An interesting way of doing business in EDA

Here is an excerpt from an interview of Ray Bulger, founder and CEO of Duolog :

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However Bulger said he believes that it is important that Duolog continues to develop leading-edge designs to maintain its familiarity with design pain points. "Duolog is a silicon developer providing software to other silicon providers," he said. "That's why I am keeping my design services operation in Hungary. They are working on 65-nm and just starting 45-nm," said Bulger.
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Here is the link for the story.

Hafnium and chips

Nov 6th 2007
From Economist.com

A new recipe involving a hitherto obscure element is the latest way to make microprocessors faster

ONE consequence of the growth of microelectronics has been an exploration of the periodic table reminiscent of European navigators’ search for the spice islands half a millennium ago.

Japan's technology giants are shedding their semiconductor units, sort of

From The Economist :

THE main ingredient of a semiconductor is silicon, but it might as well be pyrite, or fool's gold. That is because consistently making money out of chips is notoriously difficult. Cyclical demand means that profits are volatile, and new kinds of chips quickly become commoditised. The business is also highly capital-intensive: a new fabrication plant, or fab, costs $3 billion-5 billion, and new facilities must be built every few years as technology advances.

Accordingly, many Western technology firms, such as Philips, Hewlett-Packard, Motorola and Siemens, long ago spun off their chipmaking units in order to focus on the final products, rather than the bits inside them. Japan's huge electronics conglomerates have largely resisted this “fab lite” strategy. This now seems to be changing, though the companies' willingness to let go fully is still in doubt.

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