Online information source for semiconductor professionals

The four big pure-play foundries have all now revealed their capital spending plans for 2008 with one common theme—a lack of spending! Read more >>

45nm native quad-core internal samples have been fabricated at AMD’s Fab 36 with yields etc… as expected. Customer samples are due out in 2 to 3 weeks and engineering samples soon after, AMD executives said during its fourth quarter conference call. Read more >>

One of the major users of SOI wafers has been Sony, who uses them for the Cell microprocessor. However, a story over at Semiconductor International highlights that Toshiba’s taking over production of the chip has led the company to consider moving the design to its bulk CMOS process instead. Read more >>

To say that 2007 has been a complete mess for AMD is an understatement. Though at a recent financial analyst meeting in early December, AMD executives painted the picture that the AMD glass was half-full rather than half-empty! However, no one bought it, even after numerous referrals back to the point of optimism from the executives in attendance. Read more >>

The old adage that ‘bad news travels fast’ couldn’t be more evident in relation to one particular company in 2007: AMD. Read more >>

Not your average eBay item up for grabs, rather a piece of photovoltaic technology history. Nanosolar, roll-to-roll Copper Indium Gallium Diselenide (CIGS) PV solar start-up, has put one of its first three production line commercially-produced PV modules (Panel #2) up for sale on eBay with a $10,300 starting price!

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A third party press release from Magma Design Automation has a wonderful quote from Ward Vercruysse, CAD director, Computing Solutions Group at AMD, which is very amusing and a little surprising considering the Barcelona delays and errata problems now fully confirmed if not detailed. Read more >>

Having listened to the conference call covering last night’s announcement that Lam Research was acquiring SEZ, the main thrust for the move by Lam was to quickly put in place the infrastructure on a global scale to better serve its two new products that cover the plasma-based bevel-edge cleaning system called Coronus and its linear single wafer cleaning platform that has yet to be officially launched! Read more >>

Though off my beat, I found a press release from sp3 Diamond Technologies, a company involved in the semiconductor industry but with tentacles in many places announce that their technology is being used by Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland.  The University is using the technology to evaluate the benefits of using diamond-coated reactors for the next generation of fusion reactors due to diamonds’ ability to withstand the intense heat involved in the process. Read more >>

Texas Instruments has been playing the ‘green’ initiative a little too long now, in regard to its hyper-environmental-energy efficient 300mm fab known as R1. When the fab was built, I fully supported the hype surrounding its light sensors, grated windows, reflective roof and fish pond etc… but the story keeps coming back again and again about how great the achievements have been and what a model it is to the semiconductor industry! Read more >>