Fisher Investments on Technology

Chapter 6. A DEEPER LOOK AT CURRENT AND EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES

Technology is in a never-ending state of change. In the spirit of competition, companies pursue a common goal: Offer the best and most cutting-edge products or services possible. This has fueled the fire of innovation over the Technology sector's entire history. Advancement has been profound, particularly in the last 30 years, be it manufacturing processes, new products, or industry-wide technology standards.

This chapter digs deeper into some of the major technologies used today, as well as how they're evolving. For the semiconductor production process, some important emerging technologies include:

Semiconductor Production Process

• Immersion Lithography

• High-k Dielectrics

And emerging technology for computers include:

Computer Technology

• Solid State Drives

• Data Deduplication

• Cloud Computing

• Virtualization

• Web 2.0

SEMICONDUCTOR PRODUCTION PROCESS

Semiconductors have evolved remarkably quickly. Over the years, chips have dramatically shrunk in size while computing power has exponentially increased—a trend largely attributed to manufacturing process advancements. But just how are chips produced?

First Things First—Silicon Wafers

Chips start out as silicon wafers. Why silicon? Silicon is an abundant element, found in raw materials like sand, with natural semiconductor properties—meaning it can act as both a conductor and an insulator and be used at higher temperatures than many alternatives. (For more, revisit Chapter 2.) Because raw materials ...