IP hot spot forms in Egypt

Peter Clarke, EETimes Europe
September 10, 2015

The formation of a set of semiconductor companies in and around Cairo, Egypt, provides hints that a possible clustering effect may be taking place there.

I have spotted four companies of various ages operating in and around Cairo. It's probably too soon to call it the Cairo Cluster or Silicon Sphinx but the region has clearly produced some exceptional individuals that are set to drive positive feedback in the universities and in startup mentoring.

The oldest of the companies is Si-Ware Systems Ltd., which describes itself as a fabless semiconductor company. Founded back in 2004 by Hisham Haddara, Ayman Ahmed and Bassan Saadany, the company has three divisions that produce MEMS interface ASICs, all-silicon oscillators and optical MEMS technology.

However, the company started out in design services before creating a building block approach called SiMOST to allow the integration of MEMS optical elements to create custom structures etched on silicon-on-insulator (SOI) wafers. Si-Ware has between 50 and 200 employees according to its LinkedIn description.

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