Faraday Announces the First Commercially Available 1GHz Memory Compiler to Enable GHz CPU & SoC Designs in UMC 90nm

Innovative design and layout schemes to achieve ultra high performance SRAM without sacrificing power and area

Hsinchu, Taiwan and Sunnyvale, California- June 12, 2008 -- Faraday Technology Corporation (TAIEX: 3035) today announced the first commercially available 1GHz memory compiler in UMC 90nm SP process. The single-port memory compiler utilizes advanced layout and circuit design techniques to provide up to 1GHz speed and keeps the same power and area requirement as generic memory solutions. Faraday's 90nm ultra fast memory compiler is silicon-proven and is now available to its customers.

As applications get more complicated and require higher video quality, users are demanding more and more processing power. Many applications, such as mobile internet device (MID), IP-Set-Top-Box, multimedia processor, network and storage SoC will require 1GHz SoC solution for their upgraded functions or models, which only more than 1GHz SoC solution can achieve. Designs, such as CPU or DSPs will need fast buffer to achieve high efficiency and reduce complexity of buffer design and size requirement. With various design techniques, embedded CPU and DSPs' speed today can scale up to greater than 1GHz. However, to keep up with 1GHz design performance, buffer design also needs to run at full speed. While generic memory compiler can only provide up to 500MHz speed and special customization is required to achieve 1GHz, Faraday's optimized memory compiler is able to deliver twice faster memory speed while maintaining the same level of power and area requirement as generic memory solutions.

"Faraday's ARM-compliant CPU, FA626TE, has achieved the high performance of 800MHz; to optimize its efficiency, a higher speed memory compiler is required. Through our RD team's effort, we are very glad to provide the first commercial 1GHz memory compiler, " said Hsin Wang, Vice President of Sales at Faraday. "In the future, we expect to see more 1GHz SoC applications and memory is one of the key components to achieve good design efficiency. While it requires long development time and high engineering cost to achieve such requirement, Faraday made it commercially available to SoC design companies. "

Faraday's ultra fast memory compiler is optimized in UMC 90nm SP process and uses high-Vth (HVT) SRAM cell to avoid high leakage. It supports single-port SRAM and allows users to generate various memory configurations. To achieve fast speed, it implements advanced design structure and layout planning to shorten the critical path and reduce data detection time. In addition, the memory compiler is designed with innovative layout schemes to provide small area and low level of metal usage for easy SoC integration.

"The 1GHz memory solution demonstrates Faraday's capability in memory design technology," said Chih-Hung Chen, R&D Associate Vice President at Faraday. " With our experienced memory design team, we are able to apply advanced layout and design techniques to overcome the timing, power and area challenges. The memory compiler has been verified in silicon with at speed MBIST implementation and is proven to meet its target speed of 1GHz and power requirement.' he added.

Availability

Faraday's ultra fast single-port memory compiler for UMC 90nm SP process is now available.

About Faraday Technology Corporation

Faraday Technology Corporation is a leading silicon IP and fabless ASIC vendor. The company's broad silicon IP portfolio includes Cell Library ,Memory Compiler,ARM-compliant CPUs, DDRII, MPEG4, H.264, USB 2.0, 10/100 Ethernet, Serial ATA, PCI Express, and UWB . With 2007 revenue of US$ 156 million, Faraday is one of the largest fabless ASIC companies in the Asia-Pacific region, and it also has a significant presence in other world-wide markets. Headquartered in Taiwan , Faraday has service and support offices around the world, including the U.S. , Japan , Europe, and China . For more information, please visit : www.faraday-tech.com