High-end research and development (R&D) and designing work related to chip making and read and write heads for hard disks are migrating to Penang at a time when multinational corporations (MNCs) are slashing jobs worldwide amidst a global recession.
Altera Corp, Intel Corp and Seagate Technology are among the MNCs that have invested in fresh R&D activities in Penang to develop the next generation 28-nanometre (NM) field programmable gate array (FPGA) chips, 45 NM and 32 NM chips, and a new range of read and write heads for hard disk drives.
Altera recently unveiled its new RM100mil centre in Penang, the site of the group’s largest offshore R&D technical centre.
Altera Corp (M) Sdn Bhd vice-president of operations and managing director Chris Oh said the R&D centre would start in the second quarter designing work on the next generation of FPGA chips, which were 28 NM in size.
“The R&D team here handles very large-scale integration (VLSI) characterization work on the 28 NM node structures, which includes measuring the electrical parameters and putting them into a model for use in circuit design,” he told in an interview.
“Without this work, there is no ability to judge how well the product will perform at the design stage. Besides circuit design, the R&D team also handles test development and software development on our Quartus software which is used to programme the chip.”
Oh said it was very important to integrate all the various aspects of circuit design, software development and layout as all three needed to synchronies and work together.
“The final product will not work if any one of these pieces fail to integrate with the rest,” he said.
FPGA chips are designed to be reconfigurable to suit the needs of different customers in the military telecommunications, high-end test equipment and consumer electronic sectors.
Altera has just introduced the 40 NM FPGA chips, called the Strait IV GT and Arria II GX, to replace the 65 NM FPGA chips.
The Seagate operations in Penang will play a key role in the development of the group’s next generation of read and write heads for hard disk drives.
Penang Seagate Industries (M) Sdn Bhd vice-president Oh Kean Cheong said the facility was now involved in the production of read and write heads for the latest line of external storage, the Free Agent and Constellation series. “The facility designs the processes for the development of read and write heads, without which the actual production work for the read and writer heads cannot proceed.
“The Free Agent Go hard disk drives, equipped with sleek and ultra-thin design features, have the capacity of up to 500GB and support automatic backup and sync functions,” he said.
It also carried the encryption feature, which password-protect data, he said, adding that the Constellation portfolio, which serves the enterprise storage, included the world’s first 2.5-inch hard drive equipped with best-in-class power efficiency, and the 3.5-inch high-capacity hard drives with up to 2 Terabyte (TB) of storage for data-hungry applications.
Despite making the decision to close down two of its test facilities in Penang, Intel is still moving higher-end work to the state for the development of the 45 NM and 32 NM chips.
To train future skilled human resources, Intel Malaysia is working with more than 13 local universities to revamp their curriculum’s focus on topics such as VLSI, network processors, packaging technology, high volume manufacturing and multi-core programming.
“There are still a billion people who aren’t connected, and all around the world governments are looking to invest in technology as a way to be competitive,” managing director Atul Bhargava said.
“That is not going away and, in fact, it is more important than ever.”
Bhargava said if companies wanted to be competitive, they needed to invest to emerge as winners in a downturn.
“Companies that fall off the investment cycle in IT are taking a risk and next generation IT solutions will give them that winning edge.
“At Intel, we are investing for the future as can be seen through our collaboration with the country’s higher education institutions.”
Source: http://biz.thestar.com/
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