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For Immediate Release
UMC GROUP AND XILINX DELIVER FIRST PURE 0.18 MICRON
FPGA PROCESS
Co-development efforts lead to three million-gate FPGAs
SUNNYVALE, Calif., October 18,
1999-UMC Group and Xilinx Inc., (NASDAQ:XLNX), today announced that
their joint development efforts have led to the production and shipment
of the industry's first 0.18 micron FPGAs. The two companies aligned
to deliver the Virtex-E FPGA family, including a two million-gate
device with 150 million transistors, available now, supporting multiple
gigabit per second I/O bandwidth and 266 MHz double data rate memory
performance. The XCV3200E three million gate FPGA will be available in 2Q00.
Jim Ballingall, vice president of worldwide marketing at UMC Group
noted, "Xilinx has clearly demonstrated its leadership position
in the FPGA industry with the delivery of its next generation Virtex
family. We are extremely happy to have contributed to this success.
Our ability to become the first pure-play foundry to achieve full
production for 0.25 micron, 0.22 micron and 0.18 micron technologies
is due, in large part, to our close cooperation with fabless technology
leaders like Xilinx. Our cooperation represents a common commitment
to developing technology leadership as a competitive advantage."
"Our new Virtex-E family clearly meets the industry's requirements
for high density and high performance FPGA devices. There are no
comparable devices on the market," said Dennis Segers, senior vice
president and general manager for the Xilinx High-end business unit.
"We attribute the early availability of this new product family
to our joint development efforts with UMC Group. UMC Group has been
extremely responsive meeting the challenging design criteria of
our Virtex-E products. Presently, their 0.18 micron technology delivers
the performance and yields that we need to retain our competitive
edge."
The aggressive development of the 0.18 micron process, currently
among the most advanced in the world, demanded a very close working
relationship between UMC Group and Xilinx. "With this unprecedented
level of cooperation, Xilinx and UMC Group have forged a whole new
pure-play foundry model that offers process technologies on par
with leading-edge vertically integrated device manufacturers," continued
Ballingal.
Segers added, "This leadership allows FPGA designers to have early
access to the most advanced technology for low-power, high performance
applications."
Xilinx recently announced the shipment of the initial members of
its next generation Virtex-E FPGA family. Four family members are
available including the new XCV2000E device, with two million system gates, supporting twice the system-gate
density and 200 percent higher I/O performance of the original Xilinx Virtex FPGAs. The Virtex-E family will consist of 11 members, from 50,000
system gates to 3.2 million system gates within the second quarter
next year. The new Virtex-E FPGAs deliver the performance and density
attributes that were previously addressed only by ASIC solutions,
which are required for emerging communications equipment such as
OC-192 systems and DSP applications capable of handling more than
200 gigabits per second bandwidth.
About Xilinx
Xilinx is the leading innovator
of complete programmable logic solutions, including advanced integrated
circuits, software design tools, predefined system functions delivered
as cores, and unparalleled field engineering support. Founded in
1984 and headquartered in San Jose, Calif., Xilinx invented the
field programmable gate array (FPGA) and fulfills more than half
of the world demand for these devices today. Xilinx solutions enable
customers to reduce significantly the time required to develop products
for the computer, peripheral, telecommunications, networking, industrial
control, instrumentation, high-reliability/military, and consumer
markets. For more information, visit the Xilinx web site at www.xilinx.com .
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