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Feb 11, 2008 at 01:19 PM |
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Anyone familiar with Chip Shots knows my proclivity for periodic ranting against the use of the English measurement system for measuring wafer sizes.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Feb 07, 2008 at 10:15 AM |
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Although semiconductor manufacturers constitute the first target market segment for Tailwinds, head honcho Dennis Riccio also has the photovoltaic, flat panel, and medical equipment markets in mind as sectors that will benefit from the company's souped-up, networked, e-commerce-enabled value/supply chain solution strategy.Write Comment (1 comments) |
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Feb 06, 2008 at 01:22 PM |
What do chipmakers, semiconductor equipment companies, solar manufacturers, display producers, and medical equipment companies have in common? A fragmented supply chain, often regional with inconsistent global reach and spotty quality, which offers far less value and efficiency to either end of the user-vendor spectrum than it might.
Imagine a sophisticated, Web-enabled one-stop shop, a neutral facilitator not tied to any single OEM or materials house, which could provide an integrated global network of outsource solutions for used/refurbished/surplus equipment and subsystems, cleanroom and materials consumables, spare parts, inventory oversight, preventive maintenance, parts cleaning, life-cycle management, even fab decommissioning/recommissioning, all under a single virtual (and in some cases physical) roof.
That's the intriguing vision of Tailwinds, a new company offering what may be the next big link currently missing in the value chain.
I spoke with company founder/chairman/CEO/president/head cheerleader Dennis Riccio last week about his latest venture in advance of Tailwinds' coming-out party.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Feb 05, 2008 at 08:00 AM |
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Even without Intel's bleeding-edge Fab 32 in Chandler making the world safe for hafnium and sub-45-nm chip processing, the greater Phoenix metro area would still be a hotbed of high tech, with the semiconductor and related micro-/nanoelectronics sectors leading the way and the photovoltaics industry catching up fast.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Feb 04, 2008 at 11:57 AM |
How do flexible electronics, American football, financial and market results, politics, and photovoltaics go together? They don't, except as fodder for some Monday morning perspectives on Chip Shots.
Watching the New York Giants upset the mighty New England Patriots in the Super Bowl got me thinking about one flexible display application that hasn't received much attention.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Jan 31, 2008 at 06:30 AM |
The government of Shenzhen in southern China may be ecstatic that SMIC will be siting a couple of fabs and an R&D; facility in the area, and SMIC's not sneering at the money involved (a cool $1.5 billion and change), but the people in the region's public relations division need a tutorial in the basics of semiconductor terminology.
In a release issued over PRNewswire by the "Shenzhen Government" on Wednesday, the copy repeatedly mixes up "chips" with "wafers," a rather basic error in the semi universe.Write Comment (1 comments) |
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Jan 29, 2008 at 09:28 PM |
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One of the bellwether companies in the semiconductor equipment arena is Cymer, the market-share monster of the DUV lithography laser-light source sector.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Jan 29, 2008 at 01:15 PM |
Before I move on to other topics, here are a few final musings and observations from the 7th annual USDC Flexible Electronics and Displays Conference, held last week in Phoenix.
Roll-to-roll manufacturing is already here, but it's also a long way off: For many, the idea of using solution-based processing (AKA pure printed electronics) on gravure, Web-coat, or flexographic manufacturing equipment, continuously producing kilometers' worth of flexible devices at modest price points, is the proverbial holy grail.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Jan 24, 2008 at 10:04 AM |
Prime Vision International's Scott Liu coined a candidate for the catch-phrase of the week at the USDC Flexible Electronics and Displays conference: "2008 is Year 1 of flexible displays." Although companies such as Kent Displays may dispute that characterization, since it's been making small, flexible displays for a variety of applications for years, Liu's comments point to the imminent appearance of consumer-oriented devices such as PVI's Flexi-E e-paper and Polymer Vision's Readius rollable-display e-reader, which are being ramped in manufacturing and will soon be shipping to customers.
Polymer Vision announced earlier in the week that Readius will have its "commercial launch" in mid-2008.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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Jan 23, 2008 at 11:35 AM |
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Is the flexible and printed electronics sector really at "a takeoff point"? NanoMarkets' Lawrence Gasman thinks so.Write Comment (0 comments) |
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