Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : Lucent Technologies (LU) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: stilts who wrote (10901)	11/5/1999 11:20:00 PM
From: matt dillabough	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 21876

Lucent Technologies' Researchers Announce World's Fastest Digital Signal Processor Operating At One Volt of Power Business Wire ~ November 5, 1999 ~ 11:16 am EST MURRAY HILL, N.J.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 5, 1999-- Bell Labs Performance Breakthrough Occurs in 20th Anniversary Year of DSP Twenty years after inventing the world's first single-chip digital signal processor, researchers at Lucent Technologies' Bell Labs have developed the world's fastest DSP operating at one volt. DSPs are the key semiconductor engines driving today's cellular phones, high-speed modems and other communications and electronics devices. The Bell Labs chips operate at 100 Megahertz - the fastest processing speed of any industry DSP technology using only one volt of power. The DSPs were made with equipment available in today's manufacturing facilities. Potential applications include enabling smaller and lighter cellular phones with extended battery life. The technology also could be instrumental in packet voice and data transport over wireless phones, higher-speed Internet surfing and video applications, as well as digital audio broadcasts. "Bell Labs was there 20 years ago when DSP technology was invented, and Bell Labs is here again today with yet another DSP technology breakthrough," said Mark Pinto, chief technical officer of Lucent's Microelectronics Group. "In this year marking the 20th anniversary of the DSP, Lucent and Bell Labs are recasting DSPs as key components in the evolution of communications semiconductors into system-on-a-chip technology." Typically, system-on-a-chip (SoC) technology combines on a single silicon chip a number of components that formerly had to be implemented on separate chips. The approach enables substantial reductions in cost, power consumption and size of integrated circuits. Lucent's one-volt DSP could be a key ingredient in SoC applications. To create this high-performance DSP technology, Bell Labs researchers turbo- charged an existing Lucent DSP 1628 chip, which is used for cellular phones. The current DSP has gates that measure 0.25 micron, or roughly 400 times smaller than the width of a human hair. Gates switch current on and off in transistors. In the turbo-charged version, Bell Labs researchers Isik C. Kizilyalli and Pat Watson shrank the gates to 0.12 micron by refining the optical lithography approach used to produce various features on today's silicon chips. The novel phase-shifting approach modified how light passes through the mask, which is the master pattern for a silicon circuit, and improved resolution considerably. The researchers powered the modified DSP 1628 at two voltages. At 1.0 volt, it ran at 100 megahertz, and at 1.5 volts, it ran at 170 megahertz. The latter is nearly a three-fold improvement over the unmodified DSP 1628's performance of 60 megahertz at 1.5 volts. To produce the high-performance DSP, the Bell Labs researchers used 248- nanometer optical lithography. The phase shifting software was provided by San Jose, Calif.-based Numerical Technologies. "Lucent's Bell Labs has long been known for its innovations in optical lithography, and these results clearly demonstrate the value of our phase shifting technology," said Y.C. (Buno) Pati, chief executive officer of Numerical Technologies. Lucent Technologies, headquartered in Murray Hill, N.J., designs, builds and delivers a wide range of public and private networks, communications systems and software, data networking systems, business telephone systems and microelectronics components. Bell Labs is the research and development arm for the company. For more information on Lucent Technologies, visit the company's web site at lucent.com or the Bell Labs web site at bell- labs.com. Lucent's Microelectronics Group designs and manufactures integrated circuits and optoelectronic components for the computer and communications industries. More information about the Microelectronics Group is available from its web site at lucent.com. CONTACT: Lucent Technologies' Bell Labs Steve Eisenberg, 908/582-7474 seisenberg@lucent.com or Lucent Technologies Microelectronics Group Charlie Hartley, 908/508-8226 cjhartley@lucent.com 11:01 EST NOVEMBER 5, 1999