Microchip buys touch screen controller firm
(07:00 PM EDT, 10/15/08)
Amid a proposed plan to buy part of rival Atmel Corp., Microchip Technology Inc. has acquired Hampshire Company Inc. for an undisclosed price.

U.S. FCC to mull Verizon, Sprint deals; white space
(05:31 PM EDT, 10/15/08)
U.S. communications regulators said they will review separate deals by Verizon Communications and Sprint Nextel, and consider opening up unlicensed spectrum for broader use at a meeting next month.

Novellus posts lower sales, profit
(04:53 PM EDT, 10/15/08)
Semiconductor fab tool vendor Novellus Systems posted sales of $250.1 million in its third quarter ended Sept. 27, down 3 percent sequentially and 36 percent year-to-year.

Evergreen Solar unveils String Ribbon solar panels
(04:32 PM EDT, 10/15/08)
Evergreen Solar, Inc. has unveiled its ES-A Series of String Ribbon solar panels at Solar Power International in San Diego, California.

Analysis: With Fister gone, Cadence layoffs may be next
(02:55 PM EDT, 10/15/08)
The resignation by Cadence Design Systems President and CEO Mike Fister and four other top executives signals the beginning of a major course change at a time when Cadence faces multiple challenges and is rumored to be on the verge of announcing a huge layoff.

Fulton demos wireless powered blender
(12:03 PM EDT, 10/15/08)
Wireless power specialist Fulton Innovation has integrated its eCoupled technology into a kitchen blender to demonstrate the versatility of the technology.

Intel buys Ethernet card specialist
(12:01 PM EDT, 10/15/08)
Intel has acquired the assets of network connectivity solutions company NetEffect for $8 million.

Researchers propose flexible power microgrids
(11:18 AM EDT, 10/15/08)
Virginia Tech researchers want to return to Thomas Edison's concept of local power generation alongside existing large-scale plants connected to transmission and distribution systems.

Groups partner for wireless sensor nets
(10:56 AM EDT, 10/15/08)
Freescale Semiconductor and Nivis LLC, a leading developer and integrator of wireless network technologies, are to combine their respective technologies to provide wired-to-wireless platform for commercial and industrial sensor mesh networks.

Fister resigns, Cadence creates interim CEO position
(09:39 AM EDT, 10/15/08)
Cadence has announced that its Board of Directors has formed an Interim Office of the Chief Executive to oversee the day-to-day running of the company's operations, effective immediately. The formation of the Interim Office of the Chief Executive followed Michael Fister's resignation as President, Chief Executive Officer and a director of the company.

Nvidia rolls high end Intel chip set
(09:00 AM EDT, 10/15/08)
Over the next few years, the market for integrated graphics chip sets will diminish and ultimately disappear, but in the short term, Nvidia Corp. sees an opportunity it is attacking with a chip for Penryn-class Intel processors that it claims delivers five times the graphics performance of Intel's own integrated parts.

Video: ASML describes road map to 22 nm litho
(08:40 AM EDT, 10/15/08)
In the midst of a shaky economic climate, ASML Holding NV laid out its road map for lithography systems needed to drive semiconductors down to 22 nm and beyond.

Achronix gets $43M equity funding in tight credit market
(08:21 AM EDT, 10/15/08)
FPGA start up Achronix Semiconductor Corp. has bagged an additional $43 million from private equity investors, defying a difficult credit market to raise funds for new product development and sales and marketing expansion.

Elmos Semi postpones production upgrade
(03:25 AM EDT, 10/15/08)
The soft demand in the automotive industry has triggered a revenue warning from Elmos Semiconductor. Many customers have postponed and in part cancelled orders at short notice, the company said. Now the chip manufacturer has postponed a production modernization.

ASML order value down in "wait and see" market
(01:34 AM EDT, 10/15/08)
Dutch chip equipment maker ASML received 498 million euros worth of orders in the third quarter, down from the previous three months and below the average analysts' forecast.

Analog design research center to open at UT-Dallas
(10:27 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
A $16 million collaboration among academia, industry and government will create The Texas Analog Center of Excellence (TxACE) at the University of Texas at Dallas, Texas Governor Rick Perry announced

Analysis: Mobile products lift Intel, but Q4 uncertain
(07:55 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
Buoyed by growth in revenue from microprocessors and chip sets for mobile computing, Intel posted a third-quarter profit of $2 billion but warned of poor fourth quarter visibility due to the current financial crisis.

Maxim buys Mobilygen in video play
(06:24 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
Analog chip maker Maxim Integrated Products Inc. has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Mobilygen Inc., a developer of H.264 video compression chips.

Altera profit rise 37 percent, shares rally
(05:02 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
Programmable chipmaker Altera Corp. said Tuesday third-quarter profit climbed 37 percent, topping Wall Street targets and sending its shares up nearly 9 percent.

DSP suits up for body-area network
(04:52 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
Researchers at IMEC will develop a custom ultra low power digital signal processor as part of work on a wireless sensor node for a variety of applications including a body area network.

Intel posts higher quarterly earnings
(04:27 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
Technology bellwether Intel Corp. posted a 12 percent rise in third-quarter profit and cautioned that demand in the current quarter was uncertain, but shares rose 3.6 percent in extended trade.

Appeals court vacates ITC ban against Qualcomm
(03:25 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
An appeals court has thrown out a U.S. import ban against Qualcomm Inc. and asked a government agency to revisit its decision on Qualcomm's patent infringement legal battle with Broadcom Corp.

Apple, Samsung unveil notebooks
(03:16 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
Electronics heavyweights Apple and Samsung Electronics announced new notebook PC products, some of which will compete head-to-head in the U.S.

Firm cuts share price target for 10 chip stocks
(02:36 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
Citing broad cuts to fourth quarter forecasts and likely foundry shipment declines nearly across the board, investment banking firm Friedman Billings Ramsey & Co. cut its share price target on 10 chip stocks, including Intel, Broadcom and Marvell Technology Group.

Video: IMEC advances software-defined radio
(02:10 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
IMEC announced a chip that can handle a variety of advanced forward error correction technologies used in a range of wide and local area wireless networks, a future component for a software-defined radio platform it demonstrated.

Broadcom co-founder Samueli stays in plea deal
(01:47 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
Broadcom Corp. co-founder Henry Samueli agreed Tuesday to remain in a plea deal in a stock options backdating case without an agreed-upon sentence, and now faces up to five years in prison at his sentencing next year, U.S. Attorney's Office spokesman Thom Mrozek said.

TUV, ASU create testing facility for solar equipment
(01:41 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
TUV Rheinland Group has partnered with Arizona State University (ASU) to create a state-of-the-art facility for testing and certification of solar energy equipment.

Sanyo launches next-gen solar panel line
(01:01 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
Sanyo Energy (U.S.A.) Corp. has introduced the HIT Power series of solar panels based on the company's proprietary HIT technology, delivering improvements in conversion efficiency and high temperature performance.

REC launches solar module in the U.S
(12:31 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
REC Group, a producer of polysilicon and wafers for the photovoltaic (PV) industry, has announced the U.S. launch of its SCM Series of high-performance solar modules.

Design site launches amid India's drive to move beyond software at ESC
(12:30 PM EDT, 10/14/08)
TechInsights used its Embedded Systems Conference: Bangalore to launch TechOnlineIndia.com amid an ongoing push by that region to develop the hardware design and manufacturing expertise needed to expand beyond its historic dependence on software development—and possibly to compete with China.

Conductive adhesive could replace solder
(11:24 AM EDT, 10/14/08)
Researchers have invented a dry adhesive that they propose using instead of soldering--not only to assemble components on circuit boards, but potentially also patterned onto chips themselves to connect together individual transistors.

Advent Solar, Deutsche Solar ink polysilicon wafer deal
(11:05 AM EDT, 10/14/08)
Solar cell and module manufacturer Advent Solar has announced a $350 million polysilicon wafer agreement with Deutsche Solar AG.

Axe finally falls on Freescale's East Kilbride fab
(11:00 AM EDT, 10/14/08)
Semiconductor manufacturing at Freescale's plant at East Kilbride will stop by the middle of next year. The decision follows the result of consultations with an Employee Forum about the future of the operation over the past three months.

Signet Solar ramps volume production for thin-film PV modules
(10:38 AM EDT, 10/14/08)
Signet Solar has begun volume production for its silicon thin-film solar PV modules at its manufacturing facility in Mochau, Germany.

Sharp to deliver second-generation solar cells in U.S.
(10:12 AM EDT, 10/14/08)
Sharp has announced today (Oct. 14) at Solar Power International 2008 that it will introduce next-generation thin-film solar cells in the U.S. market, aimed at multi-megawatt, large-scale installations.

Multi-core: A new challenge for debugging
(09:59 AM EDT, 10/14/08)
Development of complex systems with powerful hardware on one side and ambitious applications on the other side, benefits from on system-spanning on-chip support for debugging.

Cisco launches contest for embedded router application software
(08:32 AM EDT, 10/14/08)
Cisco launches contest for software developers to write to ISR router.

Micronas gains ground in third quarter
(04:47 AM EDT, 10/14/08)
Micronas Semiconductor Holding AG (Zurich, Switzerland) is the first major semiconductor vendor to publish quarterly results after the financial crisis. The vendor of automotive and consumer ICs managed to swing its operational loss into a profit, but the expectations are uncertain.

Handset makers results seen gauge of consumer demand
(04:34 AM EDT, 10/14/08)
Investors are looking to third-quarter results from the world's top mobile phone handset makers to guage how hard the global financial crisis has hit consumer spending and what will happen to key Christmas sales.

Startup claims Gbit version of Wi-Fi
(12:01 AM EDT, 10/14/08)
Quantenna Communications Inc. officially joins the ranks of companies crafting high-end variations of 802.11n silicon with a chip set using 4x4 MIMO antennas along with beam forming and mesh technologies to deliver an aggregate throughput of up to a Gbit/second.

TriQuint rolls integrated GPS front-end module
(07:28 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
RF device and foundry supplier TriQuint Semiconductor introduced a front-end RF module for GPS navigation systems combining filter and low noise amplifier functions in a 3x3mm form factor.

Maxim expects revenue to be flat
(05:49 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
Maxim Integrated Products said it expects to report net revenue of $500 million to $502 million and earnings per share of 19 to 22 cents for the quarter ended Sept. 27.

Europe's solar researchers bet on silicon
(04:26 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
Crystalline silicon technology remains the big bet in solar cell research at Europe's IMEC, but the group is also exploring options in silicon thin films, compound materials and organics.

Seiko Epson develops 3-D LCD for cellphones
(04:13 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
While 3-D is expected to become all the rage for next-generation TV, some Japanese vendors are thinking ahead to figure out a way to bring 3-D images to mobile handset screens.

FPGA survey sees sunset for gate arrays, continued dominance by Xilinx, Altera
(03:15 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
FPGA Survey finds transition out of ASICs, continued dominance by Xilinx, Altera.

Harvard spinout licenses 'black silicon' patents
(03:09 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
Startup SiOnyx has licensed a portfolio of shallow junction photonics patents developed by Harvard University in exchange for an unspecified equity stake and downstream royalties.

Toshiba licenses processor architecture, multiprocessor tools from IMEC
(01:17 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
Research institute IMEC, announced that Japanese chipmaker Toshiba Corp. has licensed IMEC technology to help it design power-efficient single- and multiprocessor wireless baseband system chips with gigabit per second download capabilities.

Gartner slashes 2009 tech spending forecast
(12:46 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
Gartner, the world's biggest technology research company, sharply cut its forecast for global technology spending next year, seeing a drop in spending in Western Europe and a slim rise in the United States.

Low stock values impede M&A deals, analyst says
(12:42 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
The depressed stock valuations that are making more firms seem like attractive acquisition targets could also stifle merger and acquisition activity as shareholders and management teams are likely to reject offers viewed as opportunistic, according to an analyst.

Election polls and engineers
(12:36 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
Do engineers congregate to one presidential candidate or party? Or are we evenly split?

Navy honors 'father of electronic warfare'
(12:03 PM EDT, 10/13/08)
The U.S. Navy has named its next missile-tracking ship after Howard Lorenzen, the "father of electronic warfare" who helped developed the first U.S. spy satellite payloads in the 1960s.

E-Porsche comes in 2009, paper says
(11:49 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Electric drives have a property that makes them interesting for sports car manufacturers: They offer an incredible torque even at low speeds. Now Porsche apparently is planning to join the electric bandwagon.

Lenovo mulls Fujitsu Siemens investment
(11:08 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
The Chinese computer manufacturer Lenovo is considering to take over the Siemens shares in the Fujitsu Siemens Computer joint venture. According to media releases here, the company says that it is considering "all options".

Updated: DoJ ends graphics-chip probe
(10:10 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
The U.S. Department of Justice has informed Advanced Micro Devices Inc. that it has closed its investigation into ATI Technologies' pricing and marketing practices in the sale of graphics processing units.

Mentor releases parallel timing analysis and optimization technology
(09:29 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Mentor Graphics has announced the availability of new task-oriented parallelism technology in the Mentor Graphics Olympus-SoC place-and-route system that allows timing analysis and optimization tasks to run in parallel.

Vishay abandons bid to acquire IR
(09:13 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Vishay Intertechnology, Inc. has abandoned attempts to acquire International Rectifier Corporation and said it would return tendered shares to their holders.

Qimonda-Elpida tech coop on hold
(08:46 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Elpida's and Qimonda's joint DRAM technology development is currently on hold. In a press conference call in which Qimonda announced its restructuring measures, CEO Kin Wah Loh said the company currently does not pursue the joint project "until further notice."

Custom litho addresses 22-nm IC manufacturing
(08:46 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Cadence announced that it has developed software that optimizes custom lithographic source illumination, a new capability in its integrated source mask optimization (SMO) technology family for IC manufacturing at 22 nanometers and beyond.

Philips Q3 hurt by healthcare, shares fall
(06:35 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Dutch conglomerate Philips posted sharply lower third-quarter core profit that missed forecasts, partly hurt by its normally resilient healthcare unit as orders in the United States slowed due to the credit crisis.

Broadcom, Marvell rise in fabless ranking
(05:43 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Broadcom Corp. edged close to Qualcomm Corp. in the second quarter ranking of top ten fabless chip companies, provided by the Global Semiconductor Alliance (GSA).

Fabless chip market up 9% in Q2, says GSA
(05:06 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Fabless semiconductor company revenue totaled $13.9 billion in the second quarter of 2008, rising 4 percent quarter-over-quarter and 9 percent year-over-year according to the Global Semiconductor Alliance industry group. This shows growth slowing compared with the first quarter when fabless sales jumped 16 percent on an annual basis.

Qimonda restructures, cuts 3000 jobs
(03:37 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Beleaguered memory chip maker Qimonda AG has announced a radical restructuring. Besides selling its share of the Inotera joint venture with Nanya Technology to competitor Micron Technology, the company will change its product focus, reduce capacities and shut down production lines. About 3000 jobs in Germany and the U.S will be cut.

Researchers target diamond based lasers and apps
(03:10 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Researchers at the Institute of Photonics, University of Strathclyde, have started work on a three and a half-year project to develop a solid-state laser design incorporating CVD (chemical vapour deposition) diamond manufactured by Element Six Ltd.

Mixed-signal FPGAs advance clinical medical apps
(12:01 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Increasing healthcare costs, the prevalence of chronic diseases, aging populations and large emerging markets--such as China, India and Brazil--are creating tremendous demand for affordable, robust and reliable medical devices to improve the treatment and care of millions of patients worldwide, and cure an increasing range of diseases. In turn, medical device designers are exploring new technologies from various industries to improve the diagnostic, monitoring and therapeutic capabilities of next-generation devices.

iPod touch: Did Apple tip its hand?
(12:01 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
On September 9, Apple announced a new line of iPods. This lineup included changes to the shuffle, nano and touch. Semiconductor Insights was eager to see what components were different between the first- and second- generation touches, as well as compare it with the iPhone 3G, which was released only months ago.

PC/104 adopts PCI Express
(12:01 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
The PC/104 bus is an ISA-compatible, 3.550-inch x 3.775-inch, stackable board-level architecture that evolved from the MiniModule mezzanine bus fielded by Ampro Computer in 1987 and was standardized under the auspices of the PC/104 Consortium in 1992. It grew over time into a family of architectures, with the advent of PC/104-Plus (ISA bus and PCI bus) in 1997 and PCI-104 (PCI only) in 2003. The latest incarnation of the form factor adds PCI Express (PCIe) to the mix, in three different specifications, all announced in spring 2008: PCI/104-Express and PCIe/104 from the 60-member consortium, now known as the PC/104 Embedded Consortium; and Express104 from a new trade group called the Small Form Factor Special Interest Group (SFF SIG).

A new telehealth age dawns
(12:01 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
It should come as no surprise that nearly half the U.S. population suffers from at least one chronic disease.

When perfect hindsight meets imperfect foresight
(12:01 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
We all know it's easy to criticize than create; unfortunately, full-time critics have become a major part of the landscape while contributing very little to progress.

Beyond simple telehealth: Biosensor frontiers
(12:01 AM EDT, 10/13/08)
Although the secure transport of patient information is fundamental to telehealth, it is just the sprawling back-end of a technology ecosystem that is only as good as the sensors themselves.

High-frequency PCB co-design speeds file translation
(08:10 PM EDT, 10/12/08)
AWR and Mentor Graphics release high-frequency PCB co-design that obsoletes file translation