May 2011 Archives

Intel's efforts at diversification have become something of an industry joke. Ventures into consumer electronics (twice) ASICs (twice) telecoms (multiple) have gone sadly awry.

So, 50 years ago, starts a story in Electronics Weekly's edition of April 26^th 1961.

According to Bo Lojek's incomparable History of Semiconductor Engineering, when the great Bob Widlar, designer of the 702 and 709, left Fairchild to go to National in December 1965, Fairchild carried on paying Widlar until April 1966 and never tried to recover the money.

The wiseheads of European technology are beginning to coalesce around the idea of  a 450mm fab in Europe.

There was once a brilliant scientist who founded four semiconductor companies and, at one of them, figured out a way to make reliable ICs in high volumes.

Question: Who can destroy $13 billion of industrial value in five years? Answer: A private equity company.

Europe has to look outside its borders if it is to survive as a semiconductor producing region. That was the clear message of the SEMI conference in Brussels this week.

If any country was due for a sharp dose of socialism, it is America.

The first electronic computer to be installed by an airline for weight and baggage control has been brought into operation by Scandinavian Airlines Systems, at Copenhagen.'

So starts a story, 50 years ago, in Electronics Weekly's edition of April 19^th 1961.

Other companies besides Intel may adopt Finfet at the 22nm generation of process technology, according to Luc van den Hove, President of Imec, Europe's foremost microelectronics research establishment.

'Problem. I've got this audio business unit which is potentially very profitable, but it's vastly overstaffed,' writes Ed in his diary, 'Solution simple - fire half  the staff. But the problem is most of the employees are in France where sacking people is hellishly complicated, time-consuming and politically unpopular. I might piss off the French public authorities which I don't want to do.'

The Intel Finfet play is like something from times past. Thirty or forty years ago chip companies would take out ads or hold press conferences saying stuff like: "Our ISO-CMOS junction-isolated 2.0 micron process delivers 30 per cent better performance than our best competitor while using half the power."

Flash is good. Toshiba the inventor and (almost) joint No.1 supplier of NAND was the third largest IC supplier in Q1, while the NAND-less Elpida's revenues dropped 31% and the company slipped four positions down IC Insights' rankings to end up at No.17.

One of the analogue industry's most exceptional managers - who founded one of the industry's leading companies - had a torrid entry into entrepreneurship.

"2010 was the highest year on record for gold demand in electronics at 326.8 tonnes or $12.9 billion," says the World Gold Council.

For a $40 billion revenue company in a $300 billion industry, Intel is sounding remarkably defensive these days.

So now there's an EC-backed Human Brain Project, led by the Swiss research institute EPFL to bring together everything we know, and all we can learn, about the workings of brain molecules, cells and connections.

'An early reply is expected to the BBC's latest approach to the Postmaster-General for authority to start experimental colour broadcasting.'

So, 50 years ago, started a story in Electronics Weekly's edition of May 10^th 1961.

NFC is an opportunity for handset makers to make some big money. Apple, with its existing iTunes payment system, could clean up if it puts NFC technology in its phones and allows people to pay for goods with their iPhones, by-passing Visa, Mastercard, Amex and the like. Google, via Android phones, could do the same.

In November 1998, Heinrich von Pierer, the CEO of Siemens, told Ulrich Schumacher, the CEO of Siemens's subsidiary Infineon, that it was going to be sold off.

Sometimes  the technical community leave you aghast.

In 1983 there was a semiconductor company which was making memories and microprocessors.  In other words it was competing with Intel. And it was a financial mess.

Google is to launch its own lap-tops in June using Intel processors and the Chrome operating system. Their USP is said to be simpler operation.

When anyone with a laptop, an iPhone or a Android phone can use Skype, what on earth is the point of owning it?

The response of the Japanese to the March 11^th earthquake has excited the admiration of the world.

Thanks to The Foundation for this one -  the 10 products and services that have contributed the least to Britons' lives over the last decade:

Infineon is looking at expanding its 300mm in-house fab capacity stating: 'Infineon will decide about the start and the location of a 300mm volume production during the current fiscal year,' says the company.

'At the present time, the two elemental semiconductor materials, germanium and silicon, are predominant.'

So starts a story, 50 years ago, in the April 26^th 1961 edition of Electronics Weekly.

I suppose we've all known for some time that Icera was going nowhere, but it's still very bad news for the UK industry as a whole that it's been sold off to Nvidia for $367 million - barely $100 million more than the funding it raised.

'The Brats phoned today,' Ed confides to his diary (the 'Brats' being the 20-something year-old, super-clever employees of his company's private equity owners who monitor the investments), 'they wanted to know what I was doing about improving RONA and what figures I was targetting for its improvement.'

A lot of the time these top chaps just don't get it. Think what it would have done for Nokia's morale if they'd gone out and hired Jonathan Ive.

The references of some of the Fairchild Eight when they joined Shockley semiconductor were somewhat underwhelming.

TSMC will not move to Finfets until the 20nm process generation.

The semiconductor industry bellwether, TSMC, was spot on in its pre-earthquake forecast of -3% to -5% measured in NT$. The company came in at - 4.3%.

Thanks to The Foundation for this one - the 10 products and services that have contributed most to British life over the last decade:

Despite 15% revenue growth and 13% unit growth for smartphones in 2010, the smartphone IC business moves towards commoditisation and consolidation like Intel-Infineon; Broadcom-Beceem; Qualcomm-Atheros.

'Exports of  British transistors in February reached a new high level of over £76,000 in value, a 27% increase on January's record total of £59,733. Imports of transistors were up slightly from £74,283 to £82,965, the gap between imports and exports closed to a mere £6,959, the narrowest yet .'

So, 50 years ago, starts a story in the April 26^th 1961 edition of Electronics Weekly.