1999-11-01 , SSC-9908
Business News From Philips Semiconductors

Company aims to deliver embedded technology for complete system-on-silicon solution for consumer electronics, communications and speech applications

Philips Semiconductors today announced a strategy to gain a leadership role in the rapidly growing embedded Digital Signal Processor (DSP) market. The company's core technology and 30-year history in the embedded DSP market, coupled with the technology and development tool expertise gained through the acquisition of VLSI Technology, enables Philips Semiconductors to provide comprehensive, true system-on-silicon solutions for high-performance applications such as consumer electronics devices, navigation systems and speech recognition products.

"Embedded DSP is a key technology for many high-growth semiconductor markets, including cellular phones, whose shipments will grow 27% (CAGR) through 2003," said Allen Leibovitch, program manager at International Data Corporation, a leading international research company. "By adding VLSI's wireless expertise, intellectual property, and Velocity Rapid Silicon Prototyping platform to its own strong background in communications and consumer semiconductors, Philips Semiconductors is positioned to capture a significant share of this growth."

"Customers that use embedded processing technology have a unique and complex array of needs," said Ray Slusarczyk, director of marketing for Philips Semiconductors' Embedded Processing Group. "The market demands comprehensive embedded DSP solutions that are flexible, high-performance and low-cost. Philips Semiconductors is positioned to address these demands and offer the market a 'one-stop-shop' for embedded DSP solutions."

Philips Semiconductors, with the acquisition of VLSI Technology, now offers a market-leading array of embedded technology and methodologies that will provide complete, low-cost, low-power solutions that offer increased performance and proven development tools to reduce time-to-market. Along with DSP cores such as  R.E.A.L. DSP, Oak and Palm, Philips Semiconductors offers customers a variety of options for creating system-on-silicon solutions including:

• Silicon & Algorithm IP
  IP blocks that assemble within an easy, reliable methodology and delivery tools including; ARM® and MIPS® CPU Cores, CPU Builder, Peripherals through HDLi and CoReUse™.
   
• Silicon System Platforms
  Platforms that provide the capability to easily develop, co-design and test hardware and software such as Nexperia™ and Velocity™.
   
• Analysis and Developments Tools
  To define the architecture, optimize, simulate and emulate the code including JumpStart, JumpStart_XE, DSP-C Compilation Tools (CoSy™ from ACE) and R.E.A.L. DSP Code Development based on ASPEX™.

Historically, Philips Semiconductors has worked closely with internal divisions to develop DSP functionality based on real market needs. Moving forward, development teams in Eindhoven, The Netherlands; Sophia, France; Sunnyvale and San Jose, California; and Tempe, Arizona will utilize the company's vast experience in all areas of architecture development and optimization to offer a solid roadmap of future product solutions that continue to address market demands. Philips Semiconductors is focused on developing common development platforms for multiple application domains, implementing the re-use of silicon cores and embedded software modules to reduce costs, and maintaining a strong relationship between architecture design, Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) implementation and development tools.

Philips Semiconductors, a division of Royal Philips Electronics, headquartered in Eindhoven, The Netherlands, is the eighth largest semiconductor supplier based on Dataquest's 1998 report ¹). Headquartered in Eindhoven, The Netherlands, the company's innovations in digital audio, video, and mobile technology position it as a leader in the consumer, multimedia and wireless communications markets. Its recent acquisition of VLSI Technology (San Jose, California, USA) further enhances Philips Semiconductors' position as one of the world's leading suppliers of handset solutions for digital cellular and cordless telephone systems including GSM, CDMA, TDMA, DECT, ISM, GPRS and Bluetooth. In addition to these digital system solutions, Philips Semiconductors also produces ICs for wired and analog cordless telephony and paging. The company's activities are supported by sales offices in all major markets around the world, and by systems labs. Additional information on Philips Semiconductors can be obtained by accessing its home page at http://www.semiconductors.philips.com

¹) Based on Vendor Revenue from Shipments of Total Semiconductors Worldwide according to Dataquest's 1998 Worldwide Semiconductor Market Share report published in May, 1999.

CoReUse, JumpStart, JumpStart_XE and Nexperia are trademarks of Philips Electronics.
CoSy is a trademark of ACE.
MIPS is a registered trademark of MIPS Technology.
ASPEX is a trademark of Allant Software Corporation.
ARM is a registered trademark of ARM Limited.