Semiconductor Industry 2022- Design Challenges
The word Electronic Devices cannot be justified before mentioning the name of semiconductors. Being the hidden workforce of every technology, we know so far, semiconductors have been contributing their share in providing the next generation of technological devices ruling the electronics market.
Taking the digital world by storm, semiconductors have now introduced a new era with the launch of sensors and smart devices but to achieve further heights, it will require even more advanced chips with higher computational power and memory capacity.
Dealing with the COVID-19 crisis that disrupted the supply chains leading to chip shortage as well as with geopolitical tensions rising, semiconductor companies have shown interest in achieving end-to-end design and manufacturing capabilities for next-gen technology.
While many governments showed their interest and support to boost up their local semiconductor markets, new fabs and vast R&D programs require billion-dollar investments that is not an easy task to raise. Thus, putting a hamper in the development of semiconductor chip productions.
And the issue doesn’t stop here. A variety of Design Challenges in Semiconductor Industry remain to be resolved that could hamper the growth of this market.
Let’s take a look at some of the Top Design Challenges in Semiconductor Industry 2022 that could cause a rift in the upcoming years.
Top Design Challenges in Semiconductor Industry 2022
Low Power Consumption Chips
Coming up as one of the major Design Challenges in Semiconductor Industry, low-power semiconductor chips are the burning issue of the decade as we are slowly moving towards AI-powered chips.
As we move towards mass production of semiconductor chips at an alarming rate, consumption of electricity is slowly progressing to higher levels which will further increase with the introduction of 5G technology immersing itself in the race. This is particularly concerning from a sustainability point of view as the chip and electronics industry continues to prosper day by day.
And that is not all as another driver is the cost prices. Though engineers can continue to design and manufacture these low-power and faster machines, it does little good if no one will be able to afford them. Therefore, presenting yet another form of Design Challenges in Semiconductor Industry.
Design Complexity
An increase in design complexity is another type of Design Challenges in Semiconductor Industry that could pose a great risk in the coming years.
As the usage of machine learning tools rises in this ever-growing data economy, machine learning requires a tradeoff between programming complexity for training. Due to this training, a large amount of energy is consumed while leveraging modern-day semiconductor hardware, which is not sustainable.
Therefore, SoC designers have to process the fabrication with longer design cycles which in turn, increases the design cost.
Density Scaling of Chips
With the shrinking of devices’ size every year, new semiconductor products are getting released in the market that can power new features in a small chip area.
However, this requires a solid mechanism to ensure that no design or manufacturing rules get violated.
The smaller size also represents less space to provide more upgraded features. Therefore, leaving little or no room for further advancements, making up as another one of the Design Challenges in Semiconductor Industry.
Performance and Latency
Talking about another Design Challenges in Semiconductor Industry, as the world is getting dominated by next-gen technologies ranging from wireless connected solutions to high-speed computers, all of them demands fast processing speed.
Capability to perform at a faster processing rate with a high-performance feature in semiconductors solutions is one of the most vital requirement. Silicon-based products have a limit to their efficiency in processing data, especially in the area of memory latency, which poses a great issue for the upcoming years as the technology is only going to evolve further.
R&D Funding
Shrinkage of chip sizes allows for more Design Challenges in Semiconductor Industry as researchers have to deal with fabrication issues like minor structural variations, quantum effects, and many more that can further complicate the chip development.
But all these testing require huge investments and funding backups from the private as well as the public sector.
This will become more challenging for innovative companies to invest in newly developed processes since they will not only require new technological processes but also new tools and manufacturing techniques.
As new technologies like 6G, ADAS and many others emerge, the scope of semiconductor devices are limitless once all these Design Challenges in Semiconductor Industry are tackled.
