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Nov 28, 2007 at 07:26 PM |
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As I scarfed my pasta during the lunch break at the mid-October press gathering at IMEC, Paul Heremans told me about the center's SOLAR+ Program's work in the organic photovoltaics (OPV) arena, including an upcoming paper at the Materials Research Society meeting about a spray-on deposition method: Not sprayed on with a spin-coating tool but deposited with an inexpensive airbrush nozzle like those used to paint cars! After swallowing my mouthful, I confirmed what Paul had said and asked what kind of conversion efficiencies the method had achieved.Write Comment (1 comments) |
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Nov 27, 2007 at 11:59 PM |
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Although it ranks as one of the more ambitious ongoing acquisitional gameplans, the parade of buyouts by Evans Analytical Group (EAG) has not exactly garnered above-the-fold microelectronics industry news coverage.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Nov 27, 2007 at 12:30 AM |
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VLSI Research gets more mileage out of its annual customer satisfaction survey than Grandpa squeezed out of his old gas-guzzler, with pieces of the report---and awards based on it---seeping out since the industry research group first announced the results several months back.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Nov 26, 2007 at 12:47 PM |
A new report reveals that although the light-emitting diode (LED) sector continues to experience gangbuster unit-volume growth, industry revenues are only increasing in single digits, and high-brightness and ultra-high-brightness LEDs (HB-, UHB-LEDs) need advanced production technologies to achieve their potential.
Yole Development and the European Photonics Industry Consortium have jointly issued a market study focused on LED manufacturing and technologies, which forecasts that the overall LED market will produce 40 billion devices and hit $4.7 billion in 2007, with low-end applications accounting for about 83% of the total, according to report author Philippe Roussel of Yole.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Nov 19, 2007 at 08:11 AM |
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Last week saw an optimistic forecast from the Semiconductor Industry Association, a mixed-bag fiscal year-end financial report from equipment big dog Applied Materials, and continued weak book-to-bill numbers from SEMI.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Nov 14, 2007 at 09:01 PM |
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While some say that nanomanufacturing is already going on in advanced semiconductor and hard-disk-drive production lines, where fabricated structures have plummeted to the low double-digit nanometer range, others believe that "true" nanomanufacturing must involve some sort of self-assembly or "bottom-up" processes.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Nov 13, 2007 at 09:52 AM |
If we are to believe recent comments from Intel's boss Paul Otellini, the Moore's Law juggernaut almost rolled off the tracks at the 45-nm station, were it not for some hafnium-enabled innovational intervention.
"I'm not sure everyone has paused to think about the impact of our reinvented transistors," Otellini told CRN.Write Comment (4 comments) |
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Nov 12, 2007 at 08:33 AM |
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While perusing the weekly stock-market wrap-up in the Los Angeles Times' business section on Saturday, I was struck by the prodigious increases (can you say, "bubble"?) in year-to-date share-price increases for several solar industry companies---despite the recent corrections/downturn in the markets: Ascent Solar, up 543%; SunPower, up 246%; JA Solar, up 206%; Yingli, up 203%; Trina Solar, up 199%; Evergreen, up 86%.Write Comment (11 comments) |
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Nov 09, 2007 at 12:19 PM |
In what may become a semiregular tradition at Chip Shots, here are a few mouthfuls of tasty Friday leftovers, starting with a welcome and unusual flavor from Tegal.
The unexpected news earlier this week that Tegal earned a quarterly profit may not have stunned the financial markets, but it certainly provided a little bit of sunshine in the plasma etch and deposition tool company's Petaluma CA, headquarters.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Nov 07, 2007 at 06:19 PM |
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A recurring rant here at Chip Shots is the failure of the global semiconductor industry to convert the last remaining vestiges of English system measurements of wafer size and silicon area into metric units.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Nov 07, 2007 at 04:25 PM |
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Erich Thallner, founder/CEO of EV Group, proudly announced Tuesday that his company had a very healthy fiscal 2007, its best year ever, growing 30% in both revenues and order intake: Now if only we had a clue what EVG's actual billings and bookings were, those percentages would be even more meaningful.Write Comment (1 comments) |
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Nov 05, 2007 at 09:19 AM |
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Few recent issues in the semiconductor manufacturing community have been as divisive as the question of the ultimate legitimacy and timing of the proposed next wafer-size transition to 450 mm.Write Comment (3 comments) |
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Nov 02, 2007 at 11:45 AM |
Several news and muse items have collected in the Chip Shots hopper over the past few weeks, so since it's Friday and the weekend's almost here, it's time to clear out those leftovers.
While the naming of ex-TI honcho Hans Stork as Applied Materials' silicon systems group's new CTO and group VP raised alot of eyebrows, one of my oldest (not old in age, but old as in I've known him a long time!) industry friends (and friend to many, many others) also landed a new job, albeit with a lot less fanfare than Hans' appointment: Matheson Tri-Gas named Terry Francis as chief technologist of its electronics group earlier this month (although I just found out about it).
Terry had told me at Semicon West that he was in negotiations with someone, but discreetly left out which company was wooing him (although I had my suspicions).Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Nov 01, 2007 at 12:06 PM |
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As noted in Chip Shots last week, French pure-play MEMS foundry Tronics has achieved profitability for five consecutive quarters, something it claimed was a unique accomplishment in its sector; but Canadian foundry Micralyne has taken issue with that statement and wants to let the world know that it too has been profitable for quite awhile.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Nov 01, 2007 at 07:45 AM |
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Although I was glad to hear the news about Cymer's restart of operations earlier this week at its San Diego headquarters campus, details in the official PR were sketchy.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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