Premier Farnell to sell Altium’s new NanoBoard 3000 series of FPGA-based development boards

SYDNEY, Sept. 29 /PRNewswire/ — Altium has appointed Premier Farnell as the web distributor for its new NanoBoard 3000 FPGA-based development board. The agreement extends to Premier Farnell’s family of global marketing and distribution services.

Altium has launched the NanoBoard 3000 to make FPGA design easier. The supplied Altium Designer software is loaded with a large library of high-quality, royalty-free, ready-to-use IP that lets engineers use every aspect of the NanoBoard 3000 without having to create any low-level logic hardware or driver software. Engineers can graphically connect the IP blocks they want to use and the system takes care of the low level tasks automatically. They can also add processors, memory controllers, peripheral blocks, software stacks – everything they need to create next-generation, FPGA-hosted embedded systems with off-the-shelf components.

The NanoBoard 3000 provides a fixed user FPGA on a motherboard, and a range of peripherals so that designers can experiment with IP as they require. For designers new to using FPGAs, it provides the ideal learning environment to embrace FPGA-based ‘soft’ design because it allows board designers to experiment with FPGAs using all their existing embedded and board level skills. It makes FPGA design more accessible to more designers, and this distribution agreement makes this logistically possible.

“Premier Farnell is pleased to stock Altium’s new NanoBoard 3000 FPGA-based development boards for immediate shipment to customers worldwide. The NanoBoard 3000 offers designers an opportunity to begin prototyping almost immediately on a target platform that can be used in production,” said Randall Restle, Director of Global Technical Marketing, Premier Farnell.
“The NanoBoard 3000 smart development board lets engineers harness their existing skills to design with FPGAs very quickly,” said Nick Martin, CEO and Founder of Altium.

“With the NanoBoard 3000, engineers with no FPGA experience can start building electronic products using Altium’s intuitive graphical interface that eliminates the need to develop in HDL or create low-level code. Engineers can simply drag-and-drop all the IP they need to develop the next generation of electronic products.”

The NanoBoard 3000 smart FPGA development board sells for a RRP of US$395. For more information or to purchase a NanoBoard 3000 from Premier Farnell, visit www.newark.com/altium. For more information on Altium’s NanoBoard 3000 series, go to www.altium.com/products/nb3000. For more information on Altium Designer, go to Altium’s web site.

About Altium
Altium Limited provides next generation electronics design software. Altium’s unified electronics design environment links all aspects of electronics product design into one process, in a single application. This helps electronics designers harness the latest devices and technologies, manage their projects across broad design ‘ecosystems’, and create connected, intelligent designs. For more information, visit www.altium.com.

Altium, Altium Designer and LiveDesign, and their respective logos, are trademarks or registered trademarks of Altium Limited, or its subsidiaries. All other registered or unregistered trademarks mentioned in this release are the property of their respective owners, and no trademark rights to the same are claimed.

Leuven, Belgium — September 30, 2009 — IMEC and its 3D integration partners have taped-out Etna, a new 3D chip integrating a commercial DRAM chip on top of a logic IC. The new 3D stack resembles as close as possible to future commercial chips. It consists of a 25µm thick logic die on top of which a commercial DRAM is stacked using through-silicon vias (TSVs) and micro-bumps.

The 3D demonstrator mimics all aspects of the approach by stacking an advanced commercial DRAM product chip on IMEC’s proprietary CMOS logic IC. As an example, heaters are integrated to test the impact of hotspot on DRAM refresh times. And, the chip contains test structures for monitoring thermo-mechanical stress in a 3D stack, ESD (electro-static discharge) hazards, electrical characteristics of TSVs and micro-bumps, fault models for TSVs, etc.

The design of the 3D chip is realized together with many players in the 3D integration supply chain. Now, IMEC is manufacturing the logic die in its prototype line, and will be stacking the commercial DRAM chip on top of it. One of IMEC’s 3D integration partners will deliver the DRAM dies, and will test the fabricated 3D stack; two other partners, will package the 3D stack using flip-chip onto a FBGA (fine-pitch ball-grid array) substrate.

“We are excited to achieve this milestone in collaboration with our 3D integration partners including memory suppliers and IC manufacturers. This test-chip is a significant step for the introduction of 3D technology in DRAM-on-logic applications;” said Pol Marchal, principal scientist 3D integration at IMEC.

Picture: ETNA 3D chip stack paving the way for DRAM on logic integration; (top) stack configuration; (bottom) layout of the logic die

About IMEC
IMEC is a world-leading independent research center in nanoelectronics and nanotechnology. IMEC is headquartered in Leuven, Belgium, and has offices in Belgium, the Netherlands, Taiwan, US, China and Japan. Its staff of more than 1,650 people include over 550 industrial residents and guest researchers. In 2008, IMEC’s revenue (P&L) was 270 million euro.
IMEC’s More Moore research targets semiconductor scaling for the 22nm technology node and beyond. With its More than Moore research, IMEC invents technology for nomadic embedded systems, wireless autonomous transducer solutions, biomedical electronics, photovoltaics, organic electronics and GaN power electronics.
IMEC’s research bridges the gap between the fundamental research at universities and R&D in the industry. It has unique processing and system know-how, intellectual property portfolio, state-of-the-art infrastructure, and a strong and worldwide network position. This makes IMEC a key partner for shaping the technology of the future.
Further information on IMEC can be found at www.imec.be.