Dynamic Chapters Chart New Programs

Ten SSCS chapters reported their activities at the annual SSCS Chapters' Luncheon on Wednesday, 6 February, the closing day of the ISSCC. Space prevents listing all the activities reported at the luncheon, but three themes are emerging in chapter management.

• Chapters are becoming more astute and better organized at tapping their own talent for their talks and programs, in addition to using the SSCS Distinguished Lecturers program.
• Chapter leaders are making efficient use of their time and meeting the needs of their members for technical information by cooperating with related IEEE chapters and other organizations in their region.
• New chapters continue to grow their own programs and serve an expanding membership

Expanding Rosters of Feature Speakers

More chapters are organizing events that bring home the ISSCC by featuring ISSCC presenters from their own section. Japan has a long tradition of this, gearing its presentations for an audience of students and young engineers. Quitang Huang reported that in March the Zurich Chapter meeting featured an agenda of Swiss contributors to the ISSCC. The Zurich Chapter also scheduled a workshop last fall that drew 50 attendees from all over Europe. Other events for 2002 are listed in the table of Distinguished Lectures.

Jieh-Tsorng Wu, Chair of the Taipei Chapter, reported that the Taipei Chapter is creating its own speaker list to promote information exchange and research cooperation within the Taiwan IC design community and to augment their two annual presentations by Society Distinguished Lecturers. This ensures their full recognition and use of the world-class talent in their midst. The lecture at their first meeting was given by Chin-Chieih Chao of Century Semiconductor, who spoke about floating-point multiplier design for a 64-b microprocessor and delayed-reset logic family.

Last year the Taipei Chapter organized four Short Courses. The two in April and May were held at the National Chiao-Tung University in Hsin-Chu and drew 250 attendees each: "Network processing ICs" by C. Bernard Shung of Broadcom Corp. U.S.A. and "Design and simulation of RF and analog ICs" by Georges G.E. Gielen of Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium. Two in August were held alongside the VLSI Design/CAD Symposium and were co-sponsored by the Chapter with the National Chiao-Tung University, drawing 120 attendees each: "VLSI DSP for broadband communications" by Meng-Lin Yu of Agere and "RFIC design for wireless communications" by Jen-Shan Lin of Agere.

The Taipei Chapter currently is preparing to host the 2002 Asian-Pacific ASIC Conference, 6–8 August at the Grand Hotel, Taipei, Taiwan. Paper selection gets underway this April.

Zhihua Wang of Tsinghue University, Chair of the Beijing Chapter, reported on a June 2001 seminar conducted by Nobel Laureate Jack Kilby on the history of the integrated circuit. About 100 students from the Bejing area attended. In September the Chapter hosted a People-to-People Delegation of 40 experts organized by the IEEE Electron Device Society. During the 11-day visit Albert Wang of the Illinois Institute of Technology and an SSCS Distinguished Lecturer conducted the seminar "On-chip ESD protection design for integrated circuits." In November Kaushik Roy of Purdue University conducted the seminar "Deep sub-micron leakage: Future trends and possible solutions."

The Chapter is also working with the Bejing Municipality and the Bejing Semiconductor Industry Association (BSIA) on an Integrated Circuit Design Training Center for industries in the area. It will open 12 April 2002. The IEEE/SSCS Bejing Chapter will be in charge of inviting international experts to train local engineers at the center in the coming few years.

The Bejing Chapter is preparing to sponsor the Asia-Pacific ASIC Conference in 2004 and has begun seeking cooperation with five other local and national associations in addition to the IEEE regional chapters, the Bejing section and Tsinghue University.

Working with Other Chapters

More Chapters are taking advantage of the efficiencies of cooperating with related chapters in their own section, other SSCS chapters in neighboring sections, and similar national professional associations. This maximizes the exposure of a speaker and the efficiencies of local volunteer leaders organizing meetings that attract local engineers. The Dallas SSCS Chapter, which has featured many SSCS Distinguished Lectures in its first three years of operation, is now cooperating with the Circuits and Systems Chapter in arranging for speakers and in planning the CAS fourth annual spring workshop and poster session. Ana Hamoui reported that the Toronto Chapter has featured local industry experts but is also interested in expanding its use of the Distinguished Lecturers program. They cite the advantages of combining with related societies to stretch both funds and volunteers' time.

Christian Enz reported that the West Switzerland Chapter is looking forward to working with the French Chapter in Grenoble. Last fall West Switzerland organized a workshop in wireless networks and plans another this coming June after ADAC.

David Robertson, reporting for Boston's Chair Bruce Hecht, mentioned that all of Boston's four programs were conducted jointly with another chapter, including MTT, EDS, LEOS, Control Systems, and ACM. They were: "Overview of DARPA microelectronic and photonics initiatives" by Bob Leheny of Microsystems Technology Office of DARPA, "Wireless system considerations in RFIC design" by Steve Lurggiel of Maxim, "Advances in semiconductor device modeling" by Steve Broadbent of Silvaco International, and "Applications, design, and development of biochips" by Manish Deshpande of Coventor. A 2002 goal for the Boston Chapter is organizing a Short Course.

Lee Colby reported that the original SSCS Chapter in the Santa Clara Valley now has 1,400 members and holds nine meetings a year. They are looking forward to a section-sponsored training workshop on chapter management in February 2002. Classes will feature tips and traps for chairs, treasurers, running Web sites, setting up email aliases, and officer training.

Growth in New Chapters

Masao Nakaya reported that the year-old Kansai Chapter has shown an almost 12% increase in SSCS membership, from 138 when it was formed last January to 156 this year. The Chapter covers the region west of Tokyo encompassing three major urban areas: Kyoto, Osaka, and Kobe. Program activities this year have been held in three cities at four different sites. A meeting at Kyoto Research Park last June drew 120 attendees and featured the following lectures: "Linearity, time-variation, phase modulation and oscillator noise" by T. H. Lee of Stanford University and "Mixed-signal LSI technology" by A. Matsuzawa of Matsushita Electric Industrial. A fall lecture meeting at Campus Plaza Kyoto drew 75 attendees and featured: "Design and other ITRS technologies: Sharing brick walls" by A. B. Kahng of University of California at San Diego and "An introduction to circuit design without SPICE" by T. Wada of the University of the Ryukyus. Other activities this fall were cosponsored with the IEICE /ICD of Japan and included a two-day September study meeting at Kobe University and a three-day workshop at Kitakyusyu.

The new IEEE Bangalore EDS/SSCS Chapter was approved officially by the IEEE in October 2001. Navakanta Bhat of the Indian Institute of Science and joint Chapter Chair sent in the following report.

There are more than 40 engineering colleges in Bangalore and several multinational companies actively involved in VLSI circuit design. Three events were held in December that covered the entire spectrum from systems to materials: "Design technology and architectural adaptation for deep sub-micron VLSI systems" by Rajesh Gupta of the University of California, Irvine; "Failure analysis challenges in deep sub-micron devices" by Dr. Radhakrishnan of Philips Electronics, Singapore; and "Development and characterization of low dielectric constant materials for CMOS and other microelectronic device applications" by Professor Gautam Sarkar of the University of Alaska. This range of topics addressed the diverse interests of the members of EDS and SSCS.

In August 2002 the Bangalore Chapter will cooperate with the VLSI Society of India to organize the three-day VLSI Design and Test Workshops. Attended by professionals both from industry and academia, the VLSI Society provides fellowships to participating academics. During 2002, the Chapter also plans to organize a one-day workshop for undergraduate and graduate students on future challenges in VLSI technology.