Initiative, Columbia University); and
  • Kang-ill Seo (Vice President, R & D, Samsung Semiconductor Inc.).

A link to more information about the symposium, as well as an agenda, can be found here: http://albanynanotechnology.org/

Leti, a research institute of CEA Tech and coordinator of the pan-European consortium FED4SAE, today announced that the 14 project partners have launched a three-year European Commission program to facilitate the acceleration of European cyber-physical-system (CPS) solutions to market. This project will boost digitization of European industry by strengthening companies’ competitiveness in the CPS market.

Cyber-physical systems link the physical world (e.g., through sensors or actuators) with the virtual world of information processing. They are comprised of diverse constituent parts that function together to create some global behavior. These constituents may include software systems, communications technology, and sensors/actuators that interact with the real world, often including embedded technologies.

The FED4SAE project, launched in September in Grenoble, will create a pan-European network of Digital Innovation Hubs (DIH) by leveraging existing regional tech or businesses ecosystems across complete value chains and multiple competencies. The network of DIHs will enable startups, SMEs and midcap companies in all sectors to build and create new digital products, smart applications and services. The project mission also includes innovation management – linking these companies to suppliers and investors to create innovative CPS solutions and accelerate their development and industrialization.

“FED4SAE will give birth to a competitive ecosystem that will help European startups, SMEs and midcaps innovate and thrive as they access leading technology sources, competencies and industrial platforms,” said Leti project coordinator, Isabelle Dor. “The network will also effectively link them to well-connected business infrastructures, such as banks, investors and business accelerators, and existing regional innovation hubs.

“Bottom line: the expanded adoption of CPS solutions offered by the network is expected to lead to quantifiable increases in the participating companies’ market share, productivity and industrial capacities,” Dor said.

The FED4SAE project will fund industrial projects thanks to the cascade-funding process set by the European Commission. There will be three open calls over the course of the project. The first call, which opens Nov. 14, will support the best projects based on their innovation potential and technical expertise, the maturity of the solution, with technology-readiness levels between 3 and 6, and their efficient management of the innovation to create a lasting impact with the developed solution.

This pan-European network will enable companies to use CPS platforms combined with expertise and knowhow from the R&D advanced platforms. The ultimate goal of each industrial project within FED4SAE is to develop a complete solution that can get to market and scale.

This includes combining hardware and software components and deploying them in a range of testbeds prior to deployment into the targeted market, as well as support in business modeling and market insights through guidance from conceptual design through market launch. Application experiments will be funded for developing innovative CPS products that will increase the competitiveness of European innovative companies.

Proposals can be submitted from Nov. 14 to Feb. 6, 2018, for the first open call. The expected average funding per applicant is €50,000 with a maximum of €60,000 for one application experiment.

SEMICON Europa 2017 will take place in Munich from 14 to 17 November, co-located with productronica. Consistent with SEMI’s theme “Connect, Collaborate, and Innovate,” co-locating SEMICON Europa with productronica gathers the full span of electronics manufacturing and end-products, creating the largest European electronics platform ever. More than 400 exhibitors will present their products and innovations at SEMICON Europa 2017. Over 40,000 attendees are expected at the co-located events.

After a period of slow growth, Europe’s semiconductor manufacturers are investing in new construction of 300mm fabs in Germany, Italy and France. Four semiconductor and MEMS manufacturers have announced investments in Europe totaling more than $10 billion. Bosch will build a new fab in Dresden; ST Microelectronics is planning two new 300mm fabs in Agrate and Crolles; and GLOBALFOUNDRIES and Infineon plan to expand their production capacity.

“The global industry will invest more than US$100 billion in equipment and materials this year. Forecasts for 2017 also predict that semiconductor manufacturers worldwide will exceed $400 billion in revenue ─ a new record,” says Ajit Manocha, president and CEO of SEMI.  “An unprecedented number of new inflections and applications will broadly expand the digital economy and drive increasing silicon content — in areas including IoT, assisted driving in automotive, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Big Data, and 5G. Assuming an average 7 percent CAGR, global chip sales could approach $1 trillion by 2030, and equipment and materials spending could similarly grow to nearly a quarter of a trillion dollars.”

The market segments in which European companies hold strong market positions also shape the conference program of SEMICON Europa 2017. More than 250 presentations, 50 conferences and high-caliber discussions provide an overview of current trends. Key issues this year include: materials, semiconductor manufacturing, advanced packaging, MEMS/sensors, power electronics, flexible and printed electronics. The focus is also on important applications such as the Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI), smart manufacturing (“Industry 4.0”), automotive electronics and medical technology.

The Opening Ceremony will include a welcome speech by Ajit Manocha, president and CEO of SEMI,followed by Laith Altimime, president, SEMI Europe, plus four keynotes:

  • Bosch Sensortec: Stefan Finkbeiner, CEO, on how environmental sensing can contribute to a better quality of life in the context of the IoT
  • Rinspeed Inc.: Frank M. Rinderknecht, founder and CEO, on how to create innovative technologies, materials and mobility means of tomorrow
  • SOITEC: Carlos Mazure, CTO, executive VP, on contributions and benefits of engineered substrates solutions and thin-layer transfer technologies, focusing on applications in the smart space
  • TSMC Europe: Maria Marced, president, on opportunities for new business models to apply in the Smart City

On the exhibition show floor, the TechARENA free sessions are a highlight with the SEMI China Innovation and Investment Forum and the INNOVATION VILLAGE.