SiTime Cascade Mems Clock Chips
Much like a human’s heartbeat, timing technologies such as oscillators and clock chips are fundamental elements of complex circuits, systems and networks. Without an accurate source clock to derive frequencies and synchronize events and communications, virtually any processor, circuit, or system would simply not work, like a band with a bad drummer who can’t keep up with the beat. And as our workloads and processing demands continue to evolve with the digital transformation of so much around us, the demand for better, higher-precision timing technologies also increases, and that’s where companies like SiTime come into play in an ever-expanding market demand. .
Late last year, SiTime Corp announced that it had entered into an exclusive agreement with Aura Semiconductor to bring together clock timing chips with its full range of oscillators, including ultra-stable temperature-controlled and oven, for a one-stop shop for verification and accuracy. timing solutions. OCXOs and TCXOs are widely deployed in many industrial, networking, aerospace/defense, and consumer product systems. These are high-precision, high-stability timing devices that serve as a system or network’s reference clock while synchronizing chips, such as SiTime technologies. acquired from Aura Semithen distribute, or multiply or divide, the necessary clock frequencies from there, to meet critical timing needs at different stages of a circuit or network.
Clock timing chips generate a critical heartbeat for the modern microprocessor
SiTime’s MEMS-based TCXO and OCXO offerings typically provide more precise and often more compact timing solutions, using a microelectromechanical system design architecture, which provides better stability, power consumption, reliability and cost per Compared to older crystal oscillators based only solutions. In a conversation with Elizabeth Donley, head of the Time and Frequency Division at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, she explained how precise timing sources are essential for building things like the world’s atomic clocks that keep virtually all networks, both mobile and internet, and devices in sync and on time around the world. Additionally, Donley then detailed how high-performance crystal oscillators for these atomic clocks may require considerable resources to produce and operate, whereas mass-produced MEMS-based oscillators could potentially offer competitive accuracy and stability with Much lower resource requirements and potentially lower costs. .
That said, precise timing and sophisticated timing circuits aren’t just necessary for the work of an atomic physicist like Elizabeth Donley at NIST. They are also key technologies for communications over telecommunications networks (cellular, fiber, high-bandwidth Ethernet and others), where network synchronization is essential for high availability and redundancy in commercial and enterprise applications at very high speed. For example, these types of super stable clock devices are also being deployed in everything from smartwatches (SiTime has about 50% market share among major brands) to 5G networks for applications like geolocation, when your Uber driver’s location is going through a difficult time. update exactly where it is on your app or map.
MEMS clocks pave the way for a paradigm shift in decades-old design techniques
Perhaps what is most interesting about this new MEMS-enabled clock technology is that SiTime turns the decades-old legacy of the crystal oscillator on its head. In fact, the only real barrier to entry for technology like this is breaking the old habit of standard crystal oscillator-based designs, and that’s where SiTime has taken a beachhead. The company now has a soup-to-nuts portfolio of virtual timing solutions, ranging from basic precision reference clocks such as MEMS-based OCXOs and TCXOs, to clock tree and fanout solutions. more standard silicon it recently acquired in its acquisition of Aura Semiconductor, all of which are verified to work together.
Rajesh Vashist, CEO of SiTime
In terms of competitive positioning, a clear upward trend is underway. During SiTime’s fourth quarter fiscal 2023 earnings call last night, the company’s CEO Rajesh Vashist said: “Our funnel continues to show robust growth… For the whole of the year, the number of design wins increased by 75%… Unlike quartz oscillators which are generally multi-source, we continue to differentiate ourselves, as evidenced by the fact that 85% of our turnover in the fourth quarter came from a single source, another indication of SiTime’s value.
Clock timing products may look like chips and candy technologies, but in an age of cutting-edge applications like AI and the digitalization of virtually everything, design engineers and CTOs have a growing critical need for a highly accurate and reliable heart rate.
