Oct 15 2012
TSMC today announced that it has taped out the foundry segment's first CoWoS™ (Chip on Wafer on Substrate) test vehicle using JEDEC Solid State Technology Association's Wide I/O mobile DRAM interface.
The milestone demonstrates the industry's system integration trend to achieve increased bandwidth, higher performance and superior energy efficiency.
This new generation of TSMC's CoWoS™ test vehicles added a silicon proof point demonstrating the integration of a logic SoC chip and DRAM into a single module using the Wide I/O interface. TSMC's CoWoS™ technology provides the front-end manufacturing through chip on wafer bonding process before forming the final component. Along with Wide I/O mobile DRAM, the integrated chips provide optimized system performance and a smaller form factor with significantly improved die-to-die connectivity bandwidth.
A key to this success is TSMC's close relationship with its ecosystem partners to provide the right features and speed time-to-market. Partners include: Wide I/O DRAM from SK Hynix; Wide I/O mobile DRAM IP from Cadence Design Systems; and EDA tools from Cadence and Mentor Graphics.
"Silicon validation is a critical step in the development of a highly advanced and complete CoWoS™ design solution," said Cliff Hou , Vice President of Research and Development at TSMC. "The successful demonstration of the JEDEC Wide I/O mobile DRAM interface highlights the significant progress TSMC and its ecosystem partners have made to capitalize on the performance, energy efficiency and form factor advantages of CoWoS™ technology."
"Collaboration with TSMC will enable SK Hynix to satisfy customer demand in system integration and we expect to implement JEDEC compatible integration products in advance," said Sungjoo Hong , Senior Vice President and Head of R&D Division of SK Hynix.
"TSMC and Cadence have worked together to validate the industry's first design IP for Wide I/O in TSMC's CoWoS™ process," said Martin Lund , Senior VP of Silicon Realization Group at Cadence. "Our design IP is capable of over 100Gbit/sec of DRAM bandwidth at very low power when connected to Wide I/O devices meeting the JEDEC JESD229 Standard. The test and characterization abilities of Cadence's design IP and TSMC's CoWoS™ process provide TSMC's customers a reliable path to success with Wide I/O."
"Mentor Graphics and TSMC continue collaborating to make sure mutual customers can use ever expanding 3DIC design techniques that are silicon proven," said Joseph Sawicki , vice president and general manager of the design to silicon division at Mentor Graphics. "Mentor and TSMC have developed a design flow that creates minimal disruption to existing flows, while still providing the highest value for our mutual customers."
CoWoS™ is an integrated process technology that attaches device silicon chips to a wafer through chip on wafer (CoW) bonding process. The CoW chip is attached to the substrate (CoW-On-Substrate) to form the final component. TSMC CoWoS™ technology has entered the pilot production stage.
Source: http://www.tsmc.com