The market for dynamic random access memory (DRAM) is expected to partially reverse the drastic losses it incurred in 2011 and achieve revenue growth this year, the result of balanced supply and demand following the exit of major manufacturer Elpida Memory, according to a new IHS iSuppli DRAM Market Tracker report. The report expects global DRAM industry revenue this year to reach $30.6 billion, up 3.3 percent from $29.6 billion in 2011.

With the semiconductor industry entering a phase of accelerating growth, the number of counterfeit-part incidents is expected to rise, according to an analysis of trends conducted by IHS. The number of counterfeit parts reported in the electronics supply chain historically has risen and fallen generally in concert with the annual performance of the global semiconductor industry. Chip sales and component counterfeits expanded in tandem during the period from 2001 to 2007—a time of expansion for the semiconductor industry.

STMicroelectronics has begun volume production of its 32-bit STM32 F0 microcontroller series launched in February 2012 to bridge the gap to high-end features in 8- and 16-bit applications. With a dedicated Discovery Kit also available, and leveraging the extensive STM32 development ecosystem, engineers, according to the company, will now have everything they need to use these new microcontrollers featuring the ARM Cortex-M0 processor in cost-sensitive consumer and industrial products.

Texas Instruments (TI) remained the world’s No. 1 microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) manufacturer in 2011, fending off runner-up Hewlett Packard in a bruising battle for the crown, according to a new IHS iSuppli MEMS Market Brief report.

CISSOID, a leading supplier of high-temperature and high reliability semiconductor solutions, has unveiled a new version of HADES, its turnkey isolated gate driver reference design, which has been tailored to support SEMISOUTH silicon carbide (SiC), normally-off power JFETs (SJEP120R100).

Swissbit has extended its CFast portfolio with a new processor technology, which has enabled it to design SLC storage cards with a capacity of up to 64GB. The F-200 series includes an SATA II (Spec 2.6) interface and is compatible with ATA7 and ATA8.

STMicroelectronics has integrated remote control technology from RealVNC, the original inventor and provider of VNC, onto its automotive-grade infotainment application processors. The integration will help to simplify and speed up the roll out of mobile-to-vehicle connectivity solutions, supporting the seamless and safe interplay of phones, apps and cars.

Melexis has launched its next generation IC family for sensor-less and sensor based BLDC motor control in automotive applications. The new IC family consists of 4 base members; the MLX81205, MLX81207, MLX81210 and MLX81215. Each is available with a variety of memory configurations and in different package options.

STMicroelectronics is set to play a leading role in the European research project on ‘Distant Speech Interaction for Robust Home Applications’ (DIRHA). The three-year program aims to investigate and prototype solutions for natural voice-enabled interaction between humans and machines in tomorrow’s smart homes.

STMicroelectronics has unveiled a motion sensor that measures very high accelerations along all three axes at ultra-low current consumption. The H3LIS331DL accelerometers address the need for precise shock detection up to 400 g in space- and power-constrained applications, from car black boxes to medical monitoring devices and sports equipment.

Wolfson Microelectronics has announced its next generation High Definition (HD) Audio System-on-a-Chip (SoC) with voice processor DSP, designed to smartphone manufacturers deliver clearer, more natural sounding voice calls in loud and noisy environments.

With device manufacturers losing billions of dollars per year to “grey market” piracy Maxim Integrated Products has unveiled a reference design that will protect Xilinx Spartan-6 field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). The reference design comprises free security software from Maxim or Xilinx and the Maxim DS28E01-100, a 1-Wire secure memory device. 

Texas Instruments has introduced what it says is the industry’s most highly integrated audio codec with embedded miniDSP cores, providing echo and noise cancellation at wideband voice sampling rates up to 16 kHz. The TLV320AIC3262 integrates five amplifiers and two miniDSP cores, and gives designers the ability to interface with to up to three devices simultaneously, such as application, Bluetooth and baseband processors.

Lattice Semiconductor has announced the immediate availability of its low cost, low power MachXO2 family of programmable logic devices (PLD) in a new 32 QFN (Quad Flatpack No-leads) package.  Launched in 2011 the addition of this small 5mm x 5mm form factor package option extends the use of the MachXO2 PLDs to applications where size constraints, ease of layout and manufacturability are critical.

Dialog Semiconductor's SC14453S has become the world’s first commercially available Voice over IP (VoIP) processor circuit that integrates Intrinsic-ID’s patented Hardware Intrinsic Security IP – also referred to as Physical Unclonable Function (PUF).

Broadcom Corporation has unveiled the industry’s first 100 Gbps full duplex network processor unit (NPU) at this year’s Globalpress Electronics Summit in Santa Cruz. Designed to enable the next wave of 100GbE optimised switches and routers for service provider networks, the fully programmable BCM88030 family features 64 custom processors running at 1GHz, delivering more than 2X the throughput of any NPU on the market.

LSI Corporation has introduced the AXE2502 Axxia communication processor to accelerate networking in enterprise and cloud datacentres. The AXE2502 has been designed to offload complex networking tasks from servers and networking equipment, improving performance and reducing power consumption.

Integrated Device Technology has unveiled a new family of precision temperature sensors targeted at ultra-low-power solid state drive applications. This family of devices has been designed to minimise power consumption and bill-of-materials (BOM) costs while remaining compatible with existing standards for high-volume memory modules.

Toshiba Electronics Europe (TEE) has launched two new high-speed logic IC photocouplers that comply with the reinforced insulation class of international safety standards. At the same time these new devices are half the size of equivalent DIP8 devices and offer guaranteed operation at temperatures from -40°C to 125°C.

CEVA, a licensor of silicon intellectual property (SIP) platform solutions and DSP cores, has introduced the CEVA-TeakLite-4, a powerful, low power and scalable 32-bit DSP architecture framework designed for advanced audio and voice applications. The CEVA-TeakLite-4 looks to address the increasingly complex requirements of voice pre-processing and audio post-processing algorithms as well as multi-channel audio codecs, for smartphones, mobile computing and digital home devices.