point
Menu
Magazines
Browse by year:
November - 2014 - issue > In My Opinion
Silicon Creating New Advancement in the Semiconductor Space
Dr. Shaker Sadasivam
President & CEO-SunEdison Semiconductor
Friday, December 5, 2014
The industry is active with several exciting trends, which are being viewed as great opportunities. Driving many of these developments is Moore's Law, which came into prominence in the 1970s. Simply put, Moore's law states that processor speeds, or the overall processing power for computers would double every 18-24 months, and has been a motivating factor for many years. Challenges arising due to continued scaling as predicted by Moore's law are opening up many exciting opportunities for new materials. Recently, there has been a renewed focus on silicon wafers as an enabler of continued advancements in terms of improved performance and lower costs.
In addition to the opportunities surrounding Silicon, the untapped potential in innovative device structures, novel integration and 3D structures and system-level thinking are gaining prominence in the on-going effort to enable better performing and lower cost integrated circuits. The market opportunities driving these technology trends are growing exponentially. These key drivers include Mobility, Cloud Computing and Storage, Internet of Things (IoT), Renewables and Hybrid vehicles and Medical technologies. As an example, the emergence of IoT is gradually leading to a completely inter-connected world. These trends will allow for continued industry growth.
Therefore, at SunEdison Semiconductor, driving innovation through exploring the advances in Silicon has been a priority.

The Technological Demands
Amidst such an impressive on-set of positive trends, it should be noted that the industry is yet to be perfect, from a technological perspective. The specialty software tools require high-level integration for ease of use and better outcomes. For instance, we constantly deal with huge amounts of information, which if tied together, would pave the way for exceptional productivity and efficiency. We have commenced attempts towards achieving this, through an internal approach; however, these efforts are time and resource intensive. As a result, SunEdison Semiconductor remains focused on delivering the best silicon material in order to stay ahead of the competition.

The Entrepreneur's Dilemmas
My role as an entrepreneur forces me to deal with different challenges, among which are finding talent from across the globe, keeping pace with the technological developments and establishing a balance in terms of resources and hiring. Talking about the need for greater global resources, talented engineering is something we are always searching for. At our firm, we have employees from different regions of the country, as well as across the globe. Moreover, it is essential for any entrepreneur to be an expert in finding the right talent.
It has become essential to keep pace with the technological trends as they evolve, and experiments on technologies assume significant importance. We are on the lookout for experts to assist us in developing new technology, and there are collaborations with recognized universities for exploring the technological aspects.
Finally, in our search for talent, there is huge dependency on countries having good education system. Another area of focus is research universities besides the local universities. Considering this, it would be worth mentioning that there exist several regions without the potential. I believe if we could find a way out of this situation, it would be highly beneficial.

Committed towards Innovation
Realizing the perceivable need for innovation, there have been significant attempts towards incorporating these ideals into the firm's functions. These attempts revolve around finding time to appreciate and recognize key contributors, apart from locating the right talent and encouraging out-of-the-box thinking. In addition, a company-wide deployment of technology as a future-oriented trend forms a significant aspect of our attempts towards enabling innovative approaches. (As told to Anitha TS)

Twitter
Share on LinkedIn
facebook