The development of the IoT industry in recent years from smartphones to wearable devices has accelerated the need for miniaturized components and advanced processing technologies. Through the integration of key manufacturing technologies, Chilisin has been able to dramatically improve inductor performance while downsizing. In the highly competitive environment today, the pursuit of miniaturization has become the trend to success.HEI160808 mini molding choke demonstrates leading innovationThe miniaturization trend of components began with the evolution of smartphones. Increasing functions in smartphones are increasingly demanding higher battery usage and hence, larger battery size. Under such circumstances, aside from batteries, all other components within a smartphone are met with a downsizing requirement. In 2013, Chilisin successfully developed the HEI (High Efficiency Inductor) series molding power choke which received notable industry recognition and approval by large international smartphone makers due to its superior performance characteristics. This year, Chilisin is launching the new HEI160808 in 1.6 x 0.8 x 0.8mm dimensions, an even smaller version of the power choke. This new product has already entered into the mass production stage and has been adopted in some of this year's newly released smartphone models. Customer satisfaction and leading technological capability especially in the smartphone sector strongly reinforces Chilisin's competitive positioning and growth momentum in the coming year.Newly-launched MTF100505 to challenge the limits of thin-film manufacturing process technologyIn the second half of 2015, Chilisin expects to launch the molding thin-film inductor MTF 100505. This product uniquely utilizes tiny film sheets as coils inside a tiny molded case, a process made only possible via advanced thin-film technology in combination with molding technology. The end result is further downsizing from the previous HEI series molding power choke to achieve 1.0 x 0.5 x 0.5 mm dimensions, the smallest possible power inductor for use in smartphones. Chilisin's President Mr. Jack Chung has indicated the Company does not only seek to miniaturize components, but also to achieve a high standard of quality and more importantly to deliver superior performance characteristics in order to build long-term relationships with customers.New highlights of high-frequency wire-wound inductors: CS0201 and CHQ0402For smartphone high-frequency application, Chilisin is unveiling two newly developed miniaturized inductors. Firstly, the CS0201 series, produced using high-precision wire-winding technology, has already entered into mass production stage. On the other hand, the CHQ0402 series, produced using multilayer technology, will be ready for sampling at the start of the fourth quarter. Both of these products are among the smallest of their kind in the industry, so small that it is barely visible to the naked eye. Once again, these products demonstrate Chilisin's success towards product miniaturization in light of the IoT era.Miniaturization trend and growing automotive segment to act as double-engine to drive futureChilisin's innovation and technological leadership in the miniaturization trend lies in having four core process technologies, including thin-film, multilayer, molding and wire-winding production methods. Chilisin's favorable position in the mobile segment began with early-on efforts to penetrate high-end smartphone and other wearable device markets. Efforts to improve fundamental production technologies, build capacity, maintain close industry analysis and supplier relationships have well prepared Chilisin to deliver innovative products to the market on such a key timing and to secure its leading position on the market.Concerns about the strength of the global economy has weighed on the market in the second half of the year as electronic and component makers worldwide struggle to sustain revenue growth. Despite a downbeat atmosphere, Chilisin delivered an impressive 25% YoY growth rate on revenue from January to July. Notably in July, revenue from overseas markets (ex-Greater China region) has, for the first time in Company history, surpassed revenue from the China market. Successful developments of large international customers have attributed to such a rapid growth for overseas divisions, where the revenue target for the full year has already been surpassed in three quarters. In terms of application segment, Chilisin is focusing largely on three of the five main segments, including mobile, automotive and networking to be the growth drivers into 2018. Developments in product innovation will continue to bring Chilisin's product offerings in line with Japanese competitors, with certain product sectors such as the molding power choke series surpassing Japanese peers. Newly established sales offices in the Eastern United States and Southeast Asia will be supporting the rapid growth rate of the Company. To end the note, Chilisin's President Mr. Jack Chung stated that under the moving puzzles of the industry, quality is the constant benchmark that must be upheld in order to guarantee success.

With the rapid emergence of IoT, wearables, automotive electronics, and various smart mobile devices, companies are keen to pursue innovations and to create something truly disruptive. In order to help customers embrace the latest technology trends and to develop differentiated products, Imagination recently held its annual Imagination Summit in Taipei and Hsinchu. With more than one thousand registered attendees and 600 people visiting the events, Imagination has set a record number of attendance since it held the first Hsinchu Summit in 2012.Imagination Summits are day-long events featuring visionary keynotes, technical deep dives and interactive sessions with experts from Imagination and its partners. This year's Summits in Taiwan feature keynotes from MediaTek, the prpl Foundation, Realtek and TSMC, as well as presentations and demonstrations from Imagination and partners including M31, Mentor Graphics and Synopsys.Maxwell Lin, Sales Director of Imagination Taiwan, said at opening remarks, "As market evolves, it's no longer feasible to follow the traditional way to design by simply selecting technical solutions with the highest CP value from PPA comparison. In an effort to develop more competitive products, companies need to have breakthrough thinking, address the security mechanism required by new services, and carefully handle the system integration issues. Thus, under this year's Summit banner "Secure. Integrate. Differentiate", we'll showcase comprehensive design solutions to help companies reach this goal."New Thinking for the Next Wave of InnovationTony King-Smith, EVP marketing of Imagination disclosed the latest development trend of semiconductor industry at the keynote speech. As a leading provider of SoC IP, Imagination not only has in-depth understanding and insights for a wide range of markets, including mobile phone, automobile, networking, enterprise, IoT, and consumer entertainment, but also needs to be able to see the trends for next 5 to 10 years, so that it can take the lead to develop new technologies for future SoCs.As consumer electronics technologies are penetrating into enterprise market and powering everything, everywhere, Tony King-Smith believes that these low-power, high performance technologies will bring profound influences to drive all kinds of applications. Computer vision, security, virtual reality (VR) & augmented reality (AR), connectivity, and application portability will be the major trends in the future.Mega Societal Changes UnderwayOn the other hand, the world that we live in is changing rapidly and dramatically. With the arrival of the emerging world, which includes the most populous countries like China, India, and Brazil, ever more middle-class is rising but also more price competitions. However, in the connected and accessible world, one global market is also forming. Also, the accelerating technological possibilities in many fields, such as IoT, robotics/automation, biomedical, will also change the landscape of hi-tech industry. It is believed that, in the future, the tier-one leading companies will be much different than what we have today.Meanwhile, facing the challenges of global warming, we need to use energy more efficiently, and low-power design will become increasingly important with the widespread usage of IoT and wearable devices. And the era of Industry 4.0 will lead to manufacturing returning to local markets in many sectors, which eventually will transform the existing supply chain. Finally, the advent of aging society, 100+ year human life spans will definitely change demographics. But it is clear that today's infrastructure can't cope with tomorrow's population's needs.Driven by these technical and market trends, the industrial chain is also evolving. As OEMs are seeking for innovation, the importance of IP is getting much higher. IP vendors should focus on the development of key function blocks, and through close collaboration, helping OEMs pursue for differentiation designs. In addition, as more and more consumers switch to online purchasing, the influential factors for buy decisions are also changed.The semiconductor world is changing, too. With the on-going consolidation and OEMs' vertical integration, product development will become more "application-driven". Under this trend, there will be four types of semiconductor players in the future. Among them, two are tradition chip vendors. One is the super-high volume SoC providers supporting large mainstream segments like mobile, and the other is specialized players focusing on smaller and specialized applications such as auto, health, home automation, and industrial.But another two types of new chip vendors will emerge, including the vertical major OEM brands with internal IC design team, such as Amazon and Apple, and the medium to large sized OEMs, which try to replicate vertical model but through partnership with other service providers and brands. In particular, in Taiwan, we will see lots of OEMs of this kind rising rapidly in the coming three to five years, and bring the next-wave of growth momentum.Multi-Domain SecurityTo address the future market requirements, companies need new concepts and solutions. Tony King-Smith talked about what matters for new product development: security, platform solutions, and IoT technologies.Every application has security demands, and it is fundamental to all connected devices, including IoT. But today's simplistic "binary in/out" model is no longer good enough to meet users and application needs. We need universal solutions to ensure security across every process elements in the SoC; therefore, multi-domain, system-wide security will become a must.Current security solutions are CPU centric, which make secure applications all co-exist in one secure area. This is good for products that are defined in the factory and never change, but it can't scale to address the needs of operators and brands delivering portfolios of cloud-based services on open platforms.OmniShield in a multi-domain, heterogeneous, scalable, and hardware-enforced security technology. Imagination is teaming up with prpl Foundation to promote truly open and heterogeneous security platform. Several companies, including Broadcom, Qualcomm, also joined to collaboratively create the next cross-industry security standard.Making use of platform solutionsPowerVR GPU, MIPS CPU, and Ensigma RPU are the three pillars of Imagination's platform solutions. On the basis of this, we can help our customers leverage their know-how to develop SoCs for various applications including mobile, smart home, enterprise, IoT, connected cars, and so on.For customers, integrating different IP blocks is a challenging job, and our mission is to integrate these major function blocks properly in advance, so that customer can focus on differentiating their products. Therefore, for the four types of semiconductor plays, our strategy is to align with and address their different needs by providing them with the comprehensive IP portfolio, reference platform, subsystem IP, and ecosystem supports, and all these IP products will be protected by our OmniShield security technology.These pre-verified solutions can help companies enable the next wave of innovation. Not only SoC IP, software and tools are equally important. For example, strong software tools are one of the key factors to the success of PowerVR GPU. We will continue to take this strategy to expand ecosystems around our market-leading IPs. For example, we already partnered with Microchip, Samsung Artik, and Toshiba in our IoT ecosystem. In addition, we initiated FlowCloud and Creator programs to offer developers early access to new technologies from Imagination.Turning IoT into RealityIoT is the hottest topic today, and it will be a very large but fragmented market. The breadth of applications means no one player will dominate. Perhaps, some tier-one system companies will take "walled garden" strategy to develop smart home related products with their proprietary technologies and services. But for most of the companies that don't have the ability to construct entire services and product portfolios, interoperability is in urgent need. Therefore, service level interoperability and security will be the growth enablers, and ecosystems of many different skills will be essential to create solutions that really work.Though IoT seems promising, it's still in very early stage. We have seen too much re-branding of existing technologies and products as IoT, but they are not really mature ones. At Imagination, we see there are three levels of IoT devices to address major societal issues: application-specific sensor hubs, sensor hubs + audio/voice, and sensor hubs + audio/voice + smart vision.Our silicon IP portfolio addresses the needs of all of these key markets, including real-time, complex processing requirements for connected processor, smart camera, and audio. In order to realize the goal of IoT, as an industry, we need to work together to build truly open standards. IoT standardization focus should be on common connectivity standards, service-level interoperability via standardized protocols and APIs, and not tied to any OS, processor or other capabilities.As for the wearables, it is also a hot new thing. Though some treat it as IoT, we consider it a distinct, separate market. The market will result in multiple segments, such as all-in-one, lifestyle-oriented, in-clothing, and so on. Therefore, wearable devices will vary in capabilities and feature requirements. Also, the future of wearables ad their relationship to mobile and connected home will be increasing profound and how they work together will be key.However, in terms of functionality, user interface, and battery life, current generation of wearables are just smartphone functionality in a watch form factor. To succeed in the market, companies should shift focus from technology to wearability of the products, and address their specific requirements by adopting new SoC architecture. Low power, connectivity, security, user interface, and interoperability will be the five winning factors.Imagination's MIPS CPU, PowerVR GPU, Ensigma RPU, FlowCloud cloud service, and OmniShield security technology can address what really matters to wearables and help our customers create innovation for success.Home Gateway: Enabling Multi-Domain Security RevolutionAccording to Volker Politz, Vice President of Segment Marketing at Imagination, with fast changing consumer demands, home gateway is now in a big transition. Especially, in the cloud and IoT era, home gateway is increasingly important to allow operators to rapidly introduce new services for home surveillance, personal health, energy management, and smart home. But traditional design is no longer able to address these new market requirements.Resiliency, scalability, protection, and service provisioning are the main design challenges for home gateway. For example, in addition to basic routing, switching and networking functions, the new-generation home gateway may be used to provide public Wi-Fi hotspot, or supports various IoT services at home enabled through Zigbee, Bluetooth, or 802.11n/ac standards.These functions require different levels of security and priority. For this, Imagination introduced OmniShield security technology incorporating comprehensive portfolio of technologies, including hardware virtualized CPU, hardware virtualized GPU, secure fabric, trusted hypervisor, virtualized connectivity and offloads, and root of trust. It supports up to 255 secure heterogeneous containers on an SoC, which means that chip designers can partition its SoC into several secure domains based on application demands.Virtualization is a mature and proven technology and has strong software supports. As a result, OmniShield can benefit from this feature to provide hardware firewall level of security and achieve the highest flexibility and performance. In the use case of home gateway, different functions such as broadband and IoT aggregation can be isolated in separate secure domains to ensure security and accelerate time to market.On the other hand, for real-time applications, MIPS multi-thread technology can be used to enable real-time operation of trusted functions with almost zero performance penalty.Total cost of ownership for home gateway will be reduced dramatically by using OmniShield and Imagination's IP and IP platforms, and to provide operators with secure, scalable, and reliable solutions.PowerVR GPU IP from Wearables to Servers"Embedded GPU has been mainly used in mobile phones and tables," Kristof Beets, Director of Business Development at Imagination, said. "As the demands for graphic function grows, it is gradually penetrated into set-up boxes, HD TV, automotive infotainment, and more."The latest trend is to have GPU used in a wide range of applications, including IoT, wearables, enterprise, servers, and laptops. Thus, we can see huge range of opportunities for GPU, and also wide range of performance and feature requirements across markets.For GPU market, the rapid evolution of industry standard APIs can further improve its performance, such as the latest Khronos Vulkan and Khronos OpenVX. Vulkan is a low-level "metal" API, and is not to replace existing OpenGL ES. By matching modern GPU architectures, it provides higher performance with less CPU overhead. OpenVX is high-level API for vision/image processing and fully GPU accelerated. PowerVR GPU will support this new API in H2 2015.Also, due to the increasing fragmentation of the OS landscape, GPU should be able to support wider range of OSes, including Android, Ubuntu, FireOS, WebOS, and Chromium. Another key issue for GPU is that designers must carefully consider optimal system integration. For example, using lossless compression to support 4K tablets, or security and virtualization technology for automotive and server applications.Because of the widespread applications of GPU, we need to provide comprehensive solutions to address both the cost-sensitive applications such digital TV, wearables, entry-level smartphones, or the performance-efficient applications such as high-end tables and automotive.PowerVR is highly competitive and continues extending its market leadership. In terms of architectural performance, by using patented tile-based deferred rendering and PowerGearing power management technologies, PowerVR delivers high sustained performance within power budget. As for power efficiency, third-party data confirms that, compared with other solutions, SoC that is enabled by PowerVR can achieve 3 times better performance at the same power consumption. Imagination will keep improving the performance for each generation PowerVR to ensure better battery life and better user experience.MIPS CPU: Differentiating the Next Wave of Innovation"With comprehensive portfolio from the tiny 32-bit MCU to high performance 32- and 64-bit multi-core solutions, MIPS CPU is a proven, efficient 64/32-bit architecture, with more than 30 years of history and 20 years of full support to 64-bit technology," Mark Throndson, Director of MIPS Business Development at Imagination, introduced.MIPS architecture has been updated for several times in past years, and the latest version is MIPS R6, which incorporates hardware virtualization, SIMD, multi-threading features. MIPS64 is fully compatible with MIPS32. Software runs on MIPS32 doesn't have to switch mode to run on MIPS64, which will bring significant benefits for customers.Also, Imagination provides comprehensive tools for every aspect of development. Codescape tools, which are used for every MIPS-based platform development from entry-level to multi-core SoC, build on the open source GNU compiler and debugger (GCC and GDB) for MIPS, including all of the tools and resources needed to get started with MIPS software development, including bootloaders, linkers, example code, and more.After acquiring MIPS, Imagination continues expanding it ecosystem. One of the key projects is to initiate prpl Foundation, which aims to drive the progress of application portability, virtualization and security, and heterogeneous computing based on MIPS open source.MIPS CPU now supports OmniShield security technology. Based on hardware virtualization, a new privilege level is added in the architecture to support multiple guest domains and realize multi-domain security on CPU. From top to bottom core lineup, including M5100, I6400, and P5600, hardware virtualization is supported, and MIPS is the only company that implements virtualization for embedded MCU.Moreover, MIPS' unique hardware multi-threading and advanced power management technologies can effectively reduce silicon area and optimize dynamic power. MIPS portfolio includes three product lines from entry-level to high performance, Warrior M-class, Warrior I-class, and Warrior P-class, to address various market requirements.Ensigma RPU: The complete wireless solution"Wireless connectivity has become a must for electronic devices, but most of them are designed by using stand-alone wireless chipset," Richard Edgar, Director of Communications Technology at Imagination, said. "In order to achieve higher level of integration, we have seen the trend of integrating wireless communication functions onto SoC. Ensigma RPU (radio processing unit) is designed for this requirement."Ensigma RPU is a complete end-to-end solution and the only complete wireless IP subsystem in the market today. It includes integrated baseband and MAC, "hardened" RF IP, complete host software, and system solution for industry certification testing and RF regulatory testing.Ensigma RPU is unique programmable multi-standard radio processor, supporting more than 30 standards including all 802.11, television, radio, and Bluetooth standards. New 802.11ax and 802.15.4 standards, and GPS and Galileo positioning standards are in development. It is expected that a total of 45 standards will be supported within two years.With superior configurability, Ensigma RPU integrates multi-stand on-chip communication standards onto SoC. For different market segment, two product lines are provided. Ensigma Explorer is featured with ultimate performance and flexibility, and Ensigma Whisper is for ultra-low wireless. With integrated MIPS processor, Whisper removes need for dedicated host to reduce total system cost. It is ideal for emerging wearable devices.Meanwhile, Explorer and Whisper have the same host interface and are based on the same core algorithms. So, software and development tools can be shared to further reduce development efforts and cost.Other sessions in the afternoon included "Wearables: Low-power Design Meets High-power Fashion", "Automotive: Making Autonomous, Multimedia-rich Cars a Reality", "Vision IP: Powering the Smarter Camera", and "Connected Processors and FlowCloud IP: Integrating and Securing end-to-end IoT", showcasing the comprehensive solutions that Imagination provides for next-generation product development.Partners Gathered to Show Great SupportIn addition to the latest trends and technical solutions presented by Imagination's executives, major partners also participated the event to share their market insights as well as the results that they work with Imagination.Siegmund Redl, VP & GM Corporate Marketing of MediaTek Europe explained the rise of the "super-mid" market opportunity resulted from the dramatic increase of middle-class population worldwide, and the brand new industry landscape caused by ubiquitous and unlimited access to information through 5G technology. Therefore, collaboration and joint development among ecosystem partners will become more important than ever before.Keynes Chang, Marketing and Planning Director of Realtek discussed the future trend and requirement of GPU in TV SoC. "As display function gets increasingly important, area of GPU on a TV SoC is now bigger than that of CPU, and both of them account for more than one third of the total die size," he said.GPU is mainly used for user interface. But with the higher resolution of multimedia devices, 3D GPU can bring much better user experience. TV will be able to run multiple high-resolution video games to replace certain functions of game console. In addition, TV will support more functions such as facial recognition and new formats of video decoding in the future.As GPU plays an increasingly important role, new security issues rise. For example, the last thing that content providers would like to see is their premium 4K content is being hacked. Or, video clips will be used as user interface on new-generation products. In the past, there were no security issues for UI, but now the situation is changed because video is handled by GPU.There are multiple ways to address security requirement for GPU. One is to use virtualization technology to have multiple isolated, secure zones on SoC. However, it requires complex memory management unit. Designers should take this account when developing SoC. He concluded that, the more powerful GPU is, the more important the content that it processes. GPU is no longer only a functional IP block, but an integral part of SoC. So its security requirement should be carefully addressed.Simon Wang, Senior Director of IoT Business Development at TSMC, introduced the latest technical solutions for IoT. Though process node shrinkage has almost reached its limitation, advanced process technology is still required to drive the diverse and advanced applications for automotive, industry 4.0, and AR/VR, and to maintain the health growth of semiconductor industry.IoT market will be taking off rapidly, but demands for advanced 16/10 nm will still exist. But it will change from performance-driven concept to low power-driven. In addition to advanced nodes, TSMC is developing low-power 55/40/28 nm process technologies to further reduce leakage and extend battery life.TSMC will also strengthen cooperation with OIP (Open Innovation Platform) partners. TSMC and Imagination have built close and long relationship. Two companies will optimize GPU designs for 28/16 nm processes and provide verified IPs to help accelerate mutual customers' time to market.Cesare Garlati, Chief Security Strategist of prpl Foundation, explored the importance of open standards with open security. Prpl Foundation is an open-source, community-driven, collaborative, non-profit foundation targeting and supporting the MIPS architecture-and open to others-with a focus on enabling next-generation datacenter-to-device portable software and virtualized architectures. To address security requirement, the foundation is now working with members to drive end-to-end system security.In the afternoon's sessions, M31 Technology introduced its Power Optimization Solutions for IoT Application. Dolby showcased its Dolby Audio, which is a set of robust technologies that deliver rich, clear, powerful sound in the cinema, at home and on the go. Imagination supports Dolby Audio on MIPS CPU, including support for Dolby TrueHD, Digital Plus, and ProLogic IIz.Mentor Graphics had two technical sessions. One is to discuss the use case of emulation of Imagination IP on Veloce platform. Veloce2 is a market-leading hardware emulator, addressing challenges for large complex SoC verification such as smartphones and ADAS, and Mentor has a long standing partnership with Imagination. The other session is to introduce Mentor's embedded software solutions for wearable Devices. Ineda's MIPS-based wearable process unit is used as an example to discuss how it works with Mentor's Nucleus RTOS.Synopsys also had two sessions. In the "Collaborating to Speed Design and Verification with Optimized PPA" session, Synopsys stressed its more than 10 years of collaboration with Imagination, and can help customers shorten design cycle with its verification and prototyping solutions. Using HAPS-70 platform to accelerate hardware verification and software development for Imagination PowerVR Series 6XT was explained. The other session discussed "Hardening Imagination's 16FF+ PowerVR Series 7 GPU for Performance & Power with DesignWare HPC Design Kit". With these rich and informative speeches and sessions, the full-day technology feast was wrapped up with a perfect end.Imagination recently held its annual Imagination Summits in Hsinchu and Taipei, with more than 1000 registered attendees and 600 people visiting the events.Maxwell Lin, Director of Sales, Taiwan Imagination TechnologyTony King-Smith, EVP Marketing, Imagination TechnologySiegmund Redl VP & GM Corporate Marketing, Europe MediaTekKeynes Chang, Marketing and Planning Director, RealtekSimon Wang, Senior Director, IoT Business Development, TSMCCesare Garlati, Chief Security Strategist, prpl FoundationVolker Politz, VP Segment Marketing, Imagination TechnologyKristof Beets, PowerVR Business Development, Imagination TechnologyMark Throndson, Director of Business Development - MIPS,Imagination TechnologyRichard Edgar Ensigma Communications Technology Marketing, Imagination TechnologyAt 2015 Imagination Summit, Imagination and its partners showcased latest technical solutions, attracting attendees' warm interactions and discussions.

During the typhoon season, strong winds often cause a lot of damages to solar power sites, and the investments are blown away instantly. To overcome extreme weather conditions, considering environmental adaptation and high-efficiency of the PV system should be the first priority instead of reducing its initial capital cost.High Reliability – Resist extreme environmental conditionsInevitably, BIG SUN Group, a Taiwanese solar photovoltaic (PV) manufacturer, also needs to overcome the typhoon issue; however, the BIG SUN iPV Solar Tracker with its dynamic balancing design of parachute-like (cable-driven) structure enables strong wind resistance. After the super typhoon lashed Taiwan, the structure of iPV Solar Tracker was not broken. If the system only had a single pier which was similar to an umbrella, it would be easy to blow away like other PV mounting systems. The patent design of iPV Solar Tracker is like a seat belt, it protects the PV system to face extreme situations as well as without hitting surroundings.The land choice is also an investment. With H-piling construction, the iPV Solar Tracker can be installed rapidly without extensive land grading and concrete curing; 25 years later, the steel piles can be recycled, the value can be preserved and the environment can be protected.High Profit – Produce valuable PV output to bring overall benefitsWhen investing in solar power plants, the first thing is to evaluate its ROI. If only considering its capital cost but being careless of qualities of modules and other system components, it will be too late to make up for these oversights after disasters. Based on many case studies, combining high-performance iPV Solar Tracker with high-efficiency BIG SUN solar panels, the solar power harvesting is able to be maximized up to 50% more than a fixed-tilt PV system. Therefore, the total profit from iPV solar tracking system is much higher than the initial spending.The other thing that needs to be evaluated is the ability of maintenance. Topper Sun, the subsidiary of BIG SUN, is a top local EPC firm which provides immediate professional maintenance and after-care services. Topper Sun also applies the iPVita monitoring and control system to improve the PV site performance, assure the output of the PV site, and reduce maintenance costs by resolving faults more effectively.One more thing to be aware of is that solar electricity must be generated in the right way. Not all PV systems have the same "value" of electricity. Fixed-tilt systems produce excess energy at noon, but solar tracking systems are able to make power production more constant throughout the day, especially dual-axis tracking systems (DAT). In the morning and late afternoon, when demand is high, the power generation of DAT can meet the need closely. Hence the electricity generated from iPV Solar Tracker, a dual-axis solar tracker, should be more valuable and needed.Summer Luo, chairman of BIG SUN Group, emphasizes, "Follow the sun to get the proper power generation system and make the right investment for best profits. More importantly, we should always have good intentions to produce good energy and respect our mother earth."About BIG SUN GroupBIG SUN was founded in 2006. Its core business is focused on the design, production, and sale of high-quality solar products. BIG SUN's main products include 6" mono-crystalline silicon solar cells, the iPV Solar Tracker and the web-based iPVita monitoring & control system. The current conversion efficiency of BIG SUN's 6" mono-crystalline silicon solar cell is 20.0% (60-cells module with up to 290 watts power). Based on its extensive product lines, BIG SUN can offer vertical integrated PV power system solutions.BIG SUN: http://www.bigsun-energy.com/Topper Sun: http://www.toppersun-energy.com/iPVita: http://www.ipvita.com/For more information, visit BIG SUN at PV Taiwan 2015 booth # K0601.

Entegris, Inc. (NASDAQ: ENTG), a leader in yield-enhancing materials and solutions announced today the release of Torrento X Series 7 nm filters with FlowPlane linear filtration technology. FlowPlane is the semiconductor industry's first scalable, linear, high-flow filtration platform enabling advanced wet cleaning applications for the 10 nm node and beyond. The first in a series of filters based on the linear filtration technology, the FlowPlane S model is designed for point of dispense (POD) applications, enabling improvements in both on-wafer defectivity and yield for critical wet cleaning applications."We've reached an inflection point where filter design must evolve to meet the needs of the most complex semiconductor manufacturing processes," said Entegris Vice-President of the Liquid Microcontamination Control business unit, Clint Haris. "A filter is the last line of defense to prevent defect-causing contaminants from reaching the wafer. Our smaller, more powerful filtration solution will enable our customers to effectively implement their 10 and 7 nm technology nodes."Torrento X series 7 nm filters with FlowPlane linear filtration technology improves retention and increase flow rate performance by 100% compared to similarly sized radial filters. Moreover, FlowPlane users will benefit from the format's smaller device footprint as well as improved wafer defectivity performance.For more information about the Torrento X Series 7 nm filters with FlowPlane linear filtration technology, go to http://www.entegris.com/.FlowPlane linear filtration technology with Torrento X series 7 nm filters improves retention and increase flow rate performance.

Driven by the consumer IC market of emerging applications, such as CMOS Image Sensor (CIS), and 8-bit or 16-bit MCU for the controller of Internet of Things (IoT) in Health Care, Smart Energy System or Intelligent Family field, various product types, reference design and development tools and R&D staff training are needed to provide. To response to the prompt demand, the designers need rapid construction structures to come out new cells in a short time and less or even no trainings for new users, an open environment which can be integrated with third party tools to facilitate all design flow and a custom solution to optimize the layout.Thus, the IC layout designers need a unified, simple but powerful layout solution to design PCell, run simulation, debug and verify in the same environment to deliver time-to-market and high quality products. GOLF is a Schematic-Driven and OpenAccess-based layout solution that provides the full hierarchical manipulation capability to increase layout productivity up to a maximum of 30X+. GOLF provides a complete solution to design and debug PCell, run 3rd party DRC, LVS or LPE tools and generate test key in an integrated development environment (IDE).Benefits- Schematic-Driven Layout (SDL) provides the efficiency of debugging, high layout productivity in an easy-to-use environment- GUI-based, rich PCell primitive types and parameterized IDE environment to convenience the layout design and reduce the learning curve for new users- Test Key Layout Generation reduces product time-to-market by guided and parameterized test structures, automated and efficient methodology. - GOLF's custom layout service completes your layout solution and can increase 10X+~30X+ productivity.Open environment and extensible architectureGOLF is an OpenAccess-based layout solution that provides full hierarchical manipulation capability to increase layout productivity up to a maximum of 30X+. GOLF provides comprehensive methodologies which include powerful layout editing and debugging functions, intuitive GUI, flexible customization and extension with TCL/Perl/Python/C++ to enable layout designers to achieve correct-by-construction results.Intuitively design PCell with parameters in GUIGOLF provides PCell design, preview, testing, debugging, and documentation in a unified environment. Designing Cell in GOLF is parameterized and step-by-step; just entering parameters for a PCell in GUI instead of programming codes, even the engineers without any programming experience can follow the steps to come out PCells directly. It is based on Anaglobe's patented highly flexible and reusable hierarchical parameterized layout generator.More than the types that system-predefined, over 40 primitive PCell objects are provided to ease the use of devices and various operators are also supplied for the convenience of device modification or reuse. Special shapes also can be created easily in GUI as well.Intelligent test key layout generationTest key layout generator is the solution for test vehicle development by creating reusable and parameterized test structure. Designers only need to input parameters, define split table with or without routing constrains, then the test module can be interactively generated and assembled to place test modules into a single top design. With this solution, the conventional test chip development flow can be changed into an efficient, consistent and automated methodology.Schematic-Driven layout solutionAnaglobe's GOLF is the worldwide proven layout solution which enabling users to overcome the challenges of today's demand from the volatile market with little or no learning curve. Schematic-based editing and step-by-step guided layout tasks are just accomplished with easy clicks, parameter inputs or intuitive menu accesses.SDL operates with a hierarchical connectivity model working simultaneously at all levels of the design hierarchy. This capability will alarm connectivity errors as the net is short or open. This makes designers easier to understand the complexity of interactions through the design hierarchy.SDL also supports one-to-many mapping across multiple hierarchy levels. This allows layout designers to view different layout hierarchies at the same time for efficient net tracing or debugging. The cross probing of hierarchy net tracer and short Indicator can easily highlight the problem net without Place-and- Route (P&R), LVS or LPE. It does significantly reduce efforts and speed up the debugging processes.Custom layout solutionThere is always the gap between the solution of the standard layout tool and problems that users have. With GOLF's customization service, complete layout requirements can be satisfied and productivity can be increased up to 10X+~30X+. One example is to unify the test chip layout with customized P&R and parser in GOLF only that you don't need to switch in various tools, spend time in database transformation any more. There are also other reference customization projects as described below:- Dummy pattern insertion- Net checker- Bump cell placer- Web-based analysis and inquiry system - Customized tape-out flow- Defect inspection flowJoin GOLF customization, then you can spend less and get more.ConclusionTo shorten the layout cycle and maximize the productivity, GOLF – provided by AnaGlobe (http://www.anaglobe.com/), does address the problems that deep nanometer layouts meet and provides the highly integrated, multi-vendor tool suite for custom and cell-based design and verification .The leading-edge semiconductor foundries or famous design companies do gain from the adoption of GOLF to layout their analog, mixed-signal, logic, embedded memory or RF designs.Open environment and extensible architecture

Wireless communication technologies play a critical role in the rapid rise of mobile devices. Multi-band configurations have particularly contributed to the launch of 4G smartphones. A general 4G phone for use around the world is expected to support over 40 frequency bands in 2016. To keep up with advancement of the highly complicated technologies, it is essential that IC developers and RF module system assemblers with ambitions to grab a share of the market overcome the technical barriers of RF FrontEnd( RFFE) testing as phone signal reception quality and energy consumption are both closely related to the control of PA characterization.IC design teams have to do additional testing required by signal processing with respect to the PA specs they need to follow. Items including dynamic EVM, ACLR, PAE and RF output power, DC power supply, and channel frequency have to be individually scanned and tested to confirm if the performance of the product that has been designed meets the standard. As IC validation is more challenging than system module testing, IC test engineering teams generally work under tremendous pressure and have to race against time on a daily basis.IC testing generally starts from setting up various testing instruments and machinery, generally including oscilloscope, spectrum analyzer, a few signal generators that can simulate PA-enabled signals, power supplies needed to simulate PA power sources and a variety of measuring equipment. To model a test environment with fixed conditions, operators generally have to use GPIB to connect all the equipment. The preparation work alone is a daily struggle with all the wire connections behind the instruments.Operators can then perform measuring, logging and analyzing, and the data is compiled in an Excel file and turned into graphs and charts which are used to verify against IC design specs to check for incompliances or errors. With every design modification, the entire testing process has to be repeated again. It may take a novice team weeks or even months to master the overall process. Therefore, it is natural for product managers and engineering project leaders to feel concerned.LitePoint has delivered comprehensive automated testing solutions for production in mass quantities, helping manufacturers deliver billions of smartphones to the market every year. Realizing that the extremely demanding testing and verification work in a laboratory can no longer be carried out in the way that it was done before, LitePoint offers zSeries' PA/FEM total design validation solution for optimized testing of PA and FEM modules used in mobile devices.Because of LitePoint's long-term collaboration with mainstream PA chip makers, LitePoint is able to offer zSeries with a complete understanding of PA characterization and a modularized hardware design integrating all the measuring instruments needed to perform testing in a rack mount chassis with 9 or 18 slots for insertion of the hardware modules. zSeries' design frees test engineering teams from complex wire connections so that they can focus on the demanding function verification work.In addition to flexible hardware configurations, zSeries also provides software support by using a language architecture similar to a test script to enable editing and modification of different configuration profiles which are similar to regular .BAT files that engineers are familiar with. The scripting language is well liked as some test engineers of LitePoint's customers have nicknamed it "LitePoint Language."When repeatedly testing PA characterization, test engineers generally have to process a great amount of test data so LitePoint offers IQramp, a data analysis system that makes use of Big Data Analytics and automatically generates reports and charts in PDF format, to help with validation work. Therefore, zSeries is not just a simple tester but a complete solution integrating software, hardware, Big Data analytics, and report creation tools. As Shawn Knapp, LitePoint's product application manager, points out, zSeries not only accelerates the testing process but also offers a flexibly integrated automated testing platform for validation applications in laboratories and during the IC or module manufacturing process. It gives IC designers and RF module makers a flexible approach to enhancing product quality.zSeries impresses Japan market with promising expansion to other Asian countries for its precisionA case about a LitePoint customer using zSeries is worth mentioning. When a system assembler used zSeries to test the PA characterization of an RF module made by an RF module vendor with its internally-developed PA chip, the system assembler was able to discover that the dynamic EVM did not comply with the specs. This was a problem that the original PA design/test team failed to catch in the lab and was found and solved because the system assembler used zSeries, enabling high-precision testing that impressed the Japan industry.With zSeries, system manufacturers can learn about PA characterization and thereby gain knowledge on new technologies including dynamic EVM, Digital Pre-Distortion(DPD), and Envelope Tracking(ET), which will help improve their RF IC design capabilities. The testing and verification processes enabled by zSeries will boost overall quality and enhance differentiating features of next generation RF IC designs and applications. For engineering teams that design systems integrating baseband, power management, application processors, and RF modules, competition is escalating and wireless transmission technologies are advancing by leaps and bounds. But zSeries, with robust function verification and automated testing capabilities, will help IC designers and RF module makers achieve their goals of time-to-market efficiency.zSeries provides tools to generate test data graphs and charts in addition to a Big Data analytics system to enable PA and RF FEM testing

Both OEM and brand-name electronics manufacturers trying to shorten time-to-market have to develop capabilities to expedite time-to-production so that they can maintain an edge over competitors by being able to make products in mass quantities, with high yields, and at continuingly reduced costs for a chance to win market support. This applies to manufacturing of all sorts of products and also to the emerging IoT industry where products feature low volume and high mix with constant challenges on testing technologies.How to find the best solution to product testing is an industry-wide challenge. LitePoint endeavors to help Taiwan-based manufacturers in the search for innovative thinking on testing technologies and offers complete solutions by convening a forum every six months.The 2015 LitePoint forum featured two sessions on July 21 and 23 respectively in Hsinchu and Taipei, both of which centered on how LitePoint wireless testing technologies can be used to raise efficiency of testing during production and function verification during product design, and to offer complete testing solutions targeting emerging IoT trends. To propose an ideal testing solution, LitePoint started the forum with the message, "What is the value of testing?" presented by Adam Smith.The real meaning behind testing is the pursuit for product qualityIn his presentation, Adam Smith, Director of Product Marketing at LitePoint, started out by outlining the importance of testing as it ensures product quality. A product without quality has neither market opportunity nor a chance at succeeding, regardless of whether it is a master design, ingenious creation, or monumental work.Wireless transmission technologies are advancing by leaps and bounds. Take a 4G smartphone for example. The product design has to take into consideration the number of frequency bands likely to grow from five to over 20 by next year and additional support for two to three wireless transmission standards including WiFi and Bluetooth, requiring a total of eight antennas in general. Moreover, 30% of new phones on the market next year are expected to come with dual SIM card support so the testing items will also have to include WCDMA and GSM. It will definitely take a tremendous part of production time to test products integrating all these complicated functionalities on a small device, covering transmission over all the wireless channels, and supporting different chipset modules. This will result in an increase to production costs and therefore impact profitability. The situation calls for a provider that is capable of delivering total integrated testing systems and production solutions.Similar to the case of handsets, testing for WiFi devices is also very challenging. Additional antenna testing conditions are required for the 802.11ac Wave 2 standard with MU-MIMO and Beamforming. Furthermore, WiFi transmission in competition with LTE for the 5GHz frequency is error prone, so testing is essential to ensuring product quality and thereby upholding brand reputation.DUT Sense, Fixture Health Check, and APLC help build up production lines and enhance overall testing efficiencyToday we see over 1 billion smartphones manufactured on the production line every year and each one has more antennas that need to be tested and verified on different testers. As such, it is natural that manufacturers are very calculating about the time required to do the testing and also the space needed to set up the testers, the arrangement of the jigs and operation dynamics.Through continuing communication and work with customers, LitePoint has developed a set of new tools that help customers improve their testing station configurations including equipment, wiring, and jig check. Before complicated DUT goes on the line, software tools including DUT Sense that performs calibration, Fixture Health Check that checks jigs and probes, Automatic Path Loss Calibration(APLC) that examines cabling and connection efficiency assist customers with the essential preparation for setting up a testing station on a production line.zSeries meets challenges regarding function verification and manufacturing for chip designers and system assemblersA mobile phone's user experience is determined by its performance with respect to signal reception and power efficiency, which is related to the RF FrontEnd(RFFE) design. A general 4G phone for use around the globe has to comply with a variety of 4G transmission specs in different countries and support over 40 frequency bands. With the 5GHz frequency soon to join the competition, chip developers are struggling with challenges arising from the complexity of multi-mode multi-band testing and therefore are in need of help from providers of RF modules. Testing tools that can facilitate IC design houses to verify functions of their chips or enable system assemblers to test RF modules become very valuable.The PA/FEM solution provided by LitePoint zSeries focuses on testing of power amplifiers and RFFE modules. In addition to different chip specs used in RF FEM modules, additional verifications required by signal processing, such as dynamic EVM, ACLR, PAE, RF output power, DC power supply, and channel frequency, are also scanned and tested. Furthermore, special verification processes including Digital Pre-Distortion(DPD) and Envelope Tracking(ET) needed during design are also incorporated. LitePoint's product application manager for zSeries stresses that the consideration about testing not only encompasses accelerating the verification process but also ensuring the end product performance matches brand reputation on quality. This can be achieved by zSeries that delivers a flexible combination of automatic testing platforms satisfying requirements by both design verification and manufacturing applications.Innovative IoT applications inspire new testing thinkingInnovative applications and new startups are flourishing with booming IoT developments and are attracting attention from consumers and investors. However, IoT is still at a stage where a multitude of companies are competing against each other and the key to winning lies in the user experience and product design as well as aesthetics. From a technological perspective, under the surface is a contention among a host of wireless transmission technologies, Big Data analytics, and software platforms provided by tech alliances and group leaders. Therefore, we will likely see integrated technologies continue to emerge.LitePoint's presentation showed a series of wireless technologies that are likely to be integrated, including BT4.2, WiFi, ZigBee, WiSUN, Z-wave, NFC, and LTE Cat0, each with its own advantage. It is still unclear which wireless technology will become dominant. WiFi and related standards are promising as they are widely used but power consumption remains an issue. New WiFi 802.11ah spec attempts to reduce power consumption but is still at draft stage. BTLE, ZigBee, WiSUN, and Z-wave have an advantage in terms of power efficiency but data transmission rate needs improvement. NFC is most special in that it is more like an inductor coil of a transformer than a wireless protocol. However, its security feature surpasses all the others so people highly anticipate the technology but it is still unclear if NFC will stand out and become dominant.LitePoint's product manager raised as many as four questions at a time about IoT device testing. Can you make money only by cutting corners? Does testing necessarily cost you an arm and a leg? Is RF testing undoubtedly difficult? Is it enough to do simple Go/NG DUT testing? Everyone may have different answers to these questions. However, LitePoint solutions will definitely offer you a more positive answer for your IoT device testing.Evolution of 802.11ac Wave2 and new challenges in testing VHT 160, 1024QAM, and BeamformingMainstream chip vendors providing 802.11ac Wave2 chips remain a minority as the market development is still at infancy. However, LitePoint is closely watching the trend to help customers create differentiating product features and capture new opportunities. Beamforming uses constructive interference generated by signals from multiple antennas and concentrates beams in the direction of the client device. Signal coverage in the direction of the client device can be increased to help WiFi AP signals penetrate through walls. Beamforming comprises Explicit and Implicit Beamforming based on the spec. Implicit Beamforming (IBF) assumes downlink and uplink channels have the same conditions and only uses uplink signals for channel estimation, which is then used for downlink signal compensation. However, such an assumption does not work in the real environment so Explicit Beamforming (EBF), dynamically performing channel estimation on both uplink and downlink channels and then making signal compensation, is developed to achieve better beamforming effects.Beamforming is very sensitive with respect to phases. PCB using different components for receiving and transmitting circuits will result in phase differences in uplink and downlink signals so production of devices with the beamforming technology requires beamforming calibration to ensure the differences will not affect beamforming performance. Furthermore, special care has to be taken regarding different beamforming calibration algorithms used in chips from various vendors. LitePoint IQxel-M8 can adjust to different chip vendors' beamforming calibration methods, thereby giving considerations to a variety of testing requirements.LitePoint's IQxel-160 and IQxel-M16 solutions additionally cover testing for some new technologies not included in 802.11ac, such as 1024QAM. In particular, IQxel-160 has become a standard tester for almost all mainstream chip developers attributing to LitePoint's long-term cooperation with chip makers, which in turn benefits other LitePoint customers as well.Adam Smith, Director of Product Marketing at LitePoint, presenting views on technology trends and values of wireless testing at the forum

From the prompt demands of semiconductor, the killer applications are handheld devices, wearable devices, automotive applications and the Internet of Things(IoT). Most ICs are manufactured beyond 65nm and even more advanced processes. Such a SoC may include multi-core CPU, application processors, communication IPs such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, 3G or LTE and multi-type of sensors.Layout ChallengesSuch rapid increase of chip complexity results in the revolution of layout design. Not only the functionality and quality of a reliable product must be ensured, but also many ultra deep submicron (UDSM) effects can no longer be ignored any more. The understanding of analysis or simulation alone is not showing enough value. The future trend is the layout tool can have the capability of the intelligence beyond the ability of ordinary people to know how to judge and decision-making.Thus, the layout engine must be powerful enough to produce high-quality layouts. This includes respect for the design requirements such as large scale layout size up to several hundred GB, debugging capabilities with clear and smart net tracing, critical area analysis and density control, edge effect analysis and pattern analyzer of big data of wafer map. All the layout requirements must be fulfilled in a unified, friendly and hyper performance environment to deliver high yield and time-to-market layouts.A Complete Solution with ThunderTo overcome the layout challenges, Thunder provides an intelligent and a complete layout solution which has Hybrid Design Database (DDB) and Defect Knowledge Database(DKDB) with data mining technologies, accelerator, optimizer and analysis engines. The technologies are Big Data Analyzer for defect analysis, Performance Accelerator for large layout size and performance issues, Dummy Fill Optimizer for non-uniform density issues, and De-duplicated Merge to reduce the file size of the redundant cells when performing IP merge. With these technologies, Thunder can handle design capacity up to 500GB+ and provide the full SoC manipulation abilities with industry-leading performance.Early Warning of Potential Defects with Big Data AnalyzerTo dig out the potential wafer defects, Thunder provides a powerful mechanism to automatically identify the defect signatures from KLARF. Thunder contains a Defect Knowledge Database (DKDB) and a robust Big Data Analyzer that can automatically compare the design data in DDB to the defect signatures in DKDB to know whether the wafer with the defect patterns or not . With Defect Extraction technology, engineers can visualize in a more trivial way ; the Big Data Analysis Engine allow the defect engineers to generate and manage their own pattern library and set the threshold to notify them when the results of Statistical Monitor exceed the threshold. This engine is also helpful for engineers to optimize parameter settings or fine tune the analysis sequence to gain the better improvement of yield.Hyper Performance Import for High Capacity Design with Direct Import TechnologyMost layout tools save the layout to the disk when importing it at the first time. Anaglobe's professional designers find that saving layout designs to disk when importing does result in the performance bottleneck and even the hanging process sometimes. To break through the bottleneck, Thunder saves and runs it in the main memory directly instead of saving it back to the disk when layout files are imported. With the direct import technology, the layout size that Thunder can import is over 500GB+ which is the biggest one over all current layout tools!LVL Performance Accelerator with Layout Analysis EngineInstead of comparing each layout one by one for LVL comparison, Thunder provides the fastest performance of LVL comparison, linear to data size, to quickly identify the differences between two designs. The intelligent layout analysis engine has the ability to quickly differentiate whether two blocks are possible to be the same or not. When they are not, further detail comparison will be no longer processed.Uniform Layout Density Distribution with Dummy Fill OptimizerNon-uniform density will degrade analog circuit performance and impact the yield. It needs intelligent methodology to check the critical area and generate the dummy cells accordingly. Thunder provides a density map generation, violation checking and rule based dummy metal fill insertion to resolve the density issue completely. Beyond other tools, small region can be done as well. For dummy fill insertion, it can insert a uniform and regular metal pattern to low density area according to the target percentage interactively and creates vertical or horizontal patterns with offset.Comprehensive Debugging with 3D VisualizationThunder's powerful 3D net tracer provides both tracing and highlight problematic nets with 3D visualization. It supports both location based and pin text based tracing. 3D View is not only for net, but also for finFET or Cut Layers.Consolidate IP Merge with De-duplicated Merge TechnologyWhen merging IPs, Thunder has a very smart mechanism, De-duplicated Merge Technology, to detect and remove the redundant layouts of cells. The power of De-duplicated Technology is to use LVL comparison during the merging process to know whether the layouts of the cells are exactly the same or not. When they are the same, only one layout will be kept in the design and other cells will be renamed. That's the way for Thunder to consolidate the design. The merge results are also very impressive to the layout designers. The best case is 60% GDS size can be saved!ConclusionWorking in Thunder's environment allows you to start from the layout prototyping, IP merge and yield improvement in one unified platform. Intuitive GUI and 3D layout view enables the efficiency of debugging. Thunder also can communicate with the third party tools and provide big data analysis for wafer inspection results. Uniform layout density distribution and dummy fill insertion in critical area also can be done automatically and intelligently. In short, Thunder is a total and an optimized customization layout solution which does address to resolve all deep submicron layout issues and can increase 30X+~50X+ productivity! Thunder – provided by AnaGlobe (http://www.anaglobe.com)A complete solution with ThunderEarly warning of potential defects with Big Data Analyzer

Who today doesn't think IoT is cool? And, why not? We're in an era where everything is connected to everything else in a six degrees of separation-like scenario for our electronics devices.Smart homes, smart autos and even smart cities are all cool amenities to make life easier and more comfortable. Smart, wearable consumer devices, such as running shoes and fitness trackers, furnish us with a personal health coach on our feet or wrist. Smart health and wellness applications are popping up everywhere, giving anyone with a smart phone or tablet instant access to an informed medical professional. Smart tile, a Bluetooth tracker, helps find lost or misplaced keys or wallets. A smart button creates shortcuts to our phones. Automatic washing machines and domestic refrigerators were cool to our grandparents because they enabled them to have more time for other pursuits. IoT is cool today for the same reason.Much of this innovation is due to a common hardware platform that has enabled what will be close to 50-billion connected devices by 2020 and lets consumers access multiple time-saving, health-conscious applications. In these new devices, the differentiation is created in embedded software, not so much hardware any longer. The embedded memory requirements are stringent and range from a small silicon footprint and low power with instant-on to programmable, non-volatile code storage. Most important is a guarantee that the memory is highly secure to protect software IP and prevent hacking of these next-generation devices.The need for high secure memory and lower power memory is greater than ever because that is what's needed for the coming devices that could make us better than what is humanly possible. Today, connectivity is ubiquitous. Sensors are ubiquitous. Hardware cost is decreasing because of Moore's Law. We love to share (or don't know we are sharing) through various social media platforms or application services. Next-generation smart peripherals could address improving our five senses: sight, taste, smell, touch, and hearing.As we age, our hearing gets worse. Smart phones now have a microphone that can capture the ambient. What if the phone or another form factor in the future could hear better than we do and alert us of the environment around us or of possible danger? We can have context awareness, which will allow us to be aware and perhaps anticipate. We have just started to think about what is possible with IoT and, maybe, not thinking big enough about the possible applications.Winners of this emerging IoT market segment will be devices featuring low power and hack-proof security. They will be inexpensive because the hardware will be tightly coupled with differentiating embedded software. And, naturally, they will have multiple application services onboard. Today, we trade data unknowingly, and the need for security will continue to be important.Power, power and more power will become even more important when we think about the changing mankind type of applications. We can't have a lithium battery in our eye when there's a contact lens helping us see beyond 20/20. Bitcell current of embedded NVM needs to be reduced in addition to the traditional peripherals done today.From the cool applications of today to the life changing peripheral applications of tomorrow, the technology requirements are advancing, and the NVM technology used for these applications needs to be at ultra-low power, low cost, and highly secure. It will be exciting to see, with these accomplishments, what the next generation applications can do for humankind.For more information about Kilopass Technology, please visit: http://www.kilopass.com/

Leading semiconductor test equipment supplier Advantest Corporation's (TSE: 6857, NYSE: ATE) subsidiary Advantest (Singapore) Pte. Ltd., outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) foundry Fabtronic Sdn Bhd and Malaysia's Northern Corridor Implementation Authority (NCIA) have entered a strategic partnership to enhance the test-development and product-characterization skills of IC test engineers by establishing a laboratory and professional training center in Malaysia's Northern Corridor Economic Region (NCER). The partner organizations expect the program to help reduce development costs and improve time to market for semiconductor devices made in Malaysia.The three organizations signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to jointly launch a shared-services test laboratory and skills development training program at the Northern Corridor Technology Development Center (NTDC), located in Phase 4 of the Bayan Lepas Free Industrial Zone in Penang, Malaysia. The new lab and training program will be run by Fabtronic, which has equipped the facility with a V93000 Smart Scale test platform from Advantest. This scalable system is designed to support both engineering and high-volume manufacturing applications."We enthusiastically support this cooperative venture to grow Malaysia's high-tech ecosystem, expand its skilled labor force and improve product-development efficiencies," said Paul Lau, managing director and CEO of Advantest (Singapore) Pte. Ltd. "Advantest is proud to be a founding member of this three-pronged coalition of private-sector and government groups helping to bring the first shared-services test lab to Southeast Asia."More information about Advantest Corporation is available at http://www.advantest.com/.