Mannerisms

First we get IBM saying its Racetrack technology can increase memory density by ten times, then we get Glasgow University saying they can make a molecular switch which could implement a Petabyte memory on a square inch substrate.

But IBM says it will be a decade before Racetrack goes commercial, and Glasgow is even further away from market realisation. God we need this technology and the sooner the better.

Dare one say it? The semiconductor industry has got a bit boring.

Shrinks don’t deliver the same sort of gains in performance and power consumption as they did.

The big companies don’t do anything interesting in their R&D departments.

The financial community understands the chip industry so well that chip CEOs are terrified of being bold.

Venture Capitalists don’t back Big Ideas.

So the industry plods along making incremental improvements, more often trying to gain competitive advantage through the use of the law-courts than the use of their laboratories.

Radically new fundamental technology would change all that.

The industry would be back in the hands of scientists and engineers rather than MBAs and accountants.

The financial community wouldn’t understand it, so wouldn’t be able to control chip industry CEOs

VCs would go potty, after seeing a few big winners, to scramble onto a new bandwagon.

The chip industry’s new products would be irresistible to end product manufacturers, who would have to buy the new chips, or see their products become uncompetitive.

And the chip industry would be off to the races again.

So roll on carbon nanotubes, graphene trannies, and molecular switches – we need you quickly before we all die of boredom.