Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Apple Propelled IC Growth to +60%/ +20%

My last blog (Semiconductor IC Sales +60% to +20% for 6 Companies) discusses large increase in semiconductor sales for some companies in first quarter of 2015.The driving force behind these large growth is Apple. Apple purchase more than $25B in 2014 (see table below). When Apple started diversifying its semiconductor sources it led to large impact on them. 


2013 Ranking

2014 Ranking


Company


2013


2014

Growth (%) 2013-2014

Market Share (%) 2014
1
1
Samsung 
30.6
32.1
5.1
9.4
2
2
Apple
23.5
25.8
9.8
7.6
3
3
HP
13.7
14.7
7.1
4.3
4
4
Lenovo
9.5
12.8
33.9
3.8
5
5
Dell
9.1
10.3
13.2
3.0
6
6
Sony
7.7
7.4
-2.8
2.2
9
7
Huawei
4.9
6.0
21.6
1.8
7
8
Cisco Systems
5.6
5.8
3.1
1.7
10
9
LG Electronics
4.7
5.5
15.9
1.6
8
10
Toshiba
5.5
5.3
-4.0
1.5


Others
200.2
214.2
7.0
63.0


Total
315.0
339.9
7.9
100.0
Note: Some columns do not add to totals shown because of rounding.
Source: Gartner (January 2015)

Apple demand is large part of TSMC 44% sales growth, GlobalFoundaries 21%, and Hynix 25% in first quarter of 2014.

Apple diversifying its semiconductor supplier started couple years ago (see November 2013 blog http://semiconductorexpert.blogspot.com/2013/11/who-will-fabricate-apple-microprocessors.html ).

When Apple shifted from using Samsung as the only vendor fabricating its microprocessor, it had large impact on Samsung sales. Apple was a major customer of Samsung several years ago. See March 2012 blog Foundry Rankings (Including Samsung’s  iPad, iPhone Breakdown) . 

More about Apple increases reliance on TSMC and adding GlobalFoundaries is in earlier blogs such as April 2015 Next iPhone Be Fabricated at TSMC .





Ron
Insightful, timely, and accurate semiconductor consulting.
Semiconductor information and news at - 
http://www.maltiel-consulting.com/

Thursday, May 21, 2015

Semiconductor IC Sales +60% to +20% for 6 Companies


While the overall Semiconductor grew 9% between 1st quarter in 2014 to 2015, 6 companies grew more than 20%. 


The article below discusses IC Insights update of top 20 semiconductor supplier sales growth. Of the top 6 that grew more than 20%, only one benefited from a merger. Of the top sale growth companies Sharp benefits from growth in CMOS image sensors, while TSMC and GlobalFoundaries are foundries.

The article and the table does not mention SanDisk, which  has yearly revenue of about $6.5B , portion of which is all the flash NAND chips used to build their products.

More about SanDisk ranking in April 2011 blog Top 25 2011 Semiconductor Sales Ranking .


Ron
Insightful, timely, and accurate semiconductor consulting.
Semiconductor information and news at - http://www.maltiel-consulting.com/




Six Top 20 1Q15 Semiconductor Suppliers Show >20% Growth

Wednesday, May 20, 2015

Metal Interconnects for 7 nm Process

Co ELD on Palladium/Tungsten (Pd/W) for different timed stops to yield an (i) under fill, (ii) potential ideal stop or an (iii) overburden in 28nm holes
Metal interconnects is a keys area that limits the shrinking of semiconductor die size. A recent advance in the development of the 7 nm technology is reported below by IMEC with Lam research.

"Co ELD technique was demonstrated as a feasible method for highly selective bottom-up contact fill and via prefill with Cobalt (Co) as an alternative metal to Copper (Cu). Moreover, the high selectivity of the ELD process, at lower cost compared to Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD), intrinsically ensures a good metal-to-metal interface and paves the way to void-free via filling and increased yield."

Ron
Insightful, timely, and accurate semiconductor consulting.
Semiconductor information and news at - http://www.maltiel-consulting.com/







During the IEEE IITC conference in Grenoble, the nanoelectronics research center imec and Lam Research Corporation today presented a novel bottom-up prefill technique for vias and contacts. The technique, based on Electroless Deposition (ELD) of Cobalt (Co) is a highly selective method resulting in void-free filling of via and contact holes. Potentially increasing the circuit performance, it is a promising path to scaling advanced interconnects and enabling future logic and DRAM nodes at the 7nm node and below.
As logic and memory nodes scale, performance of these advanced interconnects is negatively impacted by increasing interconnect resistance. Furthermore, voids that occur in heavily scaled vias severely impact yield. imec’s industrial affiliation program on advanced interconnects is exploring novel metallization methods to solve these issues. One way to solve the problem is to identify integration and metallization alternatives that provide resistance benefits over conventional technology without compromising reliability and yield. Together with Lam Research, a Co ELD technique was demonstrated as a feasible method for highly selective bottom-up contact fill and via prefill with Cobalt (Co) as an alternative metal to Copper (Cu). Moreover, the high selectivity of the ELD process, at lower cost compared to Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD), intrinsically ensures a good metal-to-metal interface and paves the way to void-free via filling and increased yield. Trench fill yield and line resistance may also benefit from the de-coupling of line and via aspect ratios, permitting the design of each for optimum Resistance/Capacitance (RC). Therefore, Co prefill ELD has the potential to enable future scaling of advanced logic and memory technologies.
Figure: Co ELD on Palladium/Tungsten (Pd/W) for different timed stops to yield an (i) under fill, (ii) potential ideal stop or an (iii) overburden in 28nm holes (Aspect Ratio (AR) 4.5)
Figure: Co ELD on Palladium/Tungsten (Pd/W) for different timed stops to yield an (i) under fill, (ii) potential ideal stop or an (iii) overburden in 28nm holes (Aspect Ratio (AR) 4.5)
The results were achieved in cooperation with imec’s key partners as part of its core CMOS programs: GlobalFoundries, Intel, Samsung, SK hynix, Sony, TSMC, Amkor, Micron, Utac, Qualcomm, Altera, Fujitsu, Panasonic, and Xilinx.

Monday, May 18, 2015

Top Semiconductor Products & Sale

Micron has benefited from its timely acquisition of Elpida . The chart presents in a nice graphically way semiconductor manufacturers ranking by size and products.

One issue with this ranking is that SanDisk has a joint venture with Toshiba which produce all of its NAND chips. SanDisk has yearly revenue of about $6.5B , portion of which is all the flash NAND chips used to build their products. It would be interesting where a combined Toshiba / SanDisk rank would be in the chart.

More about SanDisk ranking in April 2011 blog Top 25 2011 Semiconductor Sales Ranking



Ron
Insightful, timely, and accurate semiconductor consulting.
Semiconductor information and news at - http://www.maltiel-consulting.com/



Micron Climbs to Fifth in Chip Manufacturing Market

Published: May 15,2015
Global Top-10 Chip Manufacturer Revenue Ranking in 2014(Source: Respective companies, compiled by MIC, May 2015)
According to MIC, Micron has emerged as the fifth largest chip manufacturer in the world. In 2014, Micron earned US$16.4 billion and climbed all the way from tenth to fifth place, only next to Intel, Samsung, TSMC and Qualcomm."Micron has been highly engaged in M&A activities and strategic alliances over the past years. Those two approaches, though not new, have been able to help Micron obtain the most outcomes such as increased sales and profitability," says Hui-Chung Tu, industry analyst with MIC.
Micron's ability to spot good investment timing is another factor determining its success. Among all, perhaps the most noteworthy deployment of Micron is its deployment in DRAM. Micron has witnessed a strong uptake in DRAM and NAND flash businesses with its annual revenue breaking US$14 billion.
This has helped Micron land in top-five semiconductor vendors, next to Intel, Samsung, TSMC and Qualcomm. While the growth momentum continued well into 2014, Micron is expected to continue to cling to the fifth spot in 2015, as the global economy is showing promising signs.

Tuesday, May 5, 2015

Apple Watch Manufacturing Highlights

The article below summarize key aspects of the new Apple watch. It is important to remember that Apple goal is to extend its ecosystem to a new interface- the watch. It pushing the manufacturing envelope further-


”The encapsulation of the entire printed circuit board assembly into a single monolithic module is especially noteworthy,” Keller said. “Whereas many products might have some form of semi-flexible encapsulant applied to the board for protection, shock and vibration purposes, Apple has effectively created one large IC out of the entire assembly. This encapsulation is done by encasing the board in the same plastic/epoxy material used for conventional ICs. Indeed, many of the devices found inside the assembly are already encapsulated, effectively creating an IC-within-an-IC affair."



Ron
Insightful, timely, and accurate semiconductor consulting.

Semiconductor information and news at - http://www.maltiel-consulting.com/








Apple Watch has lowest cost to price ratio

Posted by IT-Online on May 5, 2015
The much-anticipated new Apple Watch has the lowest hardware costs compared to retail price of any Apple phone IHS Technology has researched, according to a preliminary estimate by IHS and its Teardown Mobile Handsets Intelligence Service.The teardown of the Apple Watch Sport by IHS Technology estimates that the actual hardware costs are only about 24 percent of the manufacturer’s suggested retail price (MSRP). Estimated hardware cost to MSRP ratios for other Apple products reviewed by IHS are in the range of 29% to 38%.

The teardown of the Apple Watch Sport 38 mm by IHS Technology shows a bill of materials of $81.20 with the cost of production rising to $83.70 when the $2.50 manufacturing expense is added. The retail price of the Apple Watch Sport 38 mm is $349.00. The IHS Technology analysis does not include logistics, amortised capital expenses, overhead, SG&A, R&D, software, IP licensing and other variables throughout the supply chain such as the EMS provider.

“It is fairly typical for a first-generation product rollout to have a higher retail price versus hardware cost,” says Kevin Keller, senior principal analyst-materials and cost benchmarking services for IHS Technology. “While retail prices always tend to decrease over time, the ratio for the Apple Watch is lower than what we saw for the iPhone 6 Plus and other new Apple products, and could be of great benefit to Apple’s bottom line if sales match the interest the Apple Watch has generated.”

There are several new features and manufacturing methods used in the Apple Watch Sport, including: a Pulse Oximeter, Force Touch sensor, “Taptic Engine” feedback, encapsulated modular printed circuit board (PCB) assembly and stacked-die integrated circuits (IC). “While these features have been promoted by Apple and none are necessarily revelatory,” Keller says. “It is noteworthy that many features are appearing for the first time – in combination – in one device. It could be a bellwether for other future Apple products.”

The Taptic Engine built into the Apple Watch, and integrated with the loudspeaker, contains a linear actuator which provides haptic feedback and vibrations. “We found that the device consumes a substantial amount of space inside the watch, and we would expect further miniaturization of this function in future iterations of the product,” he adds.

The preliminary results of the teardown do not show any big surprises in the IC content; all of the manufacturers identified so far were expected. The Apple Watch NAND memory is a Toshiba Flash 8GB and DRAM is a Micron SDRAM 512Mb. Broadcom, STMicro, Maxim, Analogue Devices and NXP are used for connectivity and interface. One noteworthy change is a shift from Invensense to STMicro for the accelerometer/gyroscope.
“The display is LG’s plastic OLED display and the touchscreen overlay module is a TPK Slim GG utilising their ‘Force Touch’ technology,” Keller says. “Force Touch was recently incorporated into the latest MacBook and is expected to be found in the next iPhone generation.”

The fabrication of the enclosure continues the Apple “Unibody” tradition of precision machining from a single block of aluminium. Apple is now extending this design philosophy into a highly miniaturized realm, mating the legacy of precision watchmaking with Apple’s specialized manufacturing practices. As with their previous products, Apple has taken fabrication techniques – once typically restricted to low-volume manufacturing and prototyping – and scaled them into a high-volume production environment.

‘”The encapsulation of the entire printed circuit board assembly into a single monolithic module is especially noteworthy,” Keller said. “Whereas many products might have some form of semi-flexible encapsulant applied to the board for protection, shock and vibration purposes, Apple has effectively created one large IC out of the entire assembly. This encapsulation is done by encasing the board in the same plastic/epoxy material used for conventional ICs. Indeed, many of the devices found inside the assembly are already encapsulated, effectively creating an IC-within-an-IC affair.

“To provide electromagnetic shielding, the encapsulated PCB assembly is further treated with a metalized coating deposited over the surface,” Keller adds. “This shielding process is used in place of conventional stamped sheet metal shielding, saving a significant amount of space, as well as cutting down slightly on weight.”

The Apple Watch is equipped with inductive charging technology and is being shipped with a wireless charger, based on Apple’s own proprietary MagSafe charging technology.
“It has been speculated that the Apple Watch could be compatible with the Wireless Power Consortium’s (WPC) Qi wireless charging specification,” says Vicky Yussuff, analyst-power supplies & wireless power for IHS. “AppleInsider recently shared a video which appears to show the Apple Watch MagSafe charger being used to charge the Moto 360 smart watch. This would suggest that Apple’s charger is Qi-compatible.

“Apple has not been announced as a member of the WPC or even a supporter of the consortium, so it is unlikely that they have produced a ‘certified’ Qi product. However, the Qi specification is an open standard meaning it is still possible for Apple to build products which are compatible to the specification. This could be the case with the Apple Watch MagSafe charger,” Yussuff says. “Although it cannot be verified if both the Moto 360 smartwatch and
Magsafe wireless charger used in the video were both un-modified ‘off the shelf’ products, this could potentially be another boost for the wireless charging industry looking to increase interoperability.”

The Apple Watch battery appears to be somewhat simpler to replace than the batteries in many other Apple products. As long as the display can be carefully removed, the battery is attached with a simple snap-on connector.