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Commentary / Analysis

• CEO interview: Minima's Tuomas Hollman on why static timing sign-off is over (Tuesday Nov. 30, 2021)
  Tuomas Hollman became CEO of Finnish near-threshold voltage pioneer Minima Processor Oy in May 2019 and since then he has been preparing the startup for growth.
  
  
• Profile of a traceability tool promising automation in SoC designs (Monday Nov. 29, 2021)
  A new tool claims to identify and fix traceability gaps between disparate systems such as requirements, specifications, EDA toolsets, software code, and documentation in system-on-chip (SoC) designs. That allows chip designers to know immediately when a change occurs and its effect on other design artifacts and parts of the system.
  
  
• Samsung Selects Texas as Site for $17 Billion Fab (Thursday Nov. 25, 2021)
  Samsung has chosen a small Texas town near Austin as the site of a $17 billion chip fab, supporting the U.S. effort to strengthen its domestic electronics supply chain.
  
  
• GPU shipments increase year-over-year in Q3 (Thursday Nov. 25, 2021)
  The PC GPU market shipments decreased by -18.2% sequentially from last quarter and increased by 12% year-to-year.
  
  
• The Democratization of Chip Design (Thursday Nov. 25, 2021)
  The well-structured practices of semiconductor design and manufacturing have been flipped on their sides and may never be the same again.
  
  
• North American Semiconductor Equipment Industry Posts October 2021 Billings (Thursday Nov. 25, 2021)
  North America-based semiconductor equipment manufacturers posted $3.74 billion in billings worldwide in October 2021 (three-month moving average basis), according to the October Equipment Market Data Subscription (EMDS) Billings Report published today by SEMI.
  
  
• Annual Revenue Growth to Skyrocket Among Top 25 (Thursday Nov. 18, 2021)
  Big gains in artificial intelligence, machine learning, 5G infrastructure provide strong boost to sales growth at AMD, MediaTek, Nvidia, and Qualcomm this year; declines for Intel and Sony.
  
  
• UK Widens Probe of Nvidia-Arm Deal (Thursday Nov. 18, 2021)
  The U.K. government has launched a 24-week, follow-up investigation into Nvidia’s proposed acquisition of IP vendor Arm, citing and competition and national security concerns. Regulators also published a full report of their initial inquiry that concluded the deal could stifle technology innovation.
  
  
• SMIC Management Shakeup Continues (Monday Nov. 15, 2021)
  Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC) announced several board-level resignations even as business for China’s biggest chip maker soars.
  
  
• After Strong Gains, DRAM Prices Expected To Retreat in 4Q21 (Thursday Nov. 11, 2021)
  DRAM prices soared 41% through the first eight months of 2021, rising from $3.37 in January to $4.77 in August. September’s DRAM ASP slipped 3% to $4.62, which still was a 37% increase from the beginning of the year.
  
  
• Heterogeneous Computing Is About Optimizing Resources (Monday Nov. 08, 2021)
  The rapid emergence of the Compute Express Link (CXL) specification is an excellent example of heterogenous computing — but not all heterogenous computing is necessarily CXL. Rather, it’s about connecting to whatever mix of compute, memory, and storage will best tackle a given workload, without out the need to over-provision.
  
  
• Embedded FPGA (eFPGA) technology: Past, present, and future (Thursday Nov. 04, 2021)
  
  
  
• Worldwide Silicon Wafer Shipments Reach Record High in Third Quarter of 2021, SEMI Reports (Thursday Nov. 04, 2021)
  Worldwide silicon wafer shipments increased 3.3% to 3,649 million square inches in the third quarter of 2021 compared to the previous quarter, a new industry record
  
  
• DDR5 Ecosystem Ramps Up (Tuesday Nov. 02, 2021)
  Like all iterations of DRAM, DDR5 will need an ecosystem of supporting technologies for it to become dominant, even as advanced workloads drive memory bandwidth requirements.
  
  
• Europe opens extended investigation into ARM-Nvidia deal (Thursday Oct. 28, 2021)
  The European Commission has formally opened an in-depth investigation into the ARM-Nvidia deal and is due to report by March 2022
  
  
• SiFive has briefly pulled back the curtains on its most powerful Risc-V processor yet. (Thursday Oct. 28, 2021)
  So far only called ‘Next Generation Core’ or Next-Gen, its official name, final design specs and availability will be unveiled early in December at the Risc-V Summit.
  
  
• Samsung to triple foundry capacity (Thursday Oct. 28, 2021)
  Earlier today, Samsung said it plans to triple its foundry capacity by 2026.
  
  
• Morris Chang says domestic US chip supply chain is impossible (Thursday Oct. 28, 2021)
  Morris Chang says the idea of building a US-based IC supply chain is impossible even if it spent much more than the $52 billion envisaged by the Chips Act.
  
  
• Semiconductor Sector Shows Signs of Cooling (Thursday Oct. 28, 2021)
  There are indications the overheated semiconductor sector may be cooling off after roughly 18 months of record-breaking demand for silicon, wafers and production gear. However, demand for chip design services remained strong during the previous quarter, registering its highest annual growth rate in a decade.
  
  
• Annual Foundry Revenue Expected to Reach Historical High Once Again in 2022 with 13% YoY Increase with Chip Shortage Showing Sign of Easing (Thursday Oct. 28, 2021)
  While the global electronics supply chain experienced a chip shortage, the corresponding shortage of foundry capacities also led various foundries to raise their quotes, resulting in an over 20% YoY increase in the total annual revenues of the top 10 foundries for both 2020 and 2021
  
  
• TSMC Details The Benefits of Its N3 Node (Wednesday Oct. 27, 2021)
  The N3 node, which will provide more of a technological leap than N4, is planned to go into volume production in the second half of 2022. N3 will indeed offer customers the kind of performance improvements they might hope for from a major node jump, though the speed improvement will be at the low-end of TSMC’s projected aspirations from last year; the company also just missed its target for density improvement.
  
  
• North American Semiconductor Equipment Industry Posts September 2021 Billings (Monday Oct. 25, 2021)
  
  
  
• TSMC's Japan Expansion Puts Profit at Risk (Wednesday Oct. 20, 2021)
  
  
  
• Global Silicon Wafer Shipments Projected to Log Robust Growth Through 2024, SEMI Reports (Monday Oct. 18, 2021)
  Global silicon wafer shipments are projected to register robust growth through 2024, with wafer area increasing 13.9% year-over-year in 2021 to a record high of nearly 14,000 millions of square inches (MSI), SEMI reported today
  
  
• Europe to extend investigation of Nvidia-ARM deal (Thursday Oct. 14, 2021)
  A deal for Nvidia to acquire processor licensor ARM is facing an extended EU antitrust investigation, according to a Reuters report. The report also values the deal at $54 billion.
  
  
• IC Industry at Heart of Possible China Takeover of Taiwan (Thursday Oct. 14, 2021)
  The ongoing trade conflict between the U.S. and China has intensified over the past couple of years. Crippling trade sanctions, especially with regard to IC technology, that the U.S. has imposed on Huawei, China’s largest electronics company, and to a lesser extent on SMIC, China’s largest indigenous IC foundry, has, in IC Insights’ opinion, caused China to question how it will be able compete in the future IC and electronics industries.
  
  
• Samsung Foundry Promises Gate All-Around in '22 (Thursday Oct. 14, 2021)
  Samsung Foundry recently held its Foundry Forum where it revealed some details of its semiconductor process roadmaps and fab expansion. Samsung is being most aggressive pursuing the next generation of transistor technology, with plans to reach mass production ahead of TSMC and Intel.
  
  
• Electronic System Design Industry Logs Double-Digit Q2 2021 Year-Over-Year Revenue Growth, ESD Alliance Reports (Thursday Oct. 14, 2021)
  Electronic System Design (ESD) industry revenue increased 14.6% year-over-year from $2,783.9 million to $3,191.4 million in Q2 2021.
  
  
• What's driving the acquisitions in the analog design realm? (Monday Oct. 11, 2021)
  What’s driving acquisitions in the analog and mixed-signal design realm? Most deals recently made in this space don’t fall into the typical unification of competitors swallowing each other to gain market share. Take the case of Renesas Electronics, a digitally-focused company, which has acquired Intersil, IDT, and Dialog Semiconductor.
  
  
• Global Semiconductor Sales Increase 29.7% Year-to-Year, 3.3% Month-to-Month in August (Tuesday Oct. 05, 2021)
  The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) today announced global semiconductor industry sales were $47.2 billion in the month of August 2021, an increase of 29.7% over the August 2020 total of $36.4 billion and 3.3% more than the July 2021 total of $45.7 billion.