SemiSouth Laboratories, Inc., a company focused on silicon carbide electronics and materials used in high power and high temperature applications, has raised funding from Delta Capital and the Southern Appalachian Fund, II-VI, Inc The amount, which remained undisclosed, is in addition to $2 million the company received from II-VI Incorporated in April of 2005.

Jeff Casady, SemiSouth's President, indicated that the funds will be used to expand capacity to meet customers needs, "We are selling to several customers who have asked us to expand our capacity to meet their needs. This investment will allow us to accommodate their requests, and we are actively putting these resources in place to help our customers grow."

Dow Corning Corporation with the announcement that AMD has approved its thermally conductive grease ( TC-5022), for use with its microprocessors, also reported that customer testing of TC-5022 offered a 10 to 15 percent reduction in thermal resistance. The lower level of thermal resistance facilitates the transfer of heat away from the integrated circuit package to the heat sink, which transfers the heat sink. With the resultant lower package temperatures, designers have further flexibility in selecting lower cost packages.

Mike Eyman, member of Technical Staff at AMD confirmed the need for the conductive grease, "Enhancing processor heat dissipation is an important industry focus, and AMD is committed to working with market leaders such as Dow Corning to find innovative solutions to meet customers' needs. TC-5022 is an excellent product that will enhance the cooling efficiency of AMD's server, workstation and desktop products."

Gradient Design Automation Inc. has introduced its FireBolt design tool, an analysis program that takes into account thermal gradients to asses the reliability of integrated circuits in operation.

According to Rajit Chandra, CEO of Gradient, thermal analysis tools are necessary to prevent design failures, "Design closure of modern semiconductor products can only be reached by using a temperature-aware design methodology throughout the design flow. Thermal analysis and thermal repair create thermal integrity, which is a necessary ingredient in nanometer chip designs. Our mission is to accurately compute all the temperatures on a chip, provide the data so physical designers can analyze it, and repair thermal problems before they cause a chip to fail."

In substantiating a Design for Cost need for their tool, Gradient pointed the International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS). The company indicated that roadmap indicates that because of a lack of thermal tools and thermal knowledge, designers will have to overdesign their chips for timing and power in the order of 30 percent to 40 percent. Gradient also noted that actual measurements on designs indicate that large interchip temperature gradients result in poor timing optimization and significant simulation-based timing errors.

Alberto Sangiovanni-Vincentelli, whose credentials are listed as a holder of the Buttner Chair of the Department of EECS at the University of California at Berkeley, a founder of Cadence and member of the Gradient Board of Directors left little doubt for the need to asses thermal chip gradients, "Gradient products are essential for reaching thermal closure before tape-out and manufacturing of complex integrated circuits. Consequently, they can save many chips from failing when tested or even after their deployment in the field. Heat is a serious problem at small geometries, and it's never constant across a chip -- temperature and its variations impact everything from power consumption, performance, and reliability, to the yield and manufacturability of today's ICs."