Top semicon articles of 2008

A very kind reader left a comment yesterday that he (or she?) spent three hours on my blog! I am simply overwhelmed and humbled!!

It has really been a pleasure writing and maintaining a semicon blog! Plenty such are around carrying very valuable information, and I salute those bloggers.

It is really tough to contend with all the other technology-related information, but then, semicon has its own charm, and its own set of dedicated readers -- who DO go on to become extremely loyal.

I am even more touched by another request by a friend to list all the top articles I've written this year. Wow!!

It is very difficult for me to say, which ones are the best! However, I am listing the articles here. They all link back to CIOL. Of course, I've blogged here first, so, those who are familiar with my blog pieces, will identify them immediately.

Here goes then -- starting from the latest back down to very late last year -- in terms of relevance. Enjoy!

Semi trends 2008: Fab spend lower, ASPs stabilizing
The call on global fab spend was for a 10 percent reduction, and this is now getting to be closer to 20 percent.

UK, India aim for semicon collaboration
ISA-UKTI study examines collaboration scope between India and UK in design, applications and devices.

Dubai an emerging silicon frontier
The government of Dubai has set up the Dubai Silicon Oasis Authority (DSOA) as the engine for propelling Dubai into the knowledge economy.

Be parallel, or perish!
Parallelism offers new doors, and creativity is required to open these new doors, says Intel.

Altera first @ 40nm FPGAs
The company has announced two product lines -- the Stratix IV FPGAs and the HardCopy IV ASICs.

Semicon likely to grow 12pc in 2008
If there will be an economic recession, the chip industry (but not all firms) is in the best shape possible to weather the ensuing storm.

India's growing might in global semicon
India is fast becoming the world's destination, and increasingly the source too, for semiconductors.

Fascinating developments in 22nm!
These augur well for the global semiconductor industry, even though the field could get much narrower.

Indian design services to touch $10.96bn by 2010
Total design services market in India is said to have grown at 21 percent year on year.

NXP India achieves RF CMOS in single chip
The entire analog and RF work done has been in Bangalore by NXP's single-chip design team.

LabVIEW 8.5 delivers power of multicore processors
With LabVIEW, designers and engineers can assign different tasks on different cores -- which are independent.

Multi-nationalization of product development process
Indian designers lead in transaction level design, and can play big role in EDA.

Can we expect exciting times in 2008? Some trends
Blurring lines between PMPs and PNDs, semicon rush or hush; Netscape's end -- all are in store!

Semicon outlook 2008: Global market likely to grow 6-11 percent in 2008
Some predictions are for 2008 to be flat year or a year of negative growth; EDA to grow 7.8pc!

That's about it! If there's anything I've missed out, kindly let me know. Thanks for all your continuing support, dear readers. It is very humbling and touching.