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Commentary / Analysis

• Recovery in 2013 Semiconductor Capex (Tuesday Apr. 30, 2013)
  Semiconductor manufacturing equipment has been on an upswing for the last few months. Combined data from Semiconductor Equipment and Materials International (SEMI) and Semiconductor Equipment Association of Japan (SEAJ) shows three-month-average bookings have increased for five consecutive months through March 2013. Billings have increased for the last two months.
  
  
• MCU Market on Migration Path to 32-bit and ARM-based Devices (Monday Apr. 29, 2013)
  In 2012, MCUs turned into a convoluted marketplace with unit shipments surging 16%, but total revenues declining 3% and average selling prices (ASPs) plunging 17%. While uncertainty about the global economy played a factor in lowering MCU revenues, the market was significantly undermined by price erosion in 2012 as competition intensified in 32-bit microcontrollers.
  
  
• Top MEMS Foundries: TSMC passes specialty MEMS players in Yole's annual ranking (Monday Apr. 29, 2013)
  In 2012, TSMC’s MEMS foundry business enjoyed ~80% growth, achieved ~$42 million in sales and moved up to third place in Yole Développement’s annual MEMS foundry sector rankings. The Taiwanese foundry’s MEMS business is now the largest of any open foundry, putting it shoulder-to-shoulder with pure-play specialty MEMS foundries like TELEDYNEDALSA (~$39 million).
  
  
• SMIC rides on China fabless growth (Friday Apr. 26, 2013)
  Five consecutive quarters of revenue growth posted by Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. (SMIC) through the first quarter of 2013 paint a picture of a new SMIC, with solid operations carefully managed by CEO T.Y. Chiu. It also tells a story of the rapid growth of China fabless companies over the recent years and how SMIC is finally profiting from that trend.
  
  
• AMD will go embedded with ARM (Tuesday Apr. 23, 2013)
  As Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (Sunnyvale, Calif.) emerges from the management revolution of 2012 it is moving quickly to try and accommodate a computing revolution. Part of the revolution is the Internet of things which AMD says it plans to address and that surely means that AMD will be offering ARM-based solutions for embedded applications.
  
  
• Worldwide Semiconductor Manufacturing Equipment Spending Declined 16 Percent in 2012, According to Final Results by Gartner (Monday Apr. 22, 2013)
  Worldwide semiconductor capital equipment spending totaled $37.8 billion in 2012, a 16.1 percent decline from 2011, according to final results by Gartner, Inc.
  
  
• Mobile SoCs still lacking good software model (Monday Apr. 22, 2013)
  The industry lacks consensus on how to program the heterogeneous mobile SoCs now on the rise in smartphones and tablets. But the good news is some promising power-friendly techniques are starting to emerge.
  
  
• Will ASICs be replaced in comms gear? (Friday Apr. 19, 2013)
  Nick McKeown, an engineering professor at Stanford University, expects a new breed of merchant networking processors to replace ASICs in routers and switches over the next decade.
  
  
• North American Semiconductor Equipment Industry Posts March 2013 Book-to-Bill Ratio of 1.14 (Friday Apr. 19, 2013)
  North America-based manufacturers of semiconductor equipment posted $1.14 billion in orders worldwide in March 2013 (three-month average basis) and a book-to-bill ratio of 1.14, according to the March Book-to-Bill Report published today by SEMI.
  
  
• Cheap smartphone boom bodes ill for Intel (Thursday Apr. 18, 2013)
  Intel is not well poised for the battle ahead in smartphones costing less than $350, expected to drive most of the sector’s growth, said a market watcher.
  
  
• ARM's low end undercut by Andes core (Thursday Apr. 18, 2013)
  Taiwan's Andes is shipping a processor core that uses 30 percent less power than an ARM Cortex M0 at the same performance as well as a new high-end core for networking.
  
  
• Could Intel's new CEO be blast from past? (Tuesday Apr. 16, 2013)
  The world’s biggest chip maker is due for a new chief executive in less than 30 days and a returning veteran could fill the chair nicely. The clock is ticking down toward the deadline for Intel to name a new chief executive, and people are starting to notice. Paul Otellini is set to retire on May 16 when the world’s largest semiconductor maker has its next shareholder meeting.
  
  
• What Imagination must do next (Monday Apr. 15, 2013)
  The integration of any two companies is a painful process. I got further explanation about the exodus of former MIPS people -- sales and FAEs -- in Korea, Taiwan, Japan and China.
  
  
• 5 questions with TSMC founder Morris Chang (Monday Apr. 15, 2013)
  It’s a rare treat to get a chance to ask a few questions of Morris Chang, the man who invented the semiconductor foundry model when he helped found Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. back in 1987. The man referred to within TSMC simply as “chairman” typically travels to the U.S. just once a year.
  
  
• TSMC starts FinFETs in 2013, tries EUV at 10 nm (Friday Apr. 12, 2013)
  Facing heated competition from Globalfoundries and Samsung, TSMC pulled in plans for initial production of its 16-nm FinFET process to the end of 2013. In addition, it hopes to adopt extreme ultraviolet lithography to make 10-nm chips starting in late 2015 but is still researching e-beam as an alternative.
  
  
• Multimode "Thin" Baseband Chip Market Grew 892% in 2012 (Thursday Apr. 11, 2013)
  The highest cellular chip growth rate last year was the multimode stand-alone (3G/LTE) baseband chip market at 892% for a total of $852 million. That represented 50 million modems and another 20 million 3G/LTE digital basebands integrated with application processors (DBB Apps Processors) brought the 3G/LTE basebands to 70 million total units.
  
  
• Fourth-Quarter Reprieve Brings Little Relief to Semiconductor Makers in 2012 - but Spurs 2013 Rebound (Wednesday Apr. 10, 2013)
  Global semiconductor revenue in 2012 declined by 2.2 percent from 2011, according to final results from the IHS iSuppli Competitive Landscaping Tool (CLT) from information and analytics provider IHS (NYSE: IHS). The preliminary forecast issued by IHS in December projected a drop of 2.3 percent.
  
  
• SEMI Reports 2012 Global Semiconductor Materials Sales of $47.1 Billion (Tuesday Apr. 09, 2013)
  The global semiconductor materials market decreased 2 percent in 2012 compared to 2011 while worldwide semiconductor revenues declined 3 percent. Revenues of $47.11 mark the first decline in the semiconductor materials market in three years.
  
  
• More Than One Fourth of Industry Wafer Capacity Dedicated to <40nm Process Geometries (Thursday Apr. 04, 2013)
  More than one quarter of installed wafer capacity worldwide is dedicated to producing IC devices using process geometries (or feature sizes) smaller than 40nm, according to data in IC Insights’ Global Wafer Capacity 2013
  
  
• TSMC expected to begin 20-nm line early (Thursday Apr. 04, 2013)
  Foundry Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (Hsinchu, Taiwan) is reportedly going to start installing equipment for 20-nm CMOS production at its Fab 14 on April 20, two months earlier than previously planned.
  
  
• Yoshida in China: Imagination dumps MIPS sales team (Thursday Apr. 04, 2013)
  
  
  
• Worldwide Semiconductor Revenue Declined 2.6 Percent in 2012, According to Final Results by Gartner (Wednesday Apr. 03, 2013)
  Total worldwide semiconductor revenue reached $299.9 billion in 2012, down 2.6 percent from 2011, according to Gartner, Inc. With the overall semiconductor market decline, the number of vendors that declined among the top 25 outnumbered those that grew.
  
  
• China fabless: Actions Semi targets 'non-Apple market' (Wednesday Apr. 03, 2013)
  Some see one of China's oldest fabless chip supplier as a shrinking player in the diminishing MP3 player market. Maybe not.
  
  
• Yoshida in China: What's Calxeda doing here? (Tuesday Apr. 02, 2013)
  In Beijing, I ran into Barry Evans, a brain behind the famed Xscale processor SoC, now a co-founder and CEO at Calxeda.
  
  
• Would the real Apple A5 please stand up? (Tuesday Apr. 02, 2013)
  Apple A-5's shrink has less to do with process and more to do with fewer circuits.
  
  
• Global Semiconductor Sales Remain Ahead of 2012 Pace in February (Tuesday Apr. 02, 2013)
  SIA today announced that worldwide sales of semiconductors reached $23.25 billion for the month of February 2013, an increase of 1.4 percent from February 2012 when sales were $22.93 billion.
  
  
• EDA Consortium Reports Revenue Increase for Q4 2012 (Monday Apr. 01, 2013)
  The EDA Consortium (EDAC) Market Statistics Service (MSS) today announced that the Electronic Design Automation (EDA) industry revenue increased 4.6 percent for Q4 2012 to $1779.1 million, compared to $1700.1 million in Q4 2011.
  
  
• Lenovo to design own chips (Monday Apr. 01, 2013)
  Lenovo, the second largest smartphone supplier in China, will get into the chip design business with a special focus on smartphones and tablets, EE Times has learned.
  
  
• Next ARM CEO's 10 toughest tasks (Thursday Mar. 28, 2013)
  On July 1, Simon Segars is set to become the third CEO in the history of processor licensing vendor ARM Holdings plc. Segars' job is no walk in the park. Despite ARM's success in recent years, the company is fighting high-stakes battles on many fronts.
  
  
• Pure-Play Foundries and Fabless Suppliers are Star Performers in Top 25 2012 Semiconductor Supplier Ranking (Thursday Mar. 28, 2013)
  The top 25 ranking includes three pure-play foundries (TSMC, GlobalFoundries, and UMC) and six fabless companies. In 2012, the pure-play foundries and fabless companies were the star performers.