“Any customer can have a car painted any colour that he wants so long as it is black.” Imagine a leader in the semiconductor world, applying Ford’s idea and stating that you can have any 28 nm technology so long as it’s…28 nm. Today, there are about eight different versions of 32/28 nm technology being promoted, not only is it a challenge figuring out which one to use, but then making sure the technology model created by the foundry is an accurate representation of the process.

The process engineers in the foundry need to figure out an extraction technique for obtaining a set of optimal model parameters for BSIM. This is usually achieved through a semi-manual fitting process using many current-voltage measurements. One of the critical models is the output conduction of the MOSFET. The output conduction has become worse with each process generation, a good analog CMOS circuit designer can cope with this as long as there is an accurate model. However, this parameter is very hard to model accurately – many measurements of different transistor aspect ratios need to be taken. It’s a double whammy.  With the number of different types of 28 nm, this is becoming a challenging and an expensive bottle-neck for the foundries. 

Ford’s genius was that he addressed the problem of the Model T assembly line bottle-neck by offering only the fastest drying paint. Black. Ultimately, what the analog CMOS analog circuit designer cares most about, regardless of the actual performance of the  technology, is the accuracy of the model.