The MEDEA+ programme as platform for co-operative R&D in Automotive Electronics
R&D is becoming increasingly a high-risk investment, accompanied by massive time-to-market and time-to-volume pressure. Its complexity and demand for ever increasing human and financial resources has reached dimensions where big companies or even nations can no longer effectively solve these issues alone. They have realised that only a transborder high-level globalisation and involvement of best-in-class partners is one answer.
The projects carried out within the scope of the MEDEA+ programme are carefully selected to foster Europe?s leadership in system innovation on silicon.
The following two project outlines provide additional information on the Challenges in Semiconductor Technology for Automotive Electronics and are successful examples where both vertical and horizontal co-operation has been set-up.
T122 - Fitness of Advanced Semiconductor Processes for 42V Battery Supply in Automotive Applications
The project T122 has started to research which of today's state of the art semiconductor processes are fit to be the base of advanced system designs, with special focus on the development of 42V power supplies for automobiles.
The 42V battery supply leads to new challenges in ASIC design for car systems. T122 is supporting the European effort towards integrated smart power devices for automotive applications focusing on reliability and robustness for integrated circuits in an extended voltage range and in harsh environments. Failure mechanisms of devices in the harsh automotive environment will be better understood, resulting in suitable semiconductor processes for save circuit designs.
To cover not only one special application aspect or only one special process line, a consortium of three sophisticated partners was established for a broad and in-depth investigation of this question. They include two of the world's top ten automotive semiconductor vendors who provide their smart power process platforms. Smart power ICs make it possible to develop systems with higher reliability, lower volume and weight, less power dissipation which are also cheaper than their predecessors.
The third partner, as system supplier and typical user of those smart power processes, brings in his experience in design and evaluation of automotive building blocks. The partners are building on the experience with those processes in the previous project MEDEA T508. In that project a 0.35um smart power process was developed, which allows the realization of very advanced systems on chip with embedded micro-controller and memory.
T124 - High Operating Temperature Systems on Chip, Assembly and Reliability (HOTCAR)
The primary technical goal of this project is to achieve and demonstrate system-level solutions for high temperature (HT) automotive applications and other related industrial branches like oil drilling. The current targeted operating temperatures for automotive applications are in the range from 150?C to 200?C. State of the art for engine and transmission controls is 125?C and 140?C respectively. Due to higher ambient temperatures the target for oil drilling is 225?C.
The HOTCAR project is divided into seven work packages: the definition of mission profiles and demonstrators; silicon technology; substrates; component packages; interconnect technology; qualification and reliability methodology; and, finally, selected application demonstrators. Functional failure models are being developed through deliberate investigation of the technology limits. Distinct mission targets have been set to ensure that the efforts of the chip designers, package and assembly experts meet the specific lifetime requirements.
As the customers will accept no premium prices, it is a big challenge for all designers to provide technologically innovative and cost efficient solutions.
The MEDEA+ T124 HOTCAR project set out to achieve industrially relevant results by forming a complete vertically structured supplier chain consortium from the chipmaker to the car manufacturer. To ensure a competitive approach embodying innovative concepts and advanced industrial research, the best available European competences have been included in the horizontal levels of the team.
