Summer draws to a close, and the pace quickens ...

** HOT Chips 17 – The upcoming conference on August 14th to 16th will be held once again on the lovely campus of Stanford University.

Conference organizers say: "Since it started in 1989, HOT Chips has been known as one of the semiconductor industry's leading conference on high-performance microprocessors and related integrated circuits. The conference is held once a year in August on the Stanford University campus in the center of the world's capital of electronics activity, Silicon Valley. The conference emphasis this year, as in previous years, is on real products and realizable technology."

** FPL – The International Conference on Field Programmable Logic will be in charming Tampere, Finland from August 24th to 26th. Conference organizers say: "FPL is the oldest and largest international conference on all aspects of Field Programmable Logic, Reconfigurable Computing, and Applications."

** 2005 EDA Tech Forum - Mentor Graphics, as well as Altera, Artisan/ARM, Chartered Semiconductor, The Mathworks, VSIA, and Accellera will be sponsoring this series of conferences in the coming months. Organizers say that each conference will include: "Technical sessions and hands-on self-paced workshops [that] address real-life design issues in IC nanometer design, functional verification, integrated system design, and emerging technologies, with presenters from [sponsoring] companies."

All told, 18 conferences are scheduled for various venues worldwide in 2005 including: Dallas, Texas; Phoenix, Boston, San Jose, Ottawa, Dresden, Reading, Paris, Penang, Bangalore, New Delhi, Beijing, Shanghai, Hsinchu, Seoul, Tokyo, and Kyoto."

Accellera's Chairman Dennis Brophy will be giving the keynote address at the 3 events taking place in August 2005. His travels will take him to the cities in the list noted in red.

** IMEC CALIT International School Events – IMEC has announced their new Center for Advanced Learning in Information Technologies (CALIT) as a platform for high-level events and training programs that focus on visionary and interdisciplinary themes. Here are some events you might consider attending in Leuven, Belgium:

The first two meetings took place in May. The third symposium, scheduled for September 1st, will address the convergence of nanometer-scale sciences and the methods needed to bridge the gap between manmade and biological systems through nanotechnology. At this event, experts will discuss what can be realistically expected from this convergence and how society should prepare for the impact of this new technology.

** Chartered Technology Forum 2005 – Two events will be taking place on September 7th in Hsinchu, Taiwan and on September 22nd in San Jose, CA. Organizers say topics at both meetings will include 90- and 65-nanometer designs, manufacturing enhancement methodologies, and "open collaboration with value-chain partners to enable optimized solutions and faster time to market for customers at reduced risk." Good stuff!

** CDNLive! Silicon Valley – This conference will be hosted by the new Cadence Users Group – "The Cadence Designer Network" – and will be taking place September 12th to the 14th, not surprisingly in Silicon Valley. Organizers say this is a "customer-driven technical forum that gives you the opportunity to interact with other designers-and with the Cadence engineers who develop the technologies you use."

Keynote speakers will include IMB's Bernard Meyerson and Morgan Stanley's Mark Edelstone. The conference will have six technical tracks plus a "Cadence Technology Night," a "Meet the Technologists" event, and a "Designer Expo" with 48 companies exhibiting.

** Semico Outlook Conference – The annual conference centers, as always, around a variety of topics including the economic outlook for the semiconductor industry, end-use market dynamics, portability and networking trends, foundry supply and demand predictions, and updates on memory and logic. Sponsors this year include ARC and Altera. You should plan to attend. It's happening on September 15th in San Jose.

** Denali MemCon 2005 – Organizers say this is "the industry's premier event for leading-edge trends in the business and technology of semiconductor memory, storage, and chip-to-chip communications." Each event includes keynotes, panel discussions, and more. Upcoming dates include MemCon Tokyo on September 15th and 16th at the Tokyo Conference Center, and MemCon San Jose on October 12th and 13th at Santa Clara.

** Zuken Customer Conferences – The Zuken Americas Design Automation Conference (ZADAC) takes place September 18th to 20th in San Diego, CA, and the Zuken European Design Automation Conference (ZEDAC) will take place on November 7th to 8th in Cologne, Germany. Organizers say "the events focus on business and technical issues relating to the design and manufacturing processes of electronics companies across the globe. This year the focus will be on IP collaboration, which looks at the major challenge for organizations of streamlining intellectual property across all divisions of the business. They will also provide a platform for business networking and an opportunity to hear about the latest trends from industry experts."

** ASIC/SOC Conference – This International meeting takes place in fast-paced Washington, D.C. from September 25th to 28th. Conference organizers say the event will be peppered with tutorials, panels, technical sessions and every other good thing that you would expect from a highly regards IEEE gathering.

** SAME 2005 is inviting you to submit a paper to their upcoming 2005 conference, to be held in the Science Technological Park of Sophia Antipolis, France on October 5th and 6th. Organizers says this year, the main topic for the forum will be System in Package & System on Chip. Interesting topics. Lovely destination. You should go.

** ISoC – Note Early Registration is now open for the 3rd International System-on-Chip Conference and Exhibition will be held November 1st and 2nd in Newport Beach, CA. Organizers say the theme for the conference will be "SoC in Wireless Applications." They also say, "Track & Session presenters, keynote speakers, and panel members who can contribute their professional expertise have a wonderful opportunity to share their innovative SoC technology/products at this event with a very focused and targeted audience."

** ICCAD-2005 will be held at the DoubleTree Hotel in San Jose from November 6th to the 10th. This is one of the 'real' conferences – real engineering, real science, real stuff. Please note that organizers say that this year, "in addition to traditional CAD topics, ICCAD has expanded its focus to include innovative design technologies for devices, circuits, and systems."

** edaForum05 will take place in Hannover, Germany, on November 17th and 18th.

This is the fourth annual forum – topics this year will include low-power design, the design of robust systems under uncertain conditions, management issues surrounding chip design, and whimsically: "Wise Men Buy EDA - Real Men Build Fabs" ... the topic notwithstanding, let's make the leap and presume there will be some women in attendance as well.

The edaForum is sponsored by edacentrum, an independent association of 47 companies "dedicated to the promotion of research and development in the area of electronic design automation."