Xilinx, IBM Ink Two-Year $100M FPGA Deal
Online staff -- Electronic News, 3/4/2002
e-insite.net
IBM Corp. and Xilinx Inc. today announced a two-year $100 million agreement under which IBM will manufacture Xilinx’s latest family of Virtex-II semiconductor devices.
Xilinx’s Virtex-II Pro FPGAs will be manufactured on IBM’s 0.13- and 0.10-micron copper-based process technology. IBM said this is its first volume foundry deal using these advanced processes.
"The decision to team with IBM for the manufacture of our products was a natural, from both a technical and a business standpoint," said Wim Roelandts, president and CEO at Xilinx. "Our collaboration enables us to serve a five billion dollar market opportunity and assures our customers a world-class source of supply."
The Xilinx products will be manufactured at IBM facilities in Burlington, Vt., and East Fishkill, N.Y.
The Virtex-II Pro devices are designed for use in communications, storage and consumer applications, and are actually the result of a collaborative design effort between the two companies. In July 2000, the two companies announced plans to integrate IBM’s PowerPC microprocessor with Xilinx FPGA technology to form a hybrid chip.
"By fully integrating our PowerPC with Xilinx's FPGA chips, we've developed a new design and development model," said Michel Mayer, general manager, IBM Microelectronics, in a statement. "Now, by optimizing those designs with our advanced manufacturing processes, we've developed a new performance and supply model." |
