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Fujitsu Microelectronics Europe

Fujitsu Launches Low-Power Consumption 256Mbit FCRAM for Digital Consumer Electronics

Langen, Germany, 26th June 2008 — Fujitsu Microelectronics Europe (FME) announced today the development of a 256Mbit Consumer FCRAM™ for digital consumer electronics, the MB81EDS256545. The new FCRAM has low power consumption and is suited for system-in-package (SiP) designs, with samples available from today.

Key features include a 64-bit I/O, a low power DDR SDRAM interface that enables data transfer capabilities equivalent to two DDR2 SDRAMs with 16-bit I/O while reducing power consumption by up to 1W (equivalent to approximately 70%). This contributes to power savings for digital consumer electronics and makes the new device ideal for consumer electronics products that require low power consumption, such as digital televisions and camcorders.

In recent years, while the electronic components that drive digital consumer electronics have become higher in performance and feature integrated functionalities, an issue to overcome had been how to handle the rise in heat generation, attributable to smaller chips and efforts made to make consumer electronics more power-efficient. This has led to a need for components with low power consumption.

Fujitsu Microelectronics' new FCRAM features significantly reduced power consumption by approximately 70%. This power saving helps reduce the power consumption for consumer electronics, while better heat dissipation simplifies product development and lowers component costs.

Fujitsu anticipates that this memory can replace conventional RAMs for use in digital consumer electronics that require lower power consumption, such as digital televisions and camcorders, and will provide solutions featuring ideal product value and cost.

Key Features

Data transfer on par with DDR2 SDRAM on maximum 1W less power consumption
DDR2 SDRAM and other high-speed memory interfaces require termination resistors to maintain stable signals, which consume much electricity. The new product uses a wide 64-bit I/O, so that it can run at a lower operating frequency and dispense with termination resistors, resulting in performance equivalent to two DDR2 SDRAMs with 16-bit I/O, while requiring about 1W less power consumption, or a 70% reduction (see Figure 1 - link below).

High-speed processing of large-scale image data at double the performance speeds of DDR2 SDRAM
With a 64-bit-wide I/O and operating frequencies up to 216MHz, this device has a maximum data transfer rate of 3.46GB per second, double that of typical DDR2 SDRAM. This makes it well-suited for processing of image/video data and other data types that demand high bandwidth, such as digital television.

Memory designed for SiP helps conserve mounting space
This product is designed to be integrated with logic chips into a SiP, thus requiring less mounting space on circuit boards and thereby reducing costs for components and the board material itself. In addition to being offered in a wafer form for SiP integration, Fujitsu's new FCRAM is also offered as a wafer level package (WLP) (see Figure 2 – link below).

Availability

Samples are available immediately.

Notes to Editors

Consumer FCRAM: Fast Cycle Random Access Memory (FCRAM) is Fujitsu's proprietary RAM core architecture featuring high-speed and low power consumption. Consumer FCRAM refers to a type of FCRAM product that combines the FCRAM core with an industry-standard low power DDR SDRAM interface for digital consumer electronics.

System-in-package (SiP): Refers to the technologies or products that are comprised of a single package that contains diverse semiconductor devices, such as memory and logic chips.

DDR2 SDRAM: Double Data Rate 2 Synchronous Random Access Memory, a standard for DRAM. Compared to DDR SDRAM (transfer speeds are double the SDRAM’s), DDR2 runs faster and at lower power consumption. This is the mainstream DRAM device currently available on the market.

Reduction of power consumption: Comparison calculated based on data transfer of 3.2GB/s using one unit of the new product and two DDR2 SDRAMs from a competitor. Because a large proportion of the DDR2 SDRAM's total power consumption was accounted for by the termination resistors, eliminating them makes a significant contribution to power savings.

Termination resistors: Resistors attached to circuit wiring or signal terminals, used to prevent the signal being distorted due to reflection. DDR2 SDRAM uses ‘on die termination’ (ODT) to build the resistors into the chip.

Wafer level package (WLP): A compact chip-sized package. After packaging processes such as solder bumping and marking are carried out in the wafer form, each WLP device is individually cut off by dicing.

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About Fujitsu Microelectronics Europe

Fujitsu Microelectronics Europe (FME) is a major supplier of semiconductor products. The company provides advanced systems solutions to the automotive, digital TV, mobile telephony, networking and industrial markets. Engineers from design centres dedicated to microcontrollers, graphics controllers, mixed-signal, wireless, multimedia ICs and ASIC products work closely with FME's marketing and sales teams throughout Europe to help satisfy customers' system development requirements. This solutions approach is supported by a broad range of advanced semiconductor devices, IP and building blocks.
For more information, please see: http://emea.fujitsu.com/microelectronics