Marveling at MEMS: The New Superheroes of The Silicon World
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
Release Date: 07/11/2023
Changing the World One Wireless RF Chip at a Time
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
After beginning his career with Hewlett-Packard, David Su met a friend for lunch to learn about a new startup called Atheros. He was so excited by the vision to develop world-changing products that Su “went for lunch and never left.” At Atheros, Su had a “front-row seat” developing wireless WAN technology that transitioned from novelty to necessity while Atheros grew from a startup to a billion-dollar behemoth. That little startup was eventually acquired by another company you may have heard of: Qualcomm. And what led Su to get involved with another startup? Well, lunch, of course. Su...
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Can Silicon Photonics Solve the Bandwidth Bottleneck in AI Data Centers?
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
Steve Klinger, Vice President of Product, joins the Moore’s Lobby podcast to discuss how LightMatter is using silicon photonics to improve speed and reduce power consumption in AI data centers. With two previous $1B+ startups under his belt, Klinger knows a thing or two about identifying successful technology solutions to current industry challenges. While compute performance continues to grow rapidly, interconnect has not been able to keep pace. In this episode, Klinger explains how LightMatter’s flagship product, Passage, creates a programmable optical fabric for the efficient...
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Freeing EEs to Design Like Tony Stark
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
While leading the system design of new head-word displays for fighter pilots, Tomide Adesanmi was most excited when he got a chance to innovate. However, like most electronics design engineers, he found that the majority of his time was spent searching distributor sites for components, drawing symbols, and working with spreadsheets. Engineers can also relate to the anxiety he felt, worrying that he might have made a silly mistake by missing a tiny detail on “page 243 of the datasheet” for a microcontroller. So, he quit his job to try to tackle the mundane problems of design using...
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Cooperation and Competition Behind the Scenes in the RISC-V Community
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
Over the course of his fascinating career, Mark Himelstein has worked on several significant computing technologies at historic companies like MIPS and Sun Microsystems. He has also worked as a consultant in various roles that include architect, VP of engineering, and advisor. However, RISC-V may have a greater impact on the computing field and our world than any of those previous efforts. Himelstein gives us an insiders view on the open standard process that is often “cooperation and competition, simultaneously.” “The thing that keeps us as a community is the effort in the...
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At Silicon Labs, Wireless IoT is Only The First Step in Rethinking Product Design
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
Daniel Cooley started his career in RF chip design at and now leads technology and product development at “the number one wireless supplier” for the Internet of Things. In this thoughtful interview, Cooley explains why adding wireless connectivity is only the first step to completely rethinking product designs and features. He noted that “the home run cases aren't where wireless is the feature; it's where wireless made that product better.” Cooley explains that Silicon Labs’ primary goal is to help companies get started with their preferred wireless protocol quickly and efficiently...
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Pragmatic Semi is Breaking the Rules and Bending Silicon Electronics
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
While Moore’s Law scaling has driven incredible advancements in computing, AI, and smartphones, many applications don’t need or benefit from the most advanced semiconductor nodes. From its inception, Pragmatic Semiconductor’s goal has been to take a…well, pragmatic…approach to develop an ultra low-cost, fast cycle time alternative to traditional silicon processing. Oh, and did we mention that the resulting chips and wafers are also flexible? You will definitely want to check out this Moore’s Lobby conversation between White and our host, Daniel Bogdanoff, as they dive into: -The...
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State of the Industry: Semiconductor Insiders Discuss the Ambitions and Realities of the CHIPS Act
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
The chip shortage made us all think about the precarious semiconductor supply chain. In response, the US government has moved to bolster the domestic industry. The CHIPS and Science Act was signed into law in August 2022, but we are still waiting to see its impact on US semiconductor manufacturing. In this podcast, we are joined by three industry insiders: Rich Simoncic, EVP of Microchip Technology. Russ Garcia, CEO of Menlo Micro. Michael Knight, President & CEO at Endries International. They will give us their perspective on the CHIPS Act and what should be done to improve the supply...
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Leading the RISC-V Revolution, SiFive Aims to Take the Computing Industry Throne
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
During his fascinating career, Jack Kang has had the opportunity to work on iconic, massively successful products like the Microsoft Xbox Kinect and Nintendo Switch. Today, as one of the founding members of SiFive, Kang works alongside several of the creators of the RISC-V ISA to bring new products to market. SiFive is developing products based on the open RISC-V standard to deliver high-performance, low-power density processors for applications from wearables to data centers, edge computing, and aerospace. The highlights of this conversation between Kang and our Moore’s Lobby host,...
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Quantum Computing: Sci-Fi Technology Requires Real-World Engineering
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
A decade after demonstrating the first entanglement of semiconducting spin quantum bits, or qubits, Oliver Dial and IBM Quantum are developing the ICs, cryogenic systems, error mitigation techniques, and software tools that will identify solutions to problems beyond the scope of classical computers. Recently, the IBM Quantum team announced the , and Dial joins us to talk about a subject that he loves. The highlights of this conversation between Dial and our Moore’s Lobby host, Daniel Bogdanoff, include: A comparison of quantum and classic Turing computing systems. Temperatures down to...
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Energizing the Future: Real-Time Precision in Renewable Energy Management
Moore's Lobby: Where engineers talk all about circuits
Optimizing energy generation and consumption requires accurately measuring currents and voltages. In addition, to maximize overall efficiency, that data must be shared in real-time or near real-time. The highlights of this conversation between Henrik Mannesson of and host Daniel Bogdanoff include discussing: -The differences between power management in the home or small factory and power management at the grid. -The evolution from smart metering to energy management. -The importance of accuracy in power measurement and how to achieve it. -The benefits of staying with a single company for many...
info_outlineSilicon transistors naturally get most of the attention. However, delicate silicon microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) with movements that are often measured in angstroms are making some noise of their own (metaphorically, because you won’t be able to hear those tiny vibrations!).
By focusing in parallel on the MEMS device and the silicon processing required to build them, SiTime has been able to improve MEMS resonator performance “close to 100,000” times, says Fari Assaderaghi, EVP of Technology and Engineering at SiTime.
Assaderaghi went on to state:
“Timing is like an unsung hero that is behind the scenes, but its performance actually limits or enables certain performance characteristics that you see at the end systems.”
Over his career, Fari learned many important lessons that he shares during this thoughtful interview. One of these is to “always go back to first principles.” He expounds on this by stating, “If you don't understand something, don't paper over it. Keep on digging.” He concludes with the warning, “There is no shortcut, and if the fundamental doesn't support it, eventually it's going to come and get you.”
Assaderaghi also learned to focus on your ultimate goal rather than what you think is possible. “If you start with what you want to achieve...you would be surprised that eventually what you thought was not possible, actually it is possible.”
Our Moore’s Lobby host, Daniel Bogndanoff, also discusses with Assaderaghi his fascinating personal journey. Over his career, Assaderaghi has had the pleasure of working alongside luminaries like Chenming Hu, the father of Finfets; Robert Dennard, the inventor of single-transistor DRAM; and Lisa Su, CEO of AMD.
Other highlights from this interview include:
-The unique SiTime culture that Fari credits to the CEO, Rajesh Vashist.
-The importance of failure
-The tuning of silicon’s mechanical properties, not just electrical
That’s a wrap on Season 6 of Moore’s Lobby. We hope you have enjoyed hearing from these amazing guests as much as we have. Please tell us what you think in the comments or share your suggestions and requests for guests and topics for Season 7.