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Commentary / Analysis

• Electronics enters era of 'systemic risk' (Thursday Sep. 01, 2011)
  The electronics industry has entered an era of "systemic complexity" where growing ecosystems of companies need to collaborate closely, according to a panel of chief executives.
  
  
• Economic news not all bad for semiconductors (Wednesday Aug. 31, 2011)
  According to the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) reporting of World Semiconductor Trade Statistics (WSTS) data, the semiconductor market declined 2% in 2Q 2011 from 1Q 2011. The semiconductor market in 2Q 2011 was down 0.5% from a year ago after 8.2% year-to-year growth in 1Q 2011.
  
  
• DRAM Pricing to Plunge in Q3 and Rest of Second Half (Monday Aug. 29, 2011)
  A dramatic oversupply and freefalling prices are in store during the third quarter for the dynamic random access memory (DRAM) space, resulting in a turbulent second half for besieged DRAM suppliers, according to a new IHS iSuppli DRAM Market Brief from information and analysis provider IHS
  
  
• IC Market to Top $300 Billion for First Time in 2013 (Thursday Aug. 25, 2011)
  Momentum that carried the IC industry to one of its strongest growth years in history in 2010 has dissipated and the feeling of optimism that was evident at the start of 2011 has been replaced with sentiments of caution, uncertainty, and hesitancy as economic headwinds have put a damper on forecast growth.
  
  
• ARM wrestles with silicon, battery hurdles (Friday Aug. 19, 2011)
  Big hurdles in silicon scaling and battery technology stand in the way of huge opportunities in mobile systems, said an ARM executive in a Hot Chips keynote.
  
  
• Complex SoC Silicon and Software Design Costs Are Skyrocketing (Thursday Aug. 18, 2011)
  Today, everywhere we turn, we hear speakers give presentations at conferences and industry events despairing how the rise in silicon design costs hampers the semiconductor industry's growth path. As part of this problem, we now recognize that software design costs have eclipsed silicon design efforts and have become the largest portion of the SoC creation effort.
  
  
• TI says OMAP not for sale (Thursday Aug. 18, 2011)
  Texas Instruments Inc. said Wednesday (Aug. 17) that its OMAP multimedia applications processor line is not for sale, contrary to widely circulated rumors.
  
  
• Viewpoint: Why Microsoft should buy Nokia (Wednesday Aug. 17, 2011)
  Monumental changes are taking place in the wireless handset and tablet PC market. Companies are crossing operating lines as it becomes more obvious that the dividing lines between software and hardware businesses were artificially created and are no longer justifiable or viable.
  
  
• Could Intel buy TI's OMAP division? (Wednesday Aug. 17, 2011)
  Try this one on for size: Intel Corp., whose x86 architecture is locked in a struggle for supremacy with the ARM architecture, could actually be a perspective buyer of Texas Instruments Inc.'s line of ARM-based applications processors, according to speculation by an analyst.
  
  
• Google to Buy Struggling Motorola Mobility (Tuesday Aug. 16, 2011)
  Google agreeing today to buy Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc. for $12.5 billion gives the search giant a more significant direct involvement in the design and production of mobile phone hardware and shores up a valuable intellectual property portfolio during a time when legal maneuvering through patent holdings is plaguing the Android market.
  
  
• What Google/Moto means for Android OEMs (Tuesday Aug. 16, 2011)
  Google's bid for Motorola raises new tensions among smartphone, tablet and TV makers as the Web giant figure out how to manage handset and set-top businesses.
  
  
• Google's Moto bid: It's all about the patents (Tuesday Aug. 16, 2011)
  Google's $12.5 billion bid for Motorola Mobility is all about the patents in a superheated legal battle over the future of Android.
  
  
• Viewpoint: Don't believe the patent sale hype (Monday Aug. 15, 2011)
  The $4.5 billion Nortel patent sale, which has lead to a flurry of commentary about a bubble in patent valuation, was an outlier, not a trend. Here's why.
  
  
• TSMC's A6 processor to respin, says report (Friday Aug. 12, 2011)
  Foundry chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (TSMC) – said to have started trial manufacturing of the ARM-based A6 processor for Apple – will put the IC through another tape-out for the "production design" in the first quarter of 2012, according to the Taiwan Economic News.
  
  
• Android takes almost 50% share of worldwide smart phone market (Monday Aug. 08, 2011)
  Canalys today published its final worldwide country-level Q2 2011 smart phone market estimates, showing substantial market growth in all regions. Globally, the market grew 73% year-on-year, with in excess of 107.7 million units shipping in the second quarter of 2011.
  
  
• MIPS' fourth quarter disappoints (Friday Aug. 05, 2011)
  Processor intellectual property licensor MIPS Technologies Inc. turned in a disappointing set of financial results for the second quarter of 2011 which was its own fourth fiscal quarter. Both revenue and net income were down from the same quarter a year before.
  
  
• Mentor CEO Rhines fears foundry oversupply (Wednesday Aug. 03, 2011)
  While global semiconductor revenue is projected to expand by 7.2 percent in 2011, Walden Rhines, chairman and CEO of EDA vendor Mentor Graphics Corp., sounds a note of caution about maintaining this growth in 2012.
  
  
• Analyst: Apple had 57% of Q2 handset profits (Tuesday Aug. 02, 2011)
  Despite holding only 5.4 percent share of the global handset market, Apple was responsible for a whopping 57 percent of all cellular handset operating profits in the second quarter, up from 51 percent in the first quarter and 41 percent in 2010, according to an analyst at Canaccord Genuity.
  
  
• Is Cadence preparing for a change at the top? (Tuesday Aug. 02, 2011)
  John Bruggeman, the face and voice of Cadence Design Systems Inc. for most of his two-year tenure as the EDA vendor's chief marketing officer, is suddenly out the door (almost), and at least one analyst thinks the move portends a change in leadership at the firm.
  
  
• Global Semiconductor Sales Grow 3.7% in First Half of 2011 (Monday Aug. 01, 2011)
  The Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) today announced that worldwide sales of semiconductors were $24.7 billion for the month of June 2011, a 1.5 percent decrease from the prior month when sales were $25 billion and 0.5 percent decrease from a year ago.
  
  
• IC Insights Lowers 2011 Worldwide Semiconductor Market Forecast to +5% (Thursday Jul. 28, 2011)
  As described in IC Insights' soon-to-be-released Mid-Year Update to The McClean Report, the worldwide semiconductor industry growth forecast for 2011 has been lowered from 10% to 5% and the 2011 IC market forecast from 10% to 4%. The primary cause for this downgrade is the weak performance of the worldwide economy in the first half of this year.
  
  
• Intel SoCs aided by interconnect, IP library (Tuesday Jul. 26, 2011)
  Intel now has the tools in place – in particular an on-chip interconnect fabric, an extensive IP library and software – to make a success of its system-on-chip engineering effort, according to Bill Leszinske, an executive with Intel's Atom processor SoC development group.
  
  
• Analysts high on Xilinx amid margin concern (Monday Jul. 25, 2011)
  Analysts remained mostly bullish on Xilinx after the company's earnings report despite some concerns about the company's declining gross margins.
  
  
• IDC Forecasts Worldwide Semiconductor Revenues to Reach $318 Billion in 2012 and Nearly $378 Billion in 2015 (Monday Jul. 25, 2011)
  IDC forecasts worldwide semiconductor revenues will grow 5% year over year in 2012 and will achieve a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6% for the 2010-2015 forecast period.
  
  
• Taiwan nurtures the next ARM (Thursday Jul. 21, 2011)
  Meet Andes Technology Corp., Taiwan’s agile and ambitious answer to ARM Ltd.
  
  
• Intel boosts capex, eyeing 7-nm node (Thursday Jul. 21, 2011)
  Intel Corp. is edging up capital expenses this year, in part to pave the way to 7-nm process technology and to bolster its efforts in tablets and so-called ultrabooks
  
  
• Fulcrum buy could signal shift for Intel (Tuesday Jul. 19, 2011)
  Intel's agreement to acquire Fulcrum Microsystems Inc. for an undisclosed sum could signal a significant change of direction for the world's biggest chip maker toward providing a comprehensive high-performance, low power solution for data centers.
  
  
• Baseband & Application Processors on a Single Die Changing Cellphone Chip Market Dynamics (Tuesday Jul. 19, 2011)
  Forward Concepts has announced the publication of its newest study of the worldwide market for the principal chips that enable cellphones. The new study, “Cellphone Core Chip Trends,” provides an in-depth market analysis of baseband, application processor, RF & power management chips.
  
  
• ARM Processors to Ship in Nearly One-Quarter of Notebook PCs in 2015 (Tuesday Jul. 19, 2011)
  After more than 30 years of domination by a single microarchitecture—Intel Corp.’s X86—the PC microprocessor (MPU) market finally is set for some real competition, with shipments of ARM processors set to soar in the coming years and projected to appear in nearly one out of every four notebook PCs made in 2015.
  
  
• EDA Consortium Reports Revenue Increase for Q1 2011 (Monday Jul. 18, 2011)
  The EDA Consortium (EDAC) Market Statistics Service (MSS) today announced that the Electronic Design Automation (EDA) industry revenue increased 16 percent for Q1 2011 to $1446.4 million, compared to $1247.0 million in Q1 2010.