NXP Semiconductors and Taiwan
Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Ltd. (NYSE:TSM) (TWSE: 2330) today
announced their cooperation to deliver the industry's first single-chip 45nm
global LCD TV platform, TV550. With NXP already delivering the engineering samples
to its lead customers, NXP and TSMC have reached a major milestone in enabling
the next generation of mainstream digital TV sets for TV manufacturers.
Featuring NXP's PNX85500 processor, built on TSMC's 45nm Low Power (LP) process
technology, the NXP TV550 digital TV platform is a production-ready reference
design that reduces time-to-market with a major step forward in functional integration
for system cost down. The newly introduced DTV platform allows TV viewers to
enjoy HD digital content and internet access with unparalleled picture quality.
The long-term partnership and collaboration between NXP and TSMC was the key
to this first-to-market achievement, with early access to silicon test results
from TSMC resulting in accurate transistor characterization using state-of-the
art PSP models.
NXP called on TSMC, who had announced the industry's first 45nm process technology
in 2007, to achieve its time-to-market lead. NXP selected TSMC's 45LP process
technology for its outstanding performance characteristics such as multiple
Vt to achieve lower power consumption, excellent current drive capability and
one of the industry's smallest SRAM cell size of 0.299-micron(2).
"Digital switchover and high definition content are the major demands for
the TV industry," said Lou Schreurs, business line TV general manager,
NXP Semiconductors. "With TSMC's valuable experience in advanced CMOS technologies
and NXP's TV system design expertise, we are able to deliver these high end
features with a reduced bill-of-materials. Our customers are highly impressed
with TV550's superb picture quality and its capability to handle the complex
global digital standards with a single platform."
The TSMC 45 LP cost-competitive process offers designers up to twice the density
of 65nm with significant low power and up to 40% smaller die size. Compared
with TSMC 40G technology, the 45LP requires less photo masks and is ideal for
products demanding excellent cost performance ratio.
"NXP has clearly achieved its leadership with the availability of this
single-chip digital TV SoC. The device is 'right-the-first-time fully functional
silicon that delivered as flip chip packaged samples just eight weeks after
tape out," said John Wei, Senior Director, Advanced Technology Marketing
for TSMC.