Laboratory | High-Speed Interface and EDA Laboratory - CNERC - National Engineering Research Centre for Application Specific Integrated Circuit System (Hong Kong Branch)

High-Speed Interface and EDA Laboratory

Establishment and Key Technical Indicators

The High-Speed Interface and EDA Laboratory is facilitated with the Thermo Fisher’s transmission line pulse (TLP) test equipment with a pulse width of 100ns and a rise time of 10ns. It meets the requirements of the general on-wafer ESD characterization of ESD devices. The Laboratory is also equipped with the Barth’s VFTLP (Barth 4012) imported from US with a pulse width of 10ns and a rise time of 1ns which meets the CDM pulse on-wafer characterization. In addition, the Laboratory has installed a system-level ESD testing equipment to provide technical assurance for system ESD testing.

R&D Capabilities

Low capacitance ESD and TVS device structure
General purpose I/O cell library and special purpose I/O cell library
High-speed I/O interface circuits such as MIPI, SerDes, SATA
Customized ESD and TVS device process development

Utilization Rate

95%

Laboratory utilization is over 95%, mainly for research and prototyping work.

Projects Undertaken and their Effectiveness

Cooperate with leading foundries to develop ESD protection devices
Follow 40nm ESD design rule, save 30% ESD area without reducing ESD capability
55nm ESD device development, HBM capability 8kV
14/16nm 3D-FinFET GPIO development
12nm 3D-FinFET RGMII I/O library development
40nm EF platform 8kV HMB I/O unit design
Research and development of high-speed I/O interface circuit

Industry-oriented Awareness

Open to industry partners for testing, consultation services and collaborative research.

Laboratory