Examining Tesla’s Claim on Drastic SiC Reduction
We asked Yole Intelligence to analyze what Tesla’s claim entails and the future of the SiC market.
News & Analysis
Renesas Aims High but Industry Cycle May Take a Toll
By Bolaji Ojo
What’s at stake:
Renesas is aiming for much higher sales and market value by 2030. CEO Shibata believes the goals are achievable but becoming a $20 billion revenue enterprise with six times the capitalization may not depend solely on the company. The cyclical market will also have to play ball.
Prophesee’s Big Three: Sony, Qualcomm and Smartphones
What’s at stake:
The successful rollout of breakthrough technologies is often the raison d’être of startups. Yet, the more unfamiliar the technology, the tougher for a fledgling startup to get the world on board. So it has gone for Prophesee. Prophesee, nonetheless, is on the cusp of turning its event-based image sensor into mainstream image-capture features for smartphone cameras. The startup owes this progress to its two big partners. Sony put Prophesee through the wringer, forcing it to meet its stringent milestone schedule for event-based CMOS image sensor development. A new alliance with Qualcomm provides its Snapdragon platform to run Prophesee’s fusion software.
By teaming with Sony, the world’s largest CMOS image sensor company, and Qualcomm, which commands a 50-percent share of the mobile SoC market, Prophesee, a Paris-based startup, is finally finding a massive volume market for its unique event-based cameras in smartphones.
Read More »Prophesee’s Big Three: Sony, Qualcomm and Smartphones
Is That an AI in My Chip Design?
By Ron Wilson
What’s at Stake:
Advances in AI could change the way chips are designed, potentially slashing design time, engineering staffing, and risk. Or they could be a huge, expensive distraction. Either way, AI is attracting attention and investment in the chip-design community.
Ever since the explosive debut of ChatGPT, a cascade of punditry — with varying degrees of information and understanding — has told us that this changes everything about creative human activities. Given the enormous investment and risk going into chip design in the semiconductor industry, we need to ask just how advances in AI will affect electronic design automation (EDA) — the engine that makes chip design possible.
Read More »Is That an AI in My Chip Design?
Can GM & GlobalFoundries Fix Auto Supply Chain Chaos?
What’s at stake:
Can the automotive industry, hard hit by the global chip shortage, restore order to its chaotic and divided supply chain? General Motors and GlobalFoundries have devised a model they say can provide better visibility for demand and supply. Questions arise: Is the real motive for the new model just to cut out the middlemen? Will chip suppliers have a say? If so, at what cost?
General Motors Co. and GlobalFoundries (GF) have cut a deal. GF, the world’s fourth largest-earning foundry, is establishing a “dedicated capacity exclusively for GM’s chip supply,” while GM makes GF its preferred foundry. The deal compels GM’s semiconductor suppliers to manufacture chips exclusively at GF’s U.S. facility.
Read More »Can GM & GlobalFoundries Fix Auto Supply Chain Chaos?
Buyer Beware: Weaponized SAE Levels Are Here
What’s at stake:
2023 is turning into the year of advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS). Forsaking the futile race to full autonomy, automakers have resorted to testing how much more automation technology they can cram into vehicles while charging more, promising software upgrades and selling consumers the claim that they’ve just bought a safer car.
There’s a catch. While car companies promise drivers more “freedom and convenience” — via eyes-off, hands-off features — they are finding ways to shirk responsibility when highly automated vehicles crash.
Read More »Buyer Beware: Weaponized SAE Levels Are Here
AV Companies Got Real Data in San Francisco. NHTSA Wants It.
What’s at stake:
AV companies in early 2023 are facing an unprecedented level of scrutiny. The city of San Francisco and federal safety regulators want to know a lot more about their technologies and how their systems are set up for safer operation on public roads. The authorities’ focus is less on the promise of AVs saving lots of lives in the long run, but on the records and operational data AV companies have yet to disclose.
The data – or its absence of it – has enabled progress for autonomous vehicle (AV) developers, despite the newness of the industry. Among the advancements they have made are public road testing, deployment of AVs without safety drivers, commercial rollout with paying passengers, and even the drafting of bills — extremely favorable to AV companies — for state legislatures.
Read More »AV Companies Got Real Data in San Francisco. NHTSA Wants It.
If Nobody’s Driving a Self-Driving Car, Who Do You Sue?
What’s at stake:
While carmakers claim their autonomous vehicles (AV) are safe enough to relegate a human driver to “rider” status, they quibble that neither carmaker nor car are liable for mishaps. Now, an AV bill proposed in Washington state goes beyond quibbling, by shielding AV companies from even the whiff of liability.
Autonomous vehicles are neither dead nor going away. Robo-taxis by Cruise and Waymo continue to operate in downtown San Francisco despite repeatedly causing traffic snafus. Next on the AV wish list are self-driving eighteen-wheelers on the highway. No drivers need apply. The industry’s first Level 3 vehicles, which no longer require the human behind the wheel to pay attention to the road (until the car requests him to take over), will hit the consumer market later this year.
Against this backdrop, AV company lobbyists have been advancing, state by state, new legislation that will pave the way for robocars. The objective is a free pass for companies to unleash and test their highly automated vehicles — without human drivers — on public roads, with few safety questions asked and few legal and financial strings attached.
Read More »If Nobody’s Driving a Self-Driving Car, Who Do You Sue?
Girding for War, Taiwan Must Also Invest In Its Economic Future
By Bolaji Ojo
What’s at stake:
As Taiwan braces for a possible takeover by China, it must simultaneously ensure it can build upon decades of economic gains in semiconductors and services.
Taiwan is caught between the proverbial rock and hard place. It is preparing for two mutually exclusive futures, one of which is the preferred option and the other a fearful possibility it is hoping allies can help it fend off. The island could preserve its democratic, peaceful and prosperous existence or slide into the tortuous unknown of a military confrontation with China over Beijing’s demand for reunification with the mainland.
Read More »Girding for War, Taiwan Must Also Invest In Its Economic Future
Taiwan’s Illustrious But Aging Semiconductor Pioneers
By Judith Cheng
Taiwan’s pioneering generation of semiconductor entrepreneurs, many trained in the United States, are nearing the end of their careers. The list below highlights key players in the current Taiwanese chip industry, including those who will seek to maintain Taiwan’s dominance of global chip manufacturing.
Read More »Taiwan’s Illustrious But Aging Semiconductor Pioneers