"HP decided to spin off its test and measurement and communications component operations into an independent company"
Without looking up the details in SEC documents, it appears that HP set them up to stand by themselves. Not sure if ADI could buy off the semi group. They do have some interesting technology and do not overlap the existing product lines that ADI has. As the news indicated, they are kind of a stealth element in Agilent. FWIW.
Awhile back there was news of SOI technology the ADI had acquired and I posted some links to technology leader, IBM. Here is a follow up showing how they are pressing the design advantage forward into products:
IBM adds SOI to copper CPUs in servers; low-k comes up next
By J. Robert lineback, Semiconductor Business News
Oct 16, 2000 (6:36 AM)
URL: semibiznews.com
AUSTIN, Tex. -- IBM Corp. today announced it is putting silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technology to work along with copper interconnects to significantly boost the performance of central processing units inside new server computers, called the pSeries 680.....
..."We came out with copper and everyone tried to pooh-pooh that move, and now everyone is doing it," noted Joel Tendler, program director of technology assessment for IBM's processor unit in Austin. "The same thing was the case with silicon-on-insulator," he said, referring to IBM's 1998 announcement to put SOI into commercial production. "At the time it wasn't seen as important, but now it is. The same thing will happen with low-k," he predicted.
IBM says the addition of SOI with copper increases performance of its CPUs by up to 30% because silicon-on-insulator wafers reduce the electrical leakage of millions of transistors on the chips......
And an adjunct article on increasing processing power in handheld devices.
Microprocessor development aims for information appliance market
By Darrell Dunn, Electronic Buyers' News
Oct 13, 2000
URL: ebnews.com
It may still be a technology looking for a market, but the promised demand for streamlined Internet-enabled computing products is leading the next wave of microprocessor development at many chip makers. Nearly half of the new products at last week's Microprocessor Forum target upcoming information appliances (IAs), with an emphasis on increased DSP and multimedia capabilities....
...Henry Wiechman, marketing manager at Texas Instruments Inc., said it's not surprising that so many microprocessor vendors are attempting to increase the DSP capabilities of their offerings.
“It speaks volumes about how DSP is the place to be in semiconductors,” Wiechman said. MPUs that attempt to perform DSP functions, however, will not be able to replace DSPs in applications in which signal processing is paramount, he said.
Jim |
