Vik's Newsletter

Vik's Newsletter

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Why the Chip Industry Is Struggling to Attract the Next Generation
Six hard truths about how engineers enter, survive, and often get stuck in the chip industry — and what needs to change.
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Vikram Sekar
12
Can You Vibe Your Way Through Chip Design?
Reinforcement learning, inverse design, and the cultural shift in electronic design automation; a look at how AI is breaking design conventions in…
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Vikram Sekar
1
The Engineer’s Guide to Measurement Precision
A field-tested checklist to ensure lab accuracy, repeatability, and regulatory readiness.
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Vikram Sekar

March 2025

NVIDIA CuLitho and the Future of Inverse Lithography
How GPU-scale compute is reshaping mask synthesis for advanced nodes.
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Vikram Sekar
1
How Electrons Move in Semiconductors: The Science of Carrier Drift
Understanding the forces, scattering mechanisms, and mobility factors that govern charge transport.
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Vikram Sekar
The Silicon Photonics Moonshot: Group IV Integrated Lasers
An exploration of how group IV materials could solve the longstanding problem of silicon’s indirect bandgap, enabling monolithic photonic circuits with…
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Vikram Sekar
Why Fathom Light uses LiDAR in Long Range Airborne Applications
Why it makes sense to use LiDAR technology instead of radar in unmanned drones.
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Vikram Sekar
The Gigabit Wall: No More Need for Speed
No, we don't need mobile data rates faster than 1 Gb/s and three upcoming wireless technologies that are actively focused on features other than speed.
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Vikram Sekar

February 2025

First Impressions from 2025 ISSCC
"The Silicon Engine Driving the AI revolution," plenary talks and overall thoughts about the conference.
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Vikram Sekar
4
Why Citing Yield Without Die Area is Meaningless
Pat Gelsinger's field notes, and how defect density is a more meaningful metric for yield.
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Vikram Sekar
 and 
amphilomath
5
The Rise of 800V Electric Vehicles and Role of Silicon Carbide
Exploring the engineering merits of higher voltage battery systems for next-generation EVs, and the benefits and challenges involved in using high…
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Vikram Sekar
1
Semiconductor Doping, Electron Affinity, Work Function and Anderson's Rule
Controlling the energy levels in semiconductors, and learning to draw energy band diagrams from intrinsic material properties.
 • 
Vikram Sekar
2
© 2025 Vikram Sekar
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