News & Analysis
Renesas Electronics Introduced Two DTV and Set-Top Box SoCs for Digital TV Broadcasting Market in Japan and South America
Renesas today announced the availability of two new system-on-chips (SoCs) for digital TVs, set top boxes, and digital broadcast receiver modules. The EMMA™3TJ and the EMMA3TS specifically target the terrestrial digital broadcasting market in Japan and South American countries such as Brazil, Argentina, and Venezuela.
Imec welcomes new research partners to its GaN research program
Micron Technology, Applied Materials, and Ultratech have joined the imec industrial affiliation program (IIAP) on GaN-on-Si technology. This multi-partner R&D program focuses on the development of GaN-on-Si (gallium nitride-on-silicon) process and equipment technologies for manufacturing solid state lighting (e.g. LEDs) and next-generation power electronics components on 8-inch Si wafers.
Imec’s SiGe MEMS technology platform improves performance of state-of-the-art MEMS
Imec demonstrates the value of its SiGe above-IC MEMS technology platform for improving performance of state-of-the-art MEMS with the development of new MEMS devices. The new devices are a 15µm SiGe micromirror and a grating light valve for high-resolution displays. The devices were realized with imec’s generic CMOS-compatible MEMS process for the monolithic integration of MEMS devices directly on top of CMOS metallization.
Imec reports record efficiencies for large-area epitaxial thin-film silicon solar cells
Imec realized large-area (70cm2) epitaxial solar cells with efficiencies of up to 16.3% on high-quality substrates. And efficiencies of up to 14.7% were achieved on large-area low-quality substrates, showing the potential of thin-film epitaxial solar cells for industrial manufacturing. The results were achieved within imec’s silicon solar cell industrial affiliation program (IIAP) that explores and develops advanced process technologies aiming ...
u-blox expands production capacity to South America
u-blox, a leading supplier of embedded wireless and global positioning semiconductors and modules, has expanded contract manufacturing capacity for its’ LEON GSM/GPRS module to Brazil. The new production line is intended to meet the rapidly growing demand for wireless modems used for Automatic Vehicle Location (AVL) amongst other applications. Utilizing a combination of GPS positioning with mobile communications, AVL is a powerful tool for trac...
Plessey's bipolar process technology now available
Plessey Semiconductors today announced that they had successfully transferred their first bipolar process, the W-series process, onto their 8-inch line in Plymouth, England. The W-series bipolar process is a critical process for a number of new product releases as well as part of the ongoing support Plessey is providing to its existing foundry customers.
Theoretical Physicist Dr. Michio Kaku to Deliver NIWeek 2010 Keynote
National Instruments has announced that Dr. Michio Kaku, best-selling author and professor at City College of New York, will deliver the closing keynote address at NIWeek 2010, the world’s largest graphical system design conference and exhibition scheduled for Aug. 3–5 in Austin, Texas.
Cypress Envirosystems' Wireless Pneumatic Thermostat Wins Gold in ACHR News 2010 Dealer Design Awards
Cypress Envirosystems was recognized for excellence in product design in the 6th annual Dealer Design Awards Program sponsored by The Air Conditioning Heating & Refrigeration News magazine. An independent panel of 30 contractors acted as judges in the contest that had 114 entries from different industry brands. The company’s Wireless Pneumatic Thermostat (WPT) was the Gold Award Winner in the Commercial Controls category. The ACHR News is the l...
NXP Semiconductors Announces Indicative Preliminary Second Quarter 2010 Results
NXP total sales were between $1,190 and 1,200 million in the second quarter of 2010, reflecting comparable growth of between 5.5% and 6.4% and nominal growth of between 2.1% and 3.0%, as compared to the first quarter of 2010. The increase was visible across all business segments and regions.
SVTC technologies selects Synopsys’ manufacturing tools to accelerate time to comercialisation
Synopsys announced that SVTC Technologies, the leading commercialisation service provider for new, emerging silicon based technologies, has chosen Synopsys’ manufacturing tool suite to enable its customers to reduce time to market for a wide variety of innovative products using CMOS processes, MEMS, photovoltaics and other related nanotechnologies.