Mannerisms

Are chips like humans? After all chips can replicate all five senses and the brain. They are the basis of seeing, smelling, hearing, feeling, tasting and thinking machines.

One of the things which people and chips have in common is that they’re both measured in frequencies.

Are we out-sourcing brain-usage? Popping into my local Waterstones this afternoon after Ben Elton’s latest novel, I take a twirl around the shelves, don’t see it, so ask the lady on duty where I could find a copy.

It was amazing to me that Henry Nicholas, co-founder of Broadcom, has a $30 million sex cave under his house, and prostitutes on his payroll, and smoked so much marijuana that the pilot of a private jet had to wear an oxygen mask.

It's good to see start-ups doing something dramatic. So many do incremental stuff - 30 per cent more performance, 30 per cent less power etc. Grand aspirations were what the semiconductor industry used to be about.

Entrepreneurs are rightly valued as people who take great risks and inspire others to follow in their footsteps but, as the legendary former CEO of Toshiba Semiconductor, Tsuyoshi Kawanishi points out in his book Chip Management, many others are also responsible for a company's success.

So, Frans van Houten is to step down as CEO of NXP. For NXP this could be a good thing. I like Frans van Houten, but he's not a semiconductor guy.

The most miserable thing about downturns is job losses. If you keep your job through a recession, the recession doesn't hurt you. If you lose it, it hurts like hell.

These top chaps have an amazing cheek. Here comes Intel's management saying it will reduce its payments into its employees' retirement plans. How much cash does Intel have in the bank? $14 billion.

Before you accept that ego-boosting offer to design ICs for Apple, don't forget to ask about the hours. A story in the Wall Street Journal this week suggests they may be longer than you think.