Headlines and summaries from the pages of Electronic Engineering Times . Previous editions are available from the 1994 , 1995 , 1996 , 1997 , and 1998 News Archives.

03/15/96

From CeBIT: Nokia rolls mobile phone/organizer

From CeBIT: VLSI Tech subsidiary eyes wireless PC cards

Zuken and Gaio team on a cosimulator

Copyright protection moves into digital age

Vendor disinterest deep-sixes PCB benchmark
What's new(s) at EE Times-interactive

03/14/96

High-tech crime: 100 suspects rounded up. More at large?

VME vendor Force moves into systems

IEEE expresses 'disappointment' with immigration bill

IDC Study: Consumers to drive technology

Ramtron, on the mend, spins out an EDRAM startup

Neural networks behind board-routing acquisitions

03/13/96

3.5-inch drives pushed to 4-Gbyte capacities

Galileo sets sights on LAN switching

3-D CAD for MEMS arrives

Optics plus MEMS equals MOMS

Digital's chips boost PCI-bridging effort

03/12/96

CommQuest puts GSM solution in a three-chip set

As board density soars, boards get thinner

Software integrates ECAD, MCAD data

03/11/96

Intel and Microsoft moves change the face of PC architecture

Set-top box loses status as next great standalone thing

Fujitsu delays 16-Mbit DRAM production at U.K. fab

Xerox sets up a company to market new flat-panel technology

Logic IC sales lag, following slowdown in memories

From CeBIT: Nokia rolls mobile phone/organizer

By Junko Yoshida

HANNOVER, Germany -- Nokia this week unveiled at CeBIT what it claims is a new generation of mobile phone--capable of information retrieval and data manipulation via faxes, as well as e-mail and short messages, while connecting to the Internet and corporate databases.

"It starts out as a mobile phone, while it features crucial connectivity for digital data applications," said Roy Gunter, director of marketing for wireless data products. "And it's also a full-function organizer."

The target introduction for the 9000 Communicator is the GSM market in Europe and Asia this summer. Codesigned by Geoworks and Intel, the communicator runs Geoworks' Geos 3.0 operating system and uses an Intel application-specific processor based on the i386 MPU core, and Intel's non-volatile, rewritable, low-voltage flash memory.

At 6.85 x 2.52 x 1.5 inches, the Communicator is shaped like a portable phone and can be opened up like a clamshell. The upper shell features a half-VGA, eight-gray-scale LCD with a 4.5- x 1.5-inch screen. While some one-touch keys are featured right next to the screen, the device comes with a fully featured keyboard on the other half-shell.

From CeBIT: VLSI Tech subsidiary eyes wireless PC cards

By Loring Wirbel

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- The CeBIT Hannover fair this week is serving as a coming-out party for VLSI Technology Inc.'s first system-level subsidiary, Creative Systems Solutions. Csys is a global entity charged with selling wireless data cards, many in PCMCIA/PC card format, called "SurfCard." Deutsche Telekom Mobilfunk GmbH (DeTeMobil) will provide CeBIT demos of the first such SurfCard, a wireless data card for the German and Swiss ModaCom packet network.

Brian Salisbury, Surfýard marketing manager, said VLSI has not structured Csys as a company appealing to end users or resellers. Instead, it will be involved in custom contracts to tailor baseband and RF solutions to particular packet- and circuit-data networks. Baseband solutions will be based in large part on custom ASIC devices c ombining the ARM RISC controller with the Pine DSP architecture, which VLSI earlier used in the Ruby chip set for cellular digital packet data (CDPD) networks.

For its first ModaCom system, Csys is packaging a complete baseband and RF solution in a small package that can attach to an HP-LX, Apple Newton or similar communicator. OEM markets may demand that Csys offer similar fully bundled products for some wireless-data markets.

Zuken and Gaio team on a cosimulator

By Yoshiko Hara

YOKOHAMA, Japan -- Zuken Inc. and Gaio Technology Co. Ltd. here have developed Zuken VPS (virtual prototyping system), a cosimulation environment for hardware and software that enables simultaneous verification.

The companies integrated Zuken's "Tsutsuji" EDA tool with Gaio's "Csim-G" microcontroller simulator.

Jinya Katsube, senior managing director of Zuken, said the system can simultaneously simul ate hardware and software operations involving image processing.

"The system has viewers and other virtual test instruments such as an oscilloscope and a network analyzer," he said. "The user can simulate the performance of the hardware and software of a facsimile controller, for example, observing the input and output images of the viewers on-screen."

Conventionally, microcontroller software development starts when hardware design and verification are completed. Zuken VPS lets an engineer design and verify both the ASIC with an embedded microcontroller and the application software for the microcontroller, in parallel.

Copyright protection moves into digital age

By George Leopold

WASHINGTON -- On Feb. 27, a Carnegie-Mellon University graduate student sent to the U.S. Copyright Office a digital copy of her dissertation along with an on-line copyright application that she signed us ing public/private-key encryption technology. The transaction kicked off testing of a digital copyright system the Copyright Office hopes will reduce processing from months to days.

This test, along with a handful of other trials and standards efforts under way in Canada and Europe, illustrates how technology solutions are emerging to tackle the growing problem of protecting intellectual-property rights in cyberspace.

Progress on digital copyrights has reached the point where groups are haggling over such details as whether universal identification systems that track digital media should be file- or object-oriented. For now, though, the concentration is on overall architectural issues. Indeed, the Copyright Office system, called Cords (Copyright Office Electronic Registration, Recordation and Deposit System), will undergo testing over the next few years as part of a joint architecture study led by the Corporation for National Research Initiatives and the Advanced Research Projects Agency (Arpa).

Vendor disinterest deep-sixes PCB benchmark

By Richard Goering

SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- What if they gave a benchmark and nobody came? That's the dilemma facing organizers of next week's PCB Design Conference here, who made a last-minute decision to cancel the annual conference benchmark because too few vendors signed up.

Probably the longest-lasting benchmarking effort in the EDA industry, the PCB Design Conference benchmark has run for four years, bringing together an average of 13 vendors, who each placed and routed a board from a uniform set of specifications. Benchmark scores were based on a checklist of capabilities in two divisions--one for basic placement-and-routing, another for high-speed pc-board design.

But this year, only six vendors signed up, said Pete Waddell, conference chair and benchmark organizer: "I think some companies are scared to participate. If they don't win ev ery category hands down, they feel like it's been a failure." The vendors who signed up were Mentor Graphics, Zuken-Redac, U.S. CAD, Dansk Data Elektronik and Orcad.

Nonetheless, Waddell believes that user interest is high. Anyone who thinks the benchmark should continue, he noted, can sign a petition at the conference.

High-tech crime: 100 suspects rounded up. More at large?

By Robert Bellinger

Though more than 100 suspects of four gangs that had terrorized high-tech companies in armed holdups, hijackings and kidnappings have been arrested in a dramatic sweep, FBI officials are warning: "Don't let your guard down."

FBI special agent Rich Bernes said, "By no means can companies feel, 'well, we can just relax now.' "

For one thing, no one thinks they've rounded up every last alleged member. The FBI was still searching for suspects two weeks after the Feb. 28 sweep.

More over, others may pick up the slack. Violent crime against high-technology companies won't go away. "The lure of the profits is there," said National Semiconductor security expert Dan Vidovich. The word is out. Crooks now know that memories, microprocessors, computers and parts fetch high profits on the black market. "It's the tip of the iceberg," said Vidovich, program administrator for emergency protective services .

The security landscape for high-tech companies, particularly for small- and medium-sized companies, has changed forever, Vidovich believes. Whereas small assembly plants, software programmers and board houses once took security for granted, they no longer can, thanks to the gangs, which targeted these more vulnerable Valley businesses. The Intels, AMDs and Nationals of the Valley, said Vidovich, have been security-conscious for a long time.

VME vendor Force moves into systems

By Craig Matsumoto

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Looking to broaden its scope from VME boards to full-blown systems, Force Computers Inc. recently announced a series of products aimed at telecommunications.

The company is targeting a sector whose players crave computer performance but lack experience with open computer systems and want to outsource as much work as they can, said Stephen Dow, Force's general manager for the Americas.

The competition among telephone providers--intensified by the recently passed Telecommunications Act--has forced those companies to migrate from proprietary to open systems.

"We're definitely talking to customers who want every bit of processing they can find," said Steven Little, director of marketing for Force. The "time-to-revenue" for a proprietary system can be five to seven years, compared with two or three for an open system, he said.

Force's move into the systems business reflects a change in the overall VME market, which is becoming less and less of a boa rd market. Boards are expected to account for only one-third of the $2.8 billion in VME products sold this year, while systems will claim closer to half the market.

IEEE expresses 'disappointment' with immigration bill

By Robert Bellinger

WASHINGTON -- IEEE-USA chairman Joel Snyder has expressed "grave disappointment" that Sen. Alan Simpson, R-Wyo., is dropping attempts to reduce legal, employment-based immigration visas.

"My first reaction was politics as usual," said Snyder. "The big- dollar interest won out at the expense of the individual."

Simpson had proposed cutting legal employment-based visas from the current 140,000 to 90,000.

Snyder said, however, that some senators are working behind the scenes to try to salvage "something out of the wreckage." Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., may propose to retain a provision that requires employers to certify that they have not laid off Americans--and will not lay them off--to bring in temporary foreign workers. It was not clear, however, whether that proposal would be included in a final bill.

Electronics-industry employers were among those who campaigned actively against the Simpson bill, saying that any cuts in legal immigration would hurt the industry, especially at a time when there are 14,000 open requisitions in the semiconductor sector.

"Overly restrictive immigration laws can . . . obstruct our ability to hire new employees," a coalition of seven top electronics executives wrote last September.

IDC Study: Consumers to drive technology

By Margaret Ryan

BOSTON -- In light of a growing "wired-consumer" community spurred by Internet expansion, analysts at the 31st annual Directions '96 conference predicted consumers will drive innovations in the computer, communications and electronics industri es over the next few years.

International Data Corp. (IDC) analysts said the consumer focus will require IT suppliers to alter their approach to product design, pricing, distribution and service in order to stay afloat. But as companies develop new products for this consumer market, they must watch out for tough competitors. Savvy and seasoned consumer-electronics companies are poised to make a comeback in the next year, IDC analysts warned.

"The consumer market will be where the leading technology developments will occur over the next few years," noted Frank Gens, senior vice president of worldwide research at IDC.

Why the consumer market? Gens explained that the industry is transitioning into the era of the wired consumer, "where the Internet's greatest commercial impact will be extending the reach of business directly into the home."

Ramtron, on the mend, spins out an EDRAM startup

By Loring Wirbel

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. -- One year after Ramtron International Corp. nearly collapsed because of the bankruptcy of former chairman Oren Benton, the company has reduced losses and is poised to move both ferroelectric RAMs and enhanced DRAM/SRAMs into production.

To ensure the success of the latter product, however, Ramtron has spun its enhanced DRAM business into a subsidiary, Enhanced Memory Systems Inc. (EMS), and is waiting for the first products from its new partner, IBM Microelectronics Inc., to move into production. While Ramtron cut its original teeth on nonvolatile ferroelectric memories, primary attention has shifted to the EDRAM architecture marketed by EMS. This week, it begins to sample 4-Mbit chips, as well as modules with 4-, 8- and 16-Mbyte densities, based on a 12-ns page read and write.

The higher speeds follow the shift by Ramtron's current partner, NPNX (Nippon Steel), to a 0.6-micron CMOS process. An EDRAM is configured like a DRAM but performs like a cache SRAM. Its main memory array looks like a static-column DRAM but contains a cache row register, from which normal memory reads take place. During a page miss, a new DRAM row is updated into the cache.

Neural networks behind board-routing acquisitions

By Richard Goering

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- A new approach to pc-board autorouting has found two large distribution channels, thanks to separate and apparently simultaneous acquisitions of technology from startup Neurocad Inc. (Harvard, Mass.). Orcad (Beaverton, Ore.) has acquired source-code rights to Neurocad's NeuroRoute 200 product, while rival Protel Technology has gone one step further and acquired the whole company.

Founded by pc-board CAD veteran Gene Marsh, Neurocad first emerged at the March 1995 PCB Design Conference. The company's claim to fame is an autorouter with an embedded neural-net algorithm that can help it deter mine the best routing. Windows-based NeuroRoute is a "shape-based" autorouter that views the board as geometric shapes rather than grid patterns.

As such, Neurocad could provide a low-cost alternative to the shape-based autorouters from Cooper & Chyan Technology (CCT; Cupertino, Calif.). But it will take a lot of smarts to compete with CCT, which resells its Specctra autorouters through many Unix and PC-based vendors, including PADS Software, MicroSim, Ivex and Mentor Graphics.

3.5-inch drives pushed to 4-Gbyte capacities

By Terry Costlow

SCOTTS VALLEY, Calif. -- Disk-drive makers are focusing on mainstream desktop markets with their most recent products, but there's also a push to raise capacity at the high end. The latest 3.5-inch drives push PC-compatible capacity between 2 and 4 Gbytes.

Maxtor Corp., Western Digital Corp. and Quantum Corp. are rolling out drives in th at range. Seagate Technology Inc. also unveiled a 4-Gbyte drive compatible with the Enhanced IDE interface used by IBM clones.

At the same time, Seagate pushed the top capacity of the industry to 23.4 Gbytes, more than doubling the storage capability of 5.25-inch drives that ship today. The larger form factor is seeing a resurgence in servers, particularly those in the storage-intensive video market.

On the desktop front, Western Digital (WD; Irvine, Calif.) has added two drives to its Caviar line, storing 2.1 and 2.5 Gbytes. Both models have three platters. Their rotational rate is 5,200 rpm, so spindle latency is 5.76 ms.

The drives use WD's 2100 oersted media. After investing substantially in media production, WD will supply roughly half the platters used in these drives.

Maxtor (San Jose, Calif.) has unveiled a 2-Gbyte drive that continues to push proximity recording, in which heads are extremely close to the disk surface, to push capacity forward. The drive has average access times of l ess than 12 ms, a standard speed for this class of drive. It supports the latest version of the Enhanced IDE specification, moving data at 16.6 Mbytes/second.

Galileo sets sights on LAN switching

By Loring Wirbel

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Extending beyond its core-logic galaxy, Galileo Technology Inc. will launch its LAN business this week as it fires a single-chip switched Ethernet controller. The device simplifies switching over the PCI bus through the use of a simple five-instruction protocol, called GalNet. What's more, Intel Corp.'s PC Enhancement Division (Chandler, Ariz.) will offer reference designs alongside its i960 that utilize Galileo's GT-48001 switched Ethernet controller.

Galileo, launched in Karmiel, Israel, in 1993, leveraged expertise in application-specific buffers and RISC-based networking design that the founders brought from Integrated Device Technology Inc. and o ther companies. Manuel Alba, president of the U.S. operation of Galileo, said that it was apparent to the design teams in Israel in early 1995 that the message-passing protocol for PCI, combined with core-buffer designs, would be "ideal for internetworking, particularly for frame-switching in low-cost PCI platforms." Their design moved to sampling just in time for a flood of interest for standard products in switched Ethernet designs.

"Our real breakthrough was the write-only GalNet protocol for PCI, since the minimization of reads is critical for bus latency," Alba said.

3-D CAD for MEMS arrives

By Gail Robinson

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. -- An MIT research project into software techniques for development of micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) has resulted in a commercial CAD tool. Licensed by startup Microcosm Technologies Inc. and slated for release at the end of the mont h, MEMCAD 3.0 targets design of next-generation MEMS for applications ranging from drug-delivery systems to automotive and telecommunications products to heads-up displays for virtual reality.

The CAD software targets 3-D visualization of devices from mask and process input; general structure analysis; electromechanical analysis for capacitance-based sensors, such as accelerometers, gyros and pressure sensors; and electromechanical analysis for electrostatic actuation, such as valves and force-balanced sensors. The company plans to add system-level technology later this year for higher-level modeling of MEMS devices with their electronic counterparts.

The goal of the MIT/Microcosm project is to allow the user to model a MEMS component and then insert it into a system modeler to show how it performs in a system.

Optics plus MEMS equals MOMS

By Chappell Brown

CLEVELAND -- A ne w micromachine principle being pursued at Case Western Reserve University here could supply a significant missing link in microtechnology. Called Micro-Optical Mechanical Systems (MOMS), the fabrication technique generates high-quality optical components that are also micromechanical systems. A special silicon-etching process has been devised by Mehran Mehregany and his colleagues at the university's Department of Electrical Engineering and Applied Physics that allows standard optical components such as interferometers, beam splitters, etalons and high-quality mirrors to be integrated with electronics and MEMS. The added capability would allow fiber-optic communications chips to incorporate miniature optical filters that could decode wavelength division-multiplexed optical signals.

The key to the new technology is the special optical properties of silicon surfaces that have been etched along a specific crystal plane. In that one direction, Mehregany has found that silicon has nearly perfect optical proper ties. Measurements of the reflectivity of these surfaces using a helium-neon laser reveal a quality comparable to polished silicon wafers. Prototype systems have revealed that a precise alignment of the etching process with the silicon lattice produces micromachined parts with nearly ideal optical surfaces. Other types of optical components can be created within the same process. For example, etching thin semitransparent membranes at the correct lattice orientation creates high-quality beam-splitters.

Digital's chips boost PCI-bridging effort

MAYNARD, Mass. -- Digital Equipment Corp. is solidifying its lead in Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI) bridge chips with a triple header, offering three devices to span a range of bridging applications. All three members of the 2115x family support the PCI 2.1 spec, which enhances performance by supporting delayed transactions for all operatio ns, including reads and writes to both memory and I/O.

Following its 21050 bridge device, Digital offers two upgrade paths: the 21150, a device with 32-bit primary and secondary paths that preserves the 208-pin package of the 21050, and the 21153, with 64-bit primary and 32-bit secondary paths, in a 256-pin ball-grid array.

At the low end, Digital is offering as a follow-on to its 21052 the 21152, a bridging device with reduced pin count (160 pins in plastic quad flat pack).

All members use a 3.3-V supply and have PCI Universal I/O buffers, allowing connection to 5-V or 3.3-V PCI buses.

CommQuest puts GSM solution in a three-chip set

By Ashok Bindra

ENCINITAS, Calif. -- CommQuest Technologies Inc. has crafted a complete solution for the expanding international digital cellular communications standard Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM).

The three-chip-set build s on CommQuest's distributed DSP architecture--CASP, for communication application-specific processor--and an associated flexible-design methodology called CommSyntax. It comes with embedded GSM protocol software and a customizable user interface, a GSM offering with ability for differentiation.

This parts-kit solution with integrated GSM protocol for GSM handsets will sample in the fall, with production slated for the first quarter of 1997.

While the 900-MHz solution is CommQuest's first entry into the GSM marketplace, the company is also readying a 1,900-MHz version for the emerging personal communications services (PCS). Several PCS providers in North America have adopted the GSM standard, originally developed for Europe but now rapidly expanding into other countries in Asia, Africa and Australia. GSM handset production could reach more than 57 million by 1999, growing at an average annual rate of 69 percent for the next few years, according to a study by market analysts Dataquest Inc.

As board density soars, boards get thinner

By Terry Costlow

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- The winds of change are blowing through circuit-board production sites as OEMs ask for thinner, lighter boards. Techniques aimed at meeting those demands were demonstrated at the IPC Printed Circuits Expo here earlier this month.

Board producers are moving new technologies into production in order to meet the requirements of portable equipment. The supply of flexible circuitry is increasing, and thin-film technologies that extend the lifetime of FR-4 are also being launched.

Eventually, conventional FR-4 won't handle the necessary line widths, but that doesn't mean the technology is facing death row. IBM (Endicott, N.Y.) is moving forward with surface-laminar circuits (SLC), in which high-density thin-film areas are screened onto laminate boards. That allows IBM boards to allot high-density sections for flip-chi p, chip-scale packages and other high-I/O packages, while maintaining cheaper laminate substrates for the bulk of the board.

IBM currently produces the technology at three plants, and Amp-Akzo (Chadds Ford, Pa.) is gearing up production capabilities acquired under a licensing agreement. To underscore both the viability and capability of SLC, IBM described the technology's application in all versions of its Thinkpad notebook computer. SLC lets designers reduce the board layer count from 10 to six while reducing by 40 percent the number of costly plated through holes. Trimming the layer count also provides a slight reduction in height and weight.

Software integrates ECAD, MCAD data

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Workgroup Solutions will demonstrate its latest data-management technologies here next week at the PCB Design conference. The company offers software tools that integrate ECAD and MCAD data f or EDA approaches from such companies as Cadence Design Systems, Mentor Graphics, Viewlogic and PADS.

Workgroup's Product Data Management (PDM) tools tightly integrate with Cadence's Concept front-end electrical-design tool. PDM manages and controls Concept parts libraries and provides revision and configuration management for critical electronics designs. Besides ensuring that Concept symbol and part data is secure, accessible and available where and when it's needed, the Workgroup Solutions software lets designers share entire drawings, design segments and information about those designs from other applications.

By leveraging such features as Check In, Check Out and Get Copy, PDM/Concept facilitates concurrent engineering from schematic capture through pc-board layout. And by coupling

the PDM/Concept tools with PDM/Allegro, Concept engineers can be notified automatically when back-annotation information is available.

Intel and Microsoft moves change the face of PC architecture

By Ron Wilson

SAN FRANCISCO -- PC hardware architecture is undergoing profound change. That's what the burst of announcements from Intel Corp. and Microsoft Corp. at Intermedia last week means, according to industry experts, who say that the effects will be felt far beyond the software world.

It's all due to the modular, collaborative nature of Microsoft's Direct3D and ActiveMovie designs, coupled with the power of Intel's MMX instruction group. Already, there are changes in the way hardware accelerators are being designed. In fact, the new wave of change threatens to obsolete an entire generation of 3-D and MPEG chips.

An underlying design principle in both Direct3D and ActiveMovie is the interchangeability of software and hardware modules. Direct3D contains a complete software-rendering engine. Called the Hardware Emulation Layer (HEL), it comprises all the modules--sorting, texture mapping, ligh ting and so forth--necessary to turn a list of triangle vertices into a 3-D image in the frame buffer.

The motivation is economic: for Microsoft and Intel to up the ante of PC-architecture 3-D applications, there must be a critical mass of 3-D-equipped personal computers in the field. But the only way Microsoft can guarantee that--short of buying 3-D add-in cards for its customers--is to bundle a 3-D rendering engine into DirectX.

Set-top box loses status as next great standalone thing

By Junko Yoshida and George Leopold

RESTON, Va. -- The set-top box, once enshrined as one of the most important stand-alone product categories in the new digital market, has been relegated to a supporting role in the fast-changing consumer electronics world.

Increasingly, system vendors are scrambling to consolidate their set-top design efforts with other consumer electronics products such as satelli te decoders, DVDs, TVs and video game platforms. Some service vendors are meanwhile looking for ways to piggyback their network-specific set-top features on existing consumer products by devising an add-in card that could be easily plugged into a PC or TV.

Indeed, most manufacturers no longer believe that developing a set-top loaded with unique, advanced features guarantees a successful sail through an uncharted digital interactive TV market. Nor do they see it as economically justifiable to devote their engineering resources solely to the dream of the ultimate set-top.

Among service vendors, Tele-TV of Reston, Va., the phone company interactive TV alliance, may be the first to spot the trend. In its latest request for proposals for its Unity box, released last week, Tele-TV has made several major changes in requirements for its architecture and features compared with the original plan issued a year ago.

Noting that Tele-TV hopes to sell the newly defined Unity box for under $300, company presiden t Ed Grebow predicted, "You're going to see some very interesting reactions from the vendor community on this." He also said that Tele-TV is in discussions with PC and TV makers about deploying a network interface module as an add-in card.

Fujitsu delays 16-Mbit DRAM production at U.K. fab

By David Lammers

TOKYO -- Fujitsu Ltd. will delay 16-Mbit DRAM production at its Durham, U.K., fab, and other Japanese companies may pull back as well.

Fujitsu had planned to build a new line at Durham beginning in April that would start making 16-Mbit DRAMs in mid-1997. However, the current weakening in the DRAM market is expected to worsen in 1997, when new fabs in Korea, Taiwan, Japan, and the United States will open.

Asked when the Durham expansion would begin, a spokesman said "we are watching demand from the market." Nevertheless, Fujitsu's capital spending in the fiscal year beginning Apri l 1 won't change much from the current fiscal year. Fujitsu is nearing completion of a 0.35-micron logic line at Mie, Japan, and is building with flash partner AMD a new flash memory fab at Aizu-Wakamatsu. New memory lines at Gresham, Ore., and Iwate, Japan, remain on schedule. Finishing those projects will keep capital expenditures at about $2 billion at Fujitsu, he said.

Though DRAM prices are softening, analyst Steven Myers at Jardine Fleming Securities Japan said the declining DRAM prices, and the switch out of 4-Mbit DRAMs, could be just what the doctor ordered to put new life into the market.

"For the last 18 months Intel has been carrying the ball practically by itself by way of cutting Pentium prices and giving the system companies some room to reduce their prices. If prices come down on DRAMs and other components, we could get a self-correction from better prices on personal computers," Myers said.

Xerox sets up a company to market new flat-panel technology

By Craig Matsumoto

PALO ALTO, Calif. -- Tired of seeing others get the glory--and cash--from its inventions, Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center is taking its newest developments to market via the first-ever Xerox PARC spinoff.

The lab has developed a flat-panel display technology whose images look better than documents on paper, as well as high-resolution input technology with similar precision. Both will be sold by a wholly-owned subsidiary named "dpiX, a Xerox Company."

Medical scanning and military aircraft are the company's first two targets. In fact, dpiX already has lined up a military customer whose name it expects to announce within weeks.

Rather than squeeze into an already cluttered portable-computer market, dpiX is seeking clients that will pay as much as $10,000 to $50,000 for a single display.

DpiX's core product is its active-matrix display, which handles 7 million pixels on a 13.5-inch diagonal screen. The company is playing to the strengths of its technology by seeking out markets that thrive on visual data.

Logic IC sales lag, following slowdown in memories

By David Lammers

TOKYO -- Business conditions that caused a classic cyclical crash in the DRAM and SRAM memory markets have spread into segments of the logic arena. Concerns over capacity and manufacturing-mix have prompted U.S., Japan and Asian companies to cut prices to burn inventories and re-evaluate their semiconductor-manufacturing and foundry strategies.

Particularly nettlesome in Japan and Taiwan is what to do with excess semiconductor-manufacturing capacity resulting from an accelerated shift from 4- to 16-Mbit DRAM production. NEC Corp., for one, is moving to convert some memory to logic production, but the company warned last week that the capacity is "more than can be absorbed" by certain products, such as m icrocontrollers.

Cirrus Logic Inc. (Fremont, Calif.), which has taken financial hits because of inventory buildup, reportedly was poised late last week to cut 10 to 15 percent of its staff. A Cirrus spokesman said only that "the company had no news to report."

Among other vendors, industry bellwether Texas Instruments Inc., responding to the memory glut, revised downward its corporate financial forecast. LSI Logic chief executive officer Wilf Corrigan also expressed his "disappointment" with recent sales.

The problems are not confined to the PC business, which has slowed dramatically, raising concerns about market saturation in the United States. There has been a drop in demand for cellular phones and other consumer-electronics products, including videogames, though companies selling silicon and systems to the telecommunications sector appear unharmed. Some analysts, including Steve Myers at Jardine Fleming Securities (Japan), said they remain optimistic that recent price cuts, such as those made by Compaq Computer and others, will reignite PC demand.

But the events of 1996 are being played out against an ominous historical backdrop: Since its inception, the semiconductor business has suffered a recession in the middle of each decade.

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