The REAL Cost for a Custom IC
There have been lots of blogs and messages lately about designing a proprietary analog IC. I wrote a blog about doing it on the cheap for $3,000. Reid Wender posted a message about prototyping 200 parts using a reconfigurable IC for $10,000.
Quite frankly, all of these cost comparisons are somewhat irrelevant. It is not about what prototyping costs -- unless you ignore the other non-recurring engineering (NRE) costs, and most people can't ignore NRE unless they are doing this in their garage for the purposes of learning or experimenting. If you spend $350,000 of NRE to design a custom IC where the lifetime buy is 100,000 pieces, it doesn't cost $3 per IC. It costs $3.50 more per unit ($350,000 amortized across 100,000 units) or $6.50. So, let's change the discussion from garages to real programs and talk about the elephant in the room called NRE.
To read the full article, click here
Related Semiconductor IP
- Ultra Ethernet MAC & PCS 100G/200G/400G/800G
- Ethernet PCS 100G/200G/400G/800G/1.6T
- Ethernet MAC 100G/200G/400G/800G/1.6T
- Junction Over-Temperature Detector with Linear Centigrade-to-Voltage Output - X-FAB XT018
- Performance P570 Gen 3
Related Blogs
- A New Era for Edge AI: Codasip’s Custom Vector Processor Drives the SYCLOPS Mission
- ReRAM-Powered Edge AI: A Game-Changer for Energy Efficiency, Cost, and Security
- RT-Europa: The Foundation for RISC-V Automotive Real-Time Computing
- Bridging the Gap: Why eFPGA Integration is a Managed Reality, Not a Schedule Risk
Latest Blogs
- Inside the SiFive Performance™ P570 Gen 3: High Performance Efficiency for Next-Generation Consumer and Commercial Applications
- What the steam engine can teach us about modern chip design
- Automotive silicon in the era of AI, functional safety, and cybersecurity
- JPEG XS Officially Joins GenICam, The Machine Vision Standard Managed By EMVA
- Beyond PCIe Compliance: Why Stress Testing Is Crucial for Edge AI Deployments