The Business of Semiconductor Summit, Explained
Semiconductors are now ubiquitous in the global economy. Their role will only expand, which means it is time to take seriously discussions about the business of semiconductor.
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Tenstorrent’s Not-So-Secret AI Plan: ‘Don’t Compete with Nvidia’
What’s at stake:
Startup survival hinges on Rule One: Never run out of money. Whether Cerebra, Tenstorrent, Groq or SambaNova, every AI chip startup faces the underdog challenge of keeping up the money flow in a market where Nvidia calls most of the shots.
Tout the unique architecture of your AI processor/accelerator. Check. Trot out your all-star engineering team. Check. Chart your product roadmap and mark the milestones. Check.
Now, explain a credible strategy for competing toe-to-toe against Goliath and the Philistines … er, Nvidia? Investors and developers want to know.
Read More »Tenstorrent’s Not-So-Secret AI Plan: ‘Don’t Compete with Nvidia’
As 2nm Approaches, the Focus Shifts Toward Interconnect
By Ron Wilson
What’s at stake:
2 nm process nodes will require novel transistors and will push the limits of EUV lithography. But if the interconnect can’t scale as well as the transistors, the new processes will deliver neither the speed, nor the density, nor the power savings designers are seeking.
As the leading edge of the semiconductor manufacturing industry — that is, Intel, Samsung, and TSMC — grinds inexorably toward the 2 nm process node, there has been much discussion of new kinds of transistors and of the new demands on EUV lithography. But another element of process technology is equally critical to the success of 2nm, and equally hard to scale: the interconnect wires that connect the transistors into circuits, and the circuits into functional blocks.
Read More »As 2nm Approaches, the Focus Shifts Toward Interconnect
TSMC’s ‘Invaluable’ Status Makes it a Target. Change, it Must
By Bolaji Ojo
What’s at stake
TSMC’s founders and the government of Taiwan didn’t plan on it becoming such a linchpin in electronic production but now that it has become the world’s No. 1 foundry, the role comes with responsibilities beyond the island’s geographic borders. Is the contract chipmaker willing and ready to shoulder the burdens that governments at home and abroad, customers and the entire semiconductor industry have placed on it?
In market capitalization, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (TSMC) is a distant second to customer Nvidia Corp., the world’s most valuable chipmaker.
Nvidia’s CEO Jensen Huang is on record for admitting his company – without the services provided by TSMC – would either not exist or be a completely different enterprise playing a much smaller role in the electronics value chain.
Not everyone in the electronics market would so bluntly state their reliance on the Hsinchu, Taiwan-based foundry. Apple Inc., the foundry’s biggest and perhaps most important customer accounting for about one-quarter of TSMC’s annual revenue, hardly talks about the supplier it relies upon for the majority of its semiconductor requirements.
The technology world may not admit this reality to themselves, but one company – TSMC – has become its most “invaluable” asset. TSMC is redefining how the industry operates and, in some ways, even its future. This is a fact the industry struggles with, hesitant to openly discuss what could turn into its biggest headache if a major disaster happens in Taiwan or if governments clash over the island’s future.
Read More »TSMC’s ‘Invaluable’ Status Makes it a Target. Change, it Must
What Is a Foundry? Is It Time for Redefinition or Regulation?
By Peter Clarke
What’s at stake?
At stake is hundreds of chip companies’ access to competitive semiconductor manufacturing. As chip and manufacturing processing complexity has increased the openness of the foundry market has diminished and the leader Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) is getting twitchy about the prospect of anti-trust regulation.
Access to semiconductor manufacturing has always been a contentious thing. Back in the very early days vertical integration of technology-based companies was standard. Every chip company was a semiconductor manufacturer that did device design by hand.
Third parties who wanted to benefit from earliest integrated circuits had to go to one of those companies skilled in the art and beg for wafer production otherwise destined for the fab operator’s primary business. Availability could come and go with market demand and lulls.
There were relatively many chip companies – or integrated device manufacturers (IDMs) – particularly across the United States. Each had proprietary methods and preferences and were slightly, or not at all, inclined to provide manufacturing services. And they were in control.
And here we have come full circle but with the change that there’s only somewhere between one and three companies skilled in the art at the leading-edge. Those being Intel, Samsung Electronics and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd.
Read More »What Is a Foundry? Is It Time for Redefinition or Regulation?
Update: CrowdStrike Pushed ‘Data Changes’ Without Testing
CrowdStrike released a preliminary incident report on the catastrophic software update that caused a global IT outage last Friday.
The company’s proposed remedies, in a section entitled “How Do We Prevent This From Happening Again?” parallel recommendations in our previous story.
CrowdStrike now says it will “implement a staggered deployment strategy for Rapid Response Content.” But some details in the preliminary report are surprising, particularly CrowdStrike’s explanation of how it implemented massively deploy its so-called “Rapid Response Content” without testing.
It turns out, as professor Phil Koopman of Carnegie Mellon University, concluded in our recent interview, that Crowdstrike tests software changes subject to phased release by IT groups. “But it pushes data changes straight to production with NO TESTING. The only precaution is a check by CrowdStrike’s own Content Validator.” The Content Validator was defective, added Koopman, “allowing bad content to get through.”
Read More »Update: CrowdStrike Pushed ‘Data Changes’ Without Testing
CrowdStrike’s Update Downfall: Who Dropped the Ball?
By Junko Yoshida
Last Friday’s worldwide IT outage, traced to CrowdStrike, galvanized everyone from corporate board directors and their information security officers to IT managers, cyber security experts and the public at large.
The cause was a faulty update from CrowdStrike, deployed to computers running Microsoft Windows.
The defective updates, which grounded flights, disrupted banking and healthcare services and 911 emergency call centers, made the high-tech industries sit up and wonder:
How did we let this happen?
Read More »CrowdStrike’s Update Downfall: Who Dropped the Ball?
Synaptics Plots Plan for AI PC ‘Edge’
Synaptics wants to “infuse AI” into everything it does: smart homes, smartphones, smart factories or AI PCs.
Chip Vendors Boost SDV Software. Is It Enough?
What’s at stake:
Renesas and NXP are rolling out software-defined vehicle development platforms. A platform encompassing hardware, software and cloud-based tools is a huge advancement compared to past offerings to the automotive industry. But no one dares to promise their effectiveness in a real world where OEMs design SDVs with hardware and software from multiple vendors.
To serve the plans of OEMs designing software-defined vehicles (SDVs), Renesas has unveiled an SDV development platform called “ROX” (R-Car Open Access),” boasting that it integrates “all essential hardware, operating systems (OS), software and tools” automakers need to rapidly develop next-generation vehicles “with secure and continuous software updates,” said Renesas.
Similarly, NXP Semiconductors announced earlier this year “CoreRide” designed to address the complexity, scalability and costs carmakers face as they transition their creaky E/E architecture to newer software-defined vehicle architectures.
This initiative by the two leading automotive chip suppliers illustrates their urgent perception that they must minimize the impact of the software crisis facing many car OEMs.
Read More »Chip Vendors Boost SDV Software. Is It Enough?
How Does Graphcore Fit into SoftBank’s AI Play?
By Peter Clarke
What’s at stake:
At stake is the future of the most important part of the deep technology sector. That is, if you believe that the AI revolution currently permeating the world is going to build on — and be more important than — the transistor, the computer and the Internet. Nvidia is the dominant AI-hardware player seeking to expand in multiple directions. Masayoshi Son, the founder and CEO of SoftBank Group, wants to transform his company into an AI full-stack powerhouse.
Graphcore Ltd. (Bristol, England) has been acquired by Japan’s SoftBank Group, finally confirming rumors of a deal that had circulated for several months.
We don’t know the purchase price but it is expected to have been less than the $700 million of venture capital raised by Graphcore since its formation in 2016; speculations put the price at about $500 million. As such, this feels like a distressed sale despite the positive gloss that CEO Nigel Toon has put on the deal.
Read More »How Does Graphcore Fit into SoftBank’s AI Play?