In the News Business and technology news from the semiconductor and design tool industries.

In the News

Startup Mysticom, Ltd. (Netanya, Israel) is entering the U.S. market, opening an office in Mountain View, Calif. The company was founded in 1997 by a team of communications industry veterans headed by David Almagor, president and chief executive officer; and Israel Greiss, cofounder and chief technical officer. Mysticom will deliver DSP-based semiconductor physical layer (PHY) products--in the form of reusable IP--that will enable semiconductor, ASIC, and system companies to implement cost-efficient broadband communications solutions. It has completed its second round of funding, which was led by Eucalyptus Ventures and includes current investors Newbury Ventures, the Polaris Group, and a number of prominent private investors. The company's initial product offerings will implement PHY for use in the development of such high-speed networking applications as network interface cards, routers, switches, and repeaters.

Mosaid Technologies, Inc. (Ottawa) announced that it has partnered with Toshiba Corp. (Tokyo) to develop, manufacture, and market an SOC targeted at the network switching market. Mosaid will be responsible for the design and sales of the product and Toshiba for its manufacture. Under the terms of the agreement, Toshiba will make a multimillion-dollar contribution toward the development costs of this first device in Mosaid's new switching product line and will retain certain rights to some of the resulting intellectual property.

LSI Logic Corp. (Milpitas, Calif.) and Silterra Sdn. Bhd. (Kulim, Malaysia), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Wafer Technology Sdn. Bhd. (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia), have agreed to share technology licensing and manufacturing. Under the terms of the five-year agreement, LSI Logic will license its deep-submicron G11+ and G12 process technologies to Silterra for use in its Kulim factory, which will be operational in Q4 2000. In exchange, it will receive $120 million in licensing fees, cost-sharing benefits, and an undisclosed equity position in Wafer Technology. As a result, LSI Logic will share development costs with Silterra and will have access to Silterra's foundry services to serve its own customers.

LSI Logic will also incorporate embedded test technology from Logicvision, Inc. (San Jose) into its own very deep submicron IC and SOC design methodology. LSI's design centers worldwide will deploy Logicvision's embedded test technology and automation tools in internally designed cores, standard products, and ASICs. LSI's Flexstream design methodology and Coreware designs will also directly integrate Logicvision's ICBIST tools.

Intel Corp. (Santa Clara, Calif.) has invested in Magma Design Automation, Inc. (Cupertino, Calif.). Under the terms of the agreement, Intel and Magma will cooperate to optimize Magma's software products, including its Blast Fusion product for Intel architecture-based workstations that incorporate the Pentium III Xeon processor and, in the future, the Merced processor.

The Fabless Semiconductor Association (FSA; Dallas) unveiled the results of its annual Wafer and Packaging Demand Survey, designed to give an aggregate view of the growth of the fabless segment. The survey, which includes a small sample of the entire fabless industry that consists of nearly 600 companies worldwide, saw a record 82 fabless companies--29 of which are publicly held--participating. Results indicated an expectation of 43 percent growth in wafer requirements in 1999 over actual 1998 wafer purchases. Of that, 27 percent will occur in the first and second quarter. In 1999, 60 percent of wafer requirements for fabless companies will be at 0.35 µm or less. By 2000, though, 39 percent of total wafer demand will be for 0.25-µm processes or smaller--a big leap from 19 percent in 1999 and a mere 2 percent in 1998. For the first time, the FSA included a section on packaging requirements in its 1999 survey to track the demand and trends for packaging technologies and test and assembly. The survey participants indicate that they expect their unit packaging needs to increase 138 percent from 1998 to 2000. Respondents also indicate a trend toward thermally enhanced packages that will grow more than two times the rate of standard power packages by 2000. Participants report that third parties performed approximately 77 percent of their probe services, 95 percent of their assembly services, and 71 percent of their test services in 1998.

VLSI Technology, Inc. (San Jose) and Numerical Technologies, Inc. (Numeritech; Santa Clara) announced a joint development relationship targeted at the design and manufacture of sub-0.15-µm circuits (0.12-µm Leff). Under the partnership, the two companies will jointly develop technology, processes, and flows aimed at designers of high-performance, subwavelength ICs. To facilitate manufacturing of silicon with that process on existing equipment, VLSI will use Numeritech's optical proximity correction product and is also evaluating its phase-shifting product. VLSI expects to use this technology in production by mid-2000.

Movers and Shakers

Silicon Metrics Corp. (Austin) has appointed Heath Wheeler as vice president of sales and Bruce Maurer as chief financial officer. Wheeler previously served as vice president of sales for Cadence Professional Services Group, a division of Cadence Design Systems. He developed and managed one of the North America sales regions as well as the sales consulting executives and solution architects. Maurer served as director of finance and a controller at Cirrus Logic, where he managed all the financial activities of its Austin operations. During his tenure at Cirrus, he also served 10 months as managing director of its international operations in Barbados.

Dado Banatao is the new chairman of the board of directors at Sandcraft, Inc. (Santa Clara, Calif.) He will focus on directing Sandcraft's growth as a microprocessor core supplier. Banatao was a founder of Chips & Technologies, Mostron, and S3. He currently serves as board chairman for a number of privately held companies, including Marvell Semiconductor, New Moon Systems, Silicon Access, SIRF Technology, and Stream Machines.

Chrysalis Symbolic Design, Inc. (N. Billerica, Mass.) has promoted Gerard Memmi to chief technology officer. Memmi will be responsible for bringing new technologies and algorithms into Chrysalis, as well as working with academia to foster two-way communications between leading research centers and Chrysalis's engineering organization. Memmi has been with Chrysalis since 1996, first as director of core technologies and then as vice president of technology development. In a parallel move, the company promoted Tom Jackson to director of corporate marketing. In his new role, he'll be responsible for all of Chrysalis's public relations and marketing communications activities. Jackson has over 16 years of experience in the EDA industry and has been with Chrysalis for a year and a half.

Money Bits

Semiconductor Equipment and Materials International (SEMI; Mountain View, Calif.) announced Q1 1999 results for total bookings and shipments of the global semiconductor equipment industry. Shipments by all manufacturers in Q1 1999 increased to $4.2 billion, seven percent over the $3.95 billion shipped in Q4 1998. Q1 1999 orders were up to $5.2 billion, a full 38 percent above Q4 1998 bookings figure of $3.8 billion. SEMI also reported that in April, North America-based manufacturers of semiconductor equipment posted a 6 percent month-over-month increase in bookings worldwide to $1.3 billion and a book-to-bill ratio of 1.28 for that month. Three-month average shipments in April were $1.02 billion--a figure 10 percent above March's level and 28 percent below April 1998's $1.4 billion. Three-month average bookings increased in April 1999 to $1.3 billion.

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