Semiconductor ETFs Helping Tech’s Turnaround

Photo Credit: ETF TrendsApple, Google and a few other sexier, “new tech” companies are the names that usually captivate investors’ attention when it comes to technology stocks and ETFs. However, a familiar sub-sector has helped lead tech’s recent resurgence.
In the past three months, the PowerShares QQQ is up almost 8%. Over the same time, shares of Intel have surged 19.5% and it almost feels like that is the quietest almost 20% gain the span of 90 days that has come along in quite a while. Quiet or not, Intel and chip stocks are helping drive a resurgence in semiconductor ETFs. [Semiconductor ETF Bouncing Back]
So sturdy have been semiconductor ETFs that opting for any of the three of the group’s largest funds has treated investors to significant out-performance over QQQ. Since March 19, the three dominant chip ETFs have returned an average of 11.6%. [ETF Spotlight: Semiconductors]
The leader of the pack over that time has been the iShares PHLX SOX Semiconductor Sector Index Fund (NasdaqGM: SOXX). Almost 12 years old, SOXX holds 31 stocks with the ETF’s top-10 holdings combing for almost 61.6% of the ETF’s weight.
Before getting too excited about chip stocks, it is worth noting there have been some tepid performances over the past three months, including a slight loss for SOXX top-10 holding Broadcom (NasdaqGS: BRCM). However, Intel and Applied Materials (NasdaqGS: AMAT) are the ETF’s two largest holdings, combing for 17% of the fund’s weight. Applied Materials has surged 22% over the past 90 days, teaming with Intel to drive SOXX higher.   READ MORE

Texas Instruments Plans to Boost China Manufacturing

Photo Credit: EE Times

Texas Instruments has said it plans to spend up to $1.69 billion expanding its wafer fab in Chengdu, China and adding an assembly and test operation there. The spending is earmarked to be spread over 15 years and could include the acquisition of land, the creation of facilities, and the purchase of manufacturing equipment, TI (Dallas, Texas) said.

The government of Chengdu has promised to give comprehensive support to the expansion plan, TI added saying that it announced the plan alongside officials from the Chengdu Hi-Tech Zone at a conference there last week.

TI purchased the fully-equipped 200-mm facility in the Chengdu High-tech Zone from Cension Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.in 2010. The Chengdu fab was previously operated by Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp. on behalf of Cension and TI took on 700 former SMIC and Cension employees that worked at the site and began production of analog ICs. The purchase price of the Chengdu fab was not disclosed at the time. READ MORE

Intel Partners with SoftKinetic to Develop 3-D Sensor Recognition

Photo Credit: Tweak TownThe world's largest manufacturer of semiconductor products, Intel Corp ( INTC ) recently announced its collaboration with SoftKinetic to develop 3D sensor and gesture recognition solutions for different platforms, including Ultrabook, notebooks, desktops, All-In-One personal computers, PCs, and tablets.

Per the terms of the agreement, Intel  will license SoftKinetic's gesture recognition software platform, iisu, within its Perceptual Computing software development kit (SDK).

Founded in Jul 2007, the Belgian company SoftKinetic provides motion control or gesture-based recognition solutions. This technology  is widely used in a variety of devices in the consumer electronics and health & fitness markets. Currently, this technology is in use in the video game industry as well. Gaming consoles such as Microsoft Corporation's ( MSFT ) Kinect and Nintendo's Wii are already equipped with this technology.

Currently, motion-based or gestures-based technology is gaining immense popularity. It is the next big thing in the technology world. The ease of use it offers-- tapping anywhere on the screen to play  a song, pause it or swipe the screen to change the track -- is the primary reason for its popularity.

Although gesture-based technology is still in a nascent stage, apps are already being developed. Start-up companies like Flutter are allowing PCs powered by Apple Inc.'s ( AAPL ) Mac and Microsoft Windows to control their music by downloading the app. The users, through gestures, can use applications such as Spotify, iTunes, Windows Media Player, QuickTime and VLC.  READ MORE

Dan Armbrust on Collaborative Research and “Right Timing”

MySemiconDailyTV interviewed Dan Armbrust, President & CEO of SEMATECH in advance of SEMICON West 2013, where he will be a presenter at the R&D Panel: “A conversation on the future of semiconductor manufacturing” (Wednesday July 10 from 10:00AM-11:00AM). Because the semiconductor industry faces a growing chorus of competing interests and economic realities, i.e., near parallel introductions of new transistor architectures, new channel materials, optical lithography extensions and EUV lithography, 450mm wafers, and stacked 3D ICs, it has to find more efficient ways to accomplish R&D. “It would certainly be convenient if we could narrow our focus to fewer of the things we need to do,” Armbrust told MSDTV. “Unfortunately, we need to do them all.” The necessity, he explains, is driven by customer expectations for continued advancements in power, performance, and lower cost. “As an industry, if we’re going to stay on the growth curve we’ve been on and remain vital, we’re going to have to solve all of the problems.”

The challenges facing the industry have a common denominator — they are difficult, complex, and have a fair amount of uncertainty, both technical and economic. “We need to respond to that uncertainty challenge by coordinating better across the entire industry,” said Armbrust. “And that means, wherever possible, reducing redundancies and eliminating waste.” He also pointed out that the timing has to be correct, i.e., when each challenge is addressed, how solutions are introduced, and getting to volume manufacturing much faster than in the past.  

With the price points of consumer electronics — especially mobile devices — continuing to be under pressure, semiconductor manufacturers will continue to be challenged with leveraging their participation in R&D consortia ever more efficiently.  And consortia will have to adapt accordingly. What doesn’t change is that, as usual, consortia will be working to bring the industry to a consensus and prioritizing actions, as well as identifying infrastructure gaps and addressing them. “The entire supply chain is under pressure to continuously adapt - and to prepare the technology with much more significant up front investment,” said Armbrust. The “why” gets back to uncertainty he pointed out. “If you look at the device roadmap — there’s significant questions about what happens — what’s the next big step as we get closer to the end of scaling as we’re used to it. Similarly, when each new technology will be introduced has a fair amount of uncertainty around it and a lot of people in the industry are talking about how the changes should be sequenced, and the interaction between them.” The degree of technical uncertainty is compounded by the economic uncertainty, i.e., can the changes be introduced while continuing to drive down costs.

To help deal with the uncertainty, Armbrust suggests the industry can get some inspiration from its roots. After all, in the beginning, the semiconductor industry was a bunch of start-ups that had restrictions on resources and were under constant time pressure. SEMATECH has been looking at what start-ups are doing today and applying the lessons learned to the dynamic semiconductor industry environment. “If we’re quick on our feet, we’ll be able to pick the right problems, and work on them when they matter, and pull the industry together in a way that makes sense...quickness and speed will matter.”

by Debra Vogler, Instant Insight Inc.

Terry Brewer on New Materials Below 20nm

The semiconductor industry is bringing to the fore new transistor architectures and new channel materials, along with the transition to EUV lithography (EUVL) and thin-wafer handling capability to enable 3D integration. The topic of new materials below 20nm, therefore, is prescient. MySemiconDailyTV asked Dr. Terry Brewer, founder, President & CEO of Brewer Science, to comment on the issues facing the industry in this Skype video interview:

Perhaps the more difficult topic to get updated now is that of EUV resists—that’s because this sector has reached the competitive stage in the industry as pilot line activity gets closer to reality. “The model of the resist and multilayer structures have come to a point where they are now executable into the early stages of manufacturing,” said Brewer. “It’s come a long way and the model is usable for a little while. There are still technical issues to solve and economic challenges, however.”  Though many industry experts concede that directed self-assembly (DSA) will be used as a complement to EUVL, some can see a role for the technology aside from EUV.

Brewer Science presented a paper at the SPIE Advanced Lithography conference on the topic of a multifunctional hard mask neutral layer for DSA and in his interview, Dr. Brewer noted that end users are very excited about DSA. “The technology and processes are moving along very quickly and it looks like it will be available as a complement to EUV, but also as a pathway on its own to achieve smaller and smaller lithography,” said Brewer. “I think what we’re seeing in general, even past DSA, is that the tool chest for materials is broadening very rapidly and can carry lithography down much further than it is now, with a particular tool set or with a variety of tool sets. I think we can accomplish the next several nodes utilizing that technology. It’s very exciting."

Wrapping up the interview, Dr. Brewer covers the topic of thin wafer handling.  He explained that for materials suppliers, the main challenge is that the process is continually evolving. “The customer is evolving it as they understand the needs better and the opportunities for the technology, and the equipment companies are evolving as they understand and better relate to the customer’s needs,” said Brewer. “And the
materials suppliers—we’re kind of at the long end of the branch, so as the customer wiggles the branch a little bit, we see a lot of wiggle and change and a lot of movement from those requirements. So we are caught between uncertainty and chaos with a constantly moving target.” Brewer noted that development work is moving into more of the process technology needs, particularly for thin wafer handling where it’s gone from materials technology, to bonding technology, to the sophistication of process to handle thin wafers. “And that’s where we are right now, and at every stage, we have to give the customer an enabling or useful technology that will allow them to apply their development or products at that stage of improvement.”

The biggest challenge of all, however, will be providing solutions at a cost and throughput that matches the
requirements of the industry.  Finally, Dr. Brewer comments on progress at the company’s recently installed scaleup reactor at its Carbon Electronics Center to support expansion of electronics-grade carbon nanotube materials for CNT-based memory devices. Within the last year or so, customers have been moving from the testing regime to pilot production — hence the need for the new reactor. By about 3Q13, the company expects to be producing about 10x more volume than previously generated.

by Debra Vogler, Instant Insight Inc.