David Lammers’ blog will look at the stories behind the news shaping the semiconductor industry, including analysis, personality profiles, and quirky happenings. en-us http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427.html?nid=3890 Copyright 2008 Reed Business Information. Subject to its Terms of Use November 18, 2008 http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/1680036568.html?nid=3890 As the Thanksgiving holiday approaches in the United States, people in the U.S. chip manufacturing business should make a quick bow towards Abu Dha... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/590036259.html?nid=3890 Dean Freeman, the Gartner semiconductor equipment analyst, threw out a zinger when he came to Austin for a SEMI market outlook gathering. The early... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/570035857.html?nid=3890 Innovation is the fourth great economic input, along with labor, capital, and machines, and the hardest to predict. Three innovations which may pay... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/100035410.html?nid=3890 An executive at a major IC manufacturer likes to tell the story about a meeting in 1996 to discuss 300 mm wafers. One after another, CEOs of the ma... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/780034478.html?nid=3890 The debate about the worthiness of high-k/metal gate technology brought to mind what Japanese semiconductor managers said about Hajime Sasaki, who ... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/120033812.html?nid=3890 The Empire State has invested ~$900M in the Albany NanoTech research complex, while IBM and other private companies have invested $3.5B in Albany. ... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/1260033126.html?nid=3890 Tomorrow, Sept. 12th, marks the day 50 years ago when Jack Kilby demonstrated the first integrated circuit at Texas Instruments in Dallas. ... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/590032659.html?nid=3890 Will the market for high-brightness light emitting diodes (HB LEDs) add more sparkle to the nanoimprint lithography (NIL) sector? Patrik Lundstr&ou... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/120032212.html?nid=3890 The competition between flash-based solid-state disk drives (SSDs) and bit patterned media HDDs is shaping up to be an intense race, although not a... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/1100031510.html?nid=3890 Mergers and acquisitions activity has picked up in the semiconductor equipment and materials industry in the last few months (see a list below). Tw... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/1050030905.html?nid=3890 The environmental impact of electronics manufacturing has become a prime concern of governments and people everywhere. A new book written and organ... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/1690029769.html?nid=3890 Bob Johnson, semiconductor manufacturing analyst at Gartner Inc., says there really isn’t any way around it: the equipment industry will reco... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/520029052.html?nid=3890 It now appears that IBM Corp. plans to implement a high-bandwidth silicon-on-insulator (SOI) embedded DRAM (eDRAM) for its server microprocessors a... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/940027294.html?nid=3890 The energy crisis presents opportunities to the long chain of the IT industry, and equipment and materials engineers are right in the thick of it. ... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/650027065.html?nid=3890 Freescale Semiconductor Inc.’s Redistributed Chip Packaging (RCP) technology is an effort that cries out for standards and partners, and Free... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/1940026594.html?nid=3890 Yoon-Woo Lee, named Wednesday (May 14) to the CEO position at Samsung Electronics Co., brings a lead-by-example attitude to his work and an aggress... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/930026093.html?nid=3890 The three companies openly pushing for 450 mm wafers are working on a plan to subsidize the equipment industry’s 450 mm development effort. T... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/10025801.html?nid=3890 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (TSMC) held its annual technology symposium in Austin Tuesday (April 29), with much of the attention on... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/1200024720.html?nid=3890 John Halladay, a clean process manager at Spansion’s Fab 25, brought a good mystery to Sematech’s Surface Preparation and Cleaning Conf... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/400024040.html?nid=3890 Count Bill McClean, president of IC Insights Inc. (Scottsdale, Ariz.), among the optimists. His forecast calls for the overall semiconductor ind... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/560023656.html?nid=3890 That phony veil of dispassion that people often hide behind slipped off at the SEMI Austin forum Wednesday. Tim Hayden, the CEO of Rite Track Inc. ... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/1910021591.html?nid=3890 The problems at Freescale Semiconductor Inc. which forced CEO Michel Mayer to resign today (Feb. 8), and Motorola Inc.’s decision earlier thi... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/1290020929.html?nid=3890 In recent years, the chip industry has pulled a couple of rabbits out of the proverbial magician’s hat: uniaxial strained silicon and immersi... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/500019450.html?nid=3890 It was nearly 10 years ago (August 1998) that IBM’s microelectronics division committed to silicon on insulator (SOI) technology for its high... http://www.semiconductor.net/blog/270000427/post/1700017970.html?nid=3890 Canon Inc., according to a reliable source, has shipped its initial AS7 ArF immersion scanners to customers in Japan, a twin-stage system that&nbsp...