March’s ‘one-two-three’ calamity! What now for chip industry?

This is a summary by Malcolm Penn, chairman and CEO, Future Horizons. For those who wish to know more, please get in touch with me or Future Horizons.

 

Malcolm Penn, Future Horizons.

It was all going so well at the beginning of March when January’s WSTS results were released. The oil and North African issues were being taken in their stride. Then, less than two weeks later, the earthquake and tsunami disaster struck Japan and by the close of the month, the Gaddafi Libyan regime was under western international airstrike siege.

Given the fragility of industry’s confidence since the Lehman Brothers crisis, the industry has weathered these ‘incidents’ with remarkable sanguinity, with concerns focused purely on supply not demand-side issues. In our view this underlines what we have been saying all along; the 2010 recovery and 2011 outlook were both stronger than most people thought.

The industry’s biggest problems in 2011 were always going to be supply not demand driven; the situation in Japan has simply amplified and accelerated their coming.

The chip industry took March’s one-two-three knocks with remarkable calm, hit first by the spike in oil prices following the politic unrest bordering on civil wars in North Africa, then the dreadful 11 March earthquake and Tsunami in Japan, culminating on 19 March with a multi-state coalition military intervention in Libya to implement United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973.

Last year, any of these events would probably have been enough to deal the industry a knockout blow, as with the September 2008 Lehman Brothers collapse; this time around, despite the still fragile global economic confidence, the industry seems to have taken these events in its stride.

Whilst it is far too early to quantify exactly what the industry impact will be, the oil price and North Africa situation pales into insignificance when compared with the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami. Japan is too important a cog in the global electronics industry for its impact not to have serious global repercussions. It has also brought to a head the far deeper industry problems that we have long warned of – man-made in the corporate boardrooms – that could (should) have been avoided.

In this aspect, Japan’s disasters do have parallels with the Lehman Brothers collapse and its impact of worldwide finance; we hope that the current disruption to manufacturing worldwide from will force a rethink of how the world manages production.

Infosys presents three points for India’s growth: ISA Vision Summit 2011

One wonders what S.D. Shibulal, COO and member of the board, Infosys Technologies, was doing as the speaker for Market and business dynamics in emerging markets. Nevertheless, he was the speaker after the inauguration of the ISA Vision Summit 2011.

More later

 

On-chip networks: Future of SoC design

Selection of the right on-chip network is critical to meeting the requirements of today’s advanced SoCs. There is easy IP integration with IP cores from many sources with different protocols, and an UVM verification environment.

John Bainbridge, staff technologist, CTO Office, Sonics Inc., said that it optimizes the system performance. Virtual channels offer efficient resource usage – saves gates and wires. The non-blocking network leads to an improved system performance. There are flexible topology choices with optimal network to match requirements.

Power management is key with advanced system partitioning, and an improved design flow and timing closure. Finally, the development environment allows easy design capture and has performance analysis tools.

For the record, there are several SoC integration challenges that need to be addressed, such as IP integration, frequency, throughput, physical design, power management, security, time-to-market and development costs.

SGN exceeds requirements
SGN met the tablet performance requirement with fabric frequency of 1066MHz. It has an efficient gate count of 508K gates. There are features such as an advanced system partitioning, security and I/O coherency. There is support for system concurrency as well as advanced power management.

Sonics offers system IP solutions such as SGN, a router based NoC solution, with flexible partitioning and VC (Virtual Channel) support. The frequency is optimized with credit based flow control.

SSX/SLX is message based crossbar/ShareLink solutions based on interleaved multi-channel technology. It has target based QoS with three arbitration levels. The SonicsExpress is for power centric clock domain crossing. There is sub-system re-use and decoupling. The MemMax manages and optimizes the DRAM efficiency while maintaining system QoS. There is run-time programmability for all traffic types. The SonicsConnect is a non-blocking peripheral interconnect.

Convergence of PV materials, test and reliability: What really matters?

SEMI, USA recently hosted the seminar on ‘Convergence of PV Materials, Test and Reliability: What Really Matters?

Reliability in growing PV industry
Speaking on the importance of reliability to a growing PV industry, Sarah Kurtz, principal scientist, Reliability group manager, NREL, said that confidence in long-term performance is a necessity in the PV industry. Current failure rates are low. There is need to demonstrate confidence so that failure rates will stay low. There has been exponential growth of the PV industry so far. PV is a significant fraction of new installations. It now represents a significant fraction of new electricity generating installations of all kinds.

How does one predict the lifetime of PV modules? There has been a qualification test evolution for JPL block buys. Most studies of c-Si modules show module failures are small. Internal electrical current issues often dominate.

The vast majority of installations show very low PV module failure rates (often less than 0.1 percent). There has been evidence that PV is low risk compared to other investments. To sustain the current installation rate, we need to demonstrate confidence that justifies the annual investment of $100 million or so.

Critical factors in economic viability of PV
DuPont has broad capabilities under one roof. It offers materials, solar cell design, and processes integrated with panel engineering. Speaking about Critical factors in economic viability of PV – materials matter – Conrad Burke, global marketing director, DuPont PV Solutions, said that material suppliers have a distinct advantage to view trends. The industry can expect consolidation among large PV module producers and large materials suppliers.

There is an increasing dependence on materials suppliers for processes, tech support and roadmap. There is renewed attention to long-term reliability and quality of materials in PV products.

There is a race for survival among panel producers. There are dropping prices for solar panels, and quality is getting compromised. There are reduced incentives in established markets. The market will continue to grow. Key factors that determine investment return for PV include lifetime, efficiency and cost.

When materials fail, the consequences are dire. There are failures such as encapsulant discoloration, backsheet failure, glass delamination, etc. Average defect rates in new-build modules has been increasing. Significant number of PV installations do not deliver the projected RoI. The system lifetime is as important as cost and incentives.

Solar cell power continues to improve. There have been improvements from metal pastes and processes. Performance loss impacts the RoI. The US Department of Energy hired JPL to develop 30-year PV modules. Recent cost pressures have led to the dramatic changes in module materials and a lack of transparency.

Analyzing modules from the recent service environments show performance issues. Certification does not mitigate risk. Tests do not predict the actual field performance. He showed tier-1 solar panel manufacturing problems from China, Japan and the USA. Backsheet is critical to protect solar panels. Few materials have lengthy field experience. We will continue to see drop in prices for solar panels and opening of new markets. Focus for PV module makers will remain efficiency, etc.

Why do we need 450mm wafers?

Here is a view from Mike Bryant of Future Horizons, taken from the Enable450 newsletter, for which, I must thank Malcolm Penn, chairman and CEO.

This is a question often asked by journalists and others not directly involved in 450mm technology, and indeed was one of the questions that formed the basis of the SMART 2010/062 report Future Horizons produced for the European Commission.

Mike Bryant.

It is also a question every new 450mm project has to answer in its funding request to the European Commission, and whilst working on the Bridge450 submission we realised the arguments have become rather unclear over time. The following gives some insight and clarity into the question.

In 1970, Gordon Moore re-formulated predictions on computer storage by Turing and others into a simple statement that the number of transistors per unit area of an IC will double every two years for at least the next ten years. This became known as “Moore’s Law” and apart from the occasional hiccup has in fact been followed for the past forty years. Note that Moore never suggested a doubling in density every 18 months, this time period coming from a different statement concerning transistor performance.

Of course, doubling the number of transistors would not be that helpful if the price per unit area also doubled. The semiconductor industry has thus strived to maintain the cost of manufacturing per unit area at a constant price, and analysed over time has done a remarkable job in maintaining this number such that the ASP of logic devices has sat at around $9 per square centimetre for this whole period during which the cost of everything else including the equipment, materials and labour used to make the IC have increased, labour costs in particular increasing by a factor of around five times.

The actual cost of processing a wafer appreciates by around 6 percent per annum due to technology cycle upgrades and insertions, for example in the past the replacement of aluminium interconnects with copper or more recently the move to double patterning for lithography of critical layers. Several approaches have been used to maintain a constant area cost, these being:

Improvements in yield – this obviously reduces wastage and vast improvements have been made in this field though yields are now so good that the problem is more maintaining these levels with each new process node rather than improving them further.

Increasing levels of automation – this is still an area undergoing improvement but again we have entered an area of diminishing returns on the investment required.

Introducing larger wafer sizes – this has been performed on an irregular basis over the history of the semiconductor industry. The increase in surface area reduces many but not all of the processing costs whilst material costs tend to stay fairly constant per unit area. Thus at the 300mm transition the increase in area by 2.25 times gave a cost per unit area reduction of 30 percent, approximately compensating for the increased processing costs acquired over the 90nm and 65nm nodes.

Focusing light on breast cancer diagnostics

A team of scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), comprising principally of Dr. Ishan Barman, Dr. Narahara Chari Dingari and Dr. Jaqueline Soares, and their clinical collaborators at University Hospitals, Cleveland have developed the Raman scattering-based concomitant diagnosis of breast cancer lesions and related micro-calcifications.

Let’s find out more about this new breast cancer research done by the team at MIT.

Early detection necessary!
According to MIT, one in eight women in the US will suffer from breast cancer in her lifetime and breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death in women. Worldwide, breast cancer accounts for 22.9 percent of all cancers (excluding non-melanoma skin cancers) in women. In 2008, breast cancer caused 458,503 deaths worldwide (13.7 percent of cancer deaths in women).

Core needle biopsy.

Therefore, technological advancements for its early detection and subsequent treatment can make a significant impact by preventing patient morbidity and mortality and reducing healthcare costs, and are thus of utmost importance to society. Currently, mammography followed by stereotactic breast biopsy serves as the most promising route for screening and early detection of cancer lesions.

Nearly 1.6 million breast biopsies are performed and roughly 250,000 new breast cancers are diagnosed in the US each year. One of the most frequent reasons for breast biopsy is microcalcifications seen on screening mammography, the initial step in early detection of breast cancer. Microcalcifications are micron-scale deposits of calcium minerals in breast tissue that are considered one of the early mammographic signs of breast cancer and are, therefore, a target for stereotactic breast needle biopsy.

However, despite stereotactic guidance, needle biopsy fails to retrieve microcalcifications in one of five breast biopsy patients. In such cases, the resulting breast biopsies are either non-diagnostic or false-negative, thereby, placing the patient at risk and potentially necessitating a repeat biopsy, often as a surgical procedure.

There is an unmet clinical need for a tool to detect microcalcifications in real time and provide feedback to the radiologist during the stereotactic needle biopsy procedure as to whether the microcalcifications seen on mammography will be retrieved or the needle should be re-positioned, without the need to wait for a confirmatory specimen radiograph.

Such a tool could enable more efficient retrieval of microcalcifications, which would, in turn, minimize the number of x-rays and tissue cores required to achieve a diagnostic biopsy, shorten procedure time, reduce patient anxiety, distress and discomfort, prevent complications such as bleeding into the biopsy site seen after multiple biopsy passes and ultimately reduce the morbidity and mortality associated with non-diagnostic and false-negative biopsies and the need for follow up surgical biopsy.

If 200,000 repeat biopsies were avoided, at a cost of $5,000 per biopsy (a conservative estimate and would be much higher for surgical biopsies), a billion dollars per year can be saved by the US healthcare system. The MIT Laser Biomedical Research Center, has recently performed pioneering studies to address this need by proposing, developing and validating Raman and diffuse reflectance spectroscopy as powerful guidance tools, due to their ability to provide exquisite molecular information with minimal perturbation.

Specifics of the technique
Stating the specifics of the technique developed by MIT, the team said that their research focuses on the development of Raman spectroscopy as a clinical tool for the real time diagnosis of breast cancer at the patient bedside. “We report for the first time development of a novel Raman spectroscopy algorithm to simultaneously determine microcalcification status and diagnose the underlying breast lesion, in real time, during stereotactic breast core needle biopsy procedures.”

Microcalcification..

In this study, Raman spectra were obtained ex vivo from fresh stereotactic breast needle biopsies using a compact clinical Raman system, modeled and analyzed using support vector machines to develop a single-step, Raman spectroscopy based diagnostic algorithm to distinguish normal breast tissue, fibrocystic change, fibroadenoma and breast cancer, with and without microcalcifications.

The developed decision algorithm exhibits a positive and negative predictive value of 100 percent and 96 percent, respectively, for the diagnosis of breast cancer with or without microcalcifications in the clinical dataset of nearly 50 patients.

Significantly, the majority of breast cancers diagnosed using this Raman algorithm are ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), the most common lesion associated with microcalcifications, which has classically presented considerable diagnostic challenges.

This study demonstrates the potential of Raman spectroscopy to provide real-time feedback to radiologists during stereotactic breast needle biopsy procedures, reducing non-diagnostic and false negative biopsies. Indeed, the proposed approach lends itself to facile assembly of a side-viewing probe that could be inserted into the central channel of the biopsy needle for intermittent acquisition of the spectra, which would, in turn, reveal whether or not the tissue to be biopsied contains the targeted microcalcifications.

Tensilica to expand Cadence IP footprint in SoCs

Chris Rowan.

Tensilica DPU solutions are meant for broad applications. It is focusing on three key verticals — Hi-Fi audio voice, IVP imaging and Diamond controllers, as well as the Xtensa. Tensilica will expand the Cadence IP footprint in SoCs. This compliments Cadence and Cosmic Circuits interface and analog IPs.

How does all of this fit into Cadence’s vision of an IP factory? According to Chris Rowan, founder and CTO, Tensilica, there will likely be an IP bazaar, architected  for efficiency, quality and strong focus on integration. He was speaking on the concluding day of the 13th Global Electronics Summit at Santa Cruz, USA.

Complex imaging functions are now everywhere. There are some challenges here such as computational demands. The off-load opportunity means more operations, and lower power per operation.

The Tensilica IVP – image/video processing family consists of the IVP, a high-performance DSP subsystem. It is built for low energy handheld devices. It also has licensable, synthesizable core with rich software tools and libraries. The IVP core has 32 element engines. The IVP has many parallel ‘element engines’ + Xtensa control programmed as SMID  uniprocessor. Application examples include feature detection, 3D noise reduction filter, and video stabiilizer.

IVP is meeting tomorrow’s imaging requirements. It is built for very high imaging efficiency. It is easy to program and is scalable — and can use multiple cores.There is a huge market in many applications. An example of how Tensilica will fit into Cadence’s IP factory is the DTV application.

Together, Cadence and Tensilica will increase customer value. They will accelerate the time-to-market with solution proven customizable design IP. There will be fully integrated data plane solutions for optimized solutions, power and area for various applications. High quality IP subsystems are tested to work optimally together. It is highly complementary to partner CPUs. It is also highly complementary to Cadence’s broad connectivity/AMS design IP, verification IP offerings, and foundry-qualified SoC design tools.

The partnership will also bolster Cadence as a next-generation IP provider. There will be an enhanced portfolio of advanced IP in advanced nodes spanning a wide range of applications. It will address seamless designs from architecture definition to silicon
tape-out. It will also strengthen solutions to address key market segments.

Intelligent evolution of FPGAs

Vince Hu.

FPGAs serve highly diverse applications. Tailored devices are serving diverging market needs. According to Vince Hu, VP Product & Corporate Marketing, Altera Corp., next-generation portfolio involves an ideal mix of process technologies.

There is greater diversity and capabilities for the broadest range of applications. Finally, Altera has added the 55nm EmbFlash that extends Altera’s tailored approach. Hu was speaking at the 13th Globalpress Electronics Summit being held in Santa Cruz, USA.

Addressing needs of higher-volume systems is key. Industrial and automotive systems tend to be cost sensitive, low power and limited in broad areas. There is an increased pressure to innovate leading to a strong demand for programmable solutions with enhanced features. Altera is expanding the capabilities of non-volatile programmable logic devices (PLDs).

Altera is also bolstering high-volume system solutions. TSMC leading-edge embedded flash technology is a device tailored for high-volume applications. It adds more functionality to non-volatile PLDs. It also re-inforces Altera’s commitment to high-volume applications.

In addressing power/performance challenges, 20SoC is said to be the  quickest path to next-generation process. It is tailored for a range of performance and bandwidth-critical applications. There is up to 60 percent lower power vs. 28nm. One of the latest results with 20SoC  process is the first 32Gbps transceivers that are operating in 20nm silicon.

Currently, high-end applications are pushing the envelope. Intel’s 14nm tri-gate is said to be a game changer for FPGAs. Tri-gate
surrounds channel on the three sides. It increases channel performance and reduces power. Tri-gate is a proven, second- generation technology. The 14nm tri-gate maintains the Moore’s Law.

Driving toward 400G OTN systems
Altera has acquired OTN IP provider TPACK. It accelerates the company’s OTN roadmap and builds on the Avalon acquisition in 2010. OTN IP, combined with high-performance silicon, positions Altera for continued growth in the high-end networking market.

Tailored devices are now serving diverging market needs. It is an extension of Altera’s tailored approach. There are even greater diversity and capabilities, serving the broadest range of applications. A mixture of application-specific IP provides even greater tailored solutions. Altera is mixing the advanced FinFET process, traditional HKMG planar process and embedded flash technology.

Brocade intros HyperEdge architecture for campus networks

Brocade has announced its HyperEdge architecture, a unified wired and wireless infrastructure, it claims is as dynamic as its users.

Edgar Dias, regional director and country manager, India, said that mobility Is redefining how we access information and connect to each other. By 2020, there are likely to be over 30 billion connected things, with over 200 billion with intermittent connections.

The number of wireless devices connecting to the corporate network has been exploding. It is estimated that by 2016, two-thirds of the mobile workforce will own a smartphone, and 40 percent of the workforce will be mobile.

Healthcare revolutionized by mobility. About 80 percent of remote patient monitoring will be by mobile devices by 2016. Education engages with wireless devices as well, with universities projected to spend more than $837 million on WiFi access points and controllers in 2013. About 22 percent of pupil-facing computers will be tablets by 2015.

The three things required from a campus network solution include reduced complexity, integrated wired and wireless, and investment protection. Mobility changes the game for all organizations and their IT departments. The campus network takes center stage in staying competitive.

Brocade’s HyperEdge architecture.

Brocade’s HyperEdge architecture is agile, as there are collapsed network layers with active links and intelligent wireless AP traffic management for mobile users. It is also automated, simplified with reduced management touch points, and self discovery and configuration of wired and wireless devices. Lower cost of acquisition and operation makes it cost effective.

HyperEdge innovation radically simplifies management, and improves performance. Distributed services such as advanced features and capabilities are propagated across premium and entry level switches. Consolidated management leads to shared switch configuration and network policies, automated management and software updates.

There are active-active links that eliminates STP to improve efficiency and performance. Multichannel trunking is available to scale and interconnect. Distributed AP forwarding leads to intelligent access points route traffic locally to avoid controller bottlenecks. There is the  centralized AP management, where controller based management keeps costs low and coverage levels high. Lastly, there are self-healing access points that automatically adjust to maintain coverage in the event of an access point failure.

New set of rules in IGBT market

The insulated-gate bipolar transistor (IGBT) is a three-terminal power semiconductor device. The main trends impacting IGBT include the power stack trend, revolution of Chinese IGBT, growth of IGBT use in consumer applications, and competition from SiC and GaN based devices, respectively.

According to Alexander Avron, Yole Developpement, current density of the IGBT has been multiplied by 3.5 in 20 years. IGBT technology is now very mature, using trenches and thin wafer. Wafer size for IGBT production is still growing and Infineon is currently the leader.

Infineon expects a cost advantage of 20-30 percent by increasing the wafer size from 8- to 12-inches. For Infineon, the 12-inch production line is for MOSFETSs, and they will probably produce IGBT 600V on thin wafer. Fairchild and IR prefer to remain at 8-inch.

Technology roadmap
A new generation release is always a low voltage product (600-900V). Main improvements have been in losses reduction. In the IGBT supply chain, vertically integrated companies are Japanese only, besides a few, like ABB. Only a few companies, like Danfoss, take advantage of doing module and inverter for motor drives. In a cost-driven market, there is not much competitive advantage in developing own module.

Trends impacting IGBT
Power stack trend - The need for more modularity and higher performance made components makers (active and passive) to join and create consortiums or JVs. It is trending toward more integration.

Revolution of the Chinese IGBT - First Chinese companies are starting to manufacture IGBTs using standard technology and low cost, perfect for a local market. Asian players are becoming a greater part of the IGBT market. While they do not make a lot of devices as yet, it is expected that they will quickly gain market shares in low cost local businesses.

Some new entrants include CSMC, Hua-Hong NEC, PSMC, BYD, Grace Semiconductor, Alpha & Omega Semiconductor, etc. Many Chinese companies are very close to or already able to manufacture their own IGBTs. This will grow and create a Chinese IGBT.

Growth of IGBT use in consumer applications - IGBTs are becoming more part of the consumer lifestyle. Renewable energies and EV/HEV are good examples. Pioneers of HV IGBT have the best market shares. Margin for HV IGBT modules is high. It is first in the EV/HEV and renewables markets. New markets are targeted by all players.

Source: Yole Developpement, France.

The ASP evolution of consumer markets has dropped down very fast as compared to the industrial markets. Also, DLB or direct lead bonding is a specific technology from Mitsubishi Electric to produce epoxy molded power modules for hybrid and electric cars. Mass production is targeted for 2013.

Competition from SiC and GaN - Next generation devices are becoming available. They will displace IGBT, but not at all the levels and in all the applications. Characteristics of GaN-based inverters are: they primarily target medium voltage apps (200-600V range). SiC diodes are already in production, mainly coupled with IGBT. Penetration of SiCs in wind turbines will happen later than expected.

As for the 2006-2020 power devices market forecast, Yole expects a more stable growth by 2020. There was an unanticipated slowdown in 2012. The market share in 2011 was Mitsubishi 27 percent, Infineon 23 percent, Fuji Electric 11 percent, etc. The IGBT market share was Infineon 35 percent, Mitsubishi 32 percent, Hitachi 12 percent, ABB 9 percent, respectively.

Yole estimates that at least 15 companies – foundries, fab lights and fabs — are working on IGBT development in China.