NXP, TSMC deliver industry’s first 45nm single-chip digital TV platform

EINDHOVEN, THE NETHERLANDS & HSINCHU, TAIWAN: NXP Semiconductors and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd announced their co-operation to deliver the industry’s first single-chip 45nm global LCD TV platform, TV550.

With NXP already delivering the engineering samples to its lead customers, NXP and TSMC have reached a major milestone in enabling the next generation of mainstream digital TV sets for TV manufacturers.

Featuring NXP’s PNX85500 processor, built on TSMC’s 45nm Low Power (LP) process technology, the NXP TV550 digital TV platform is a production-ready reference design that reduces time-to-market with a major step forward in functional integration for system cost down.

The newly introduced DTV platform allows TV viewers to enjoy HD digital content and internet access with unparalleled picture quality. The long-term partnership and collaboration between NXP and TSMC was the key to this first-to-market achievement, with early access to silicon test results from TSMC resulting in accurate transistor characterization using state-of-the art PSP models.

NXP called on TSMC, who had announced the industry’s first 45nm process technology in 2007, to achieve its time-to-market lead. NXP selected TSMC’s 45LP process technology for its outstanding performance characteristics such as multiple Vt to achieve lower power consumption, excellent current drive capability and one of the industry’s smallest SRAM cell size of 0.299µm2.

“Digital switchover and high definition content are the major demands for the TV industry,” said Lou Schreurs, business line TV general manager, NXP Semiconductors.

“With TSMC’s valuable experience in advanced CMOS technologies and NXP’s TV system design expertise, we are able to deliver these high end features with a reduced bill-of-materials. Our customers are highly impressed with TV550’s superb picture quality and its capability to handle the complex global digital standards with a single platform.”

The TSMC 45 LP cost-competitive process offers designers up to twice the density of 65nm with significant low power and up to 40% smaller die size. Compared with TSMC 40G technology, the 45LP requires less photo masks and is ideal for products demanding excellent cost performance ratio.

“NXP has clearly achieved its leadership with the availability of this single-chip digital TV SoC. The device is ‘right-the-first-time fully functional silicon that delivered as flip chip packaged samples just eight weeks after tape out,” said John Wei, Senior Director, Advanced Technology Marketing for TSMC.