“In five years China will teem with very capable designers”

Dr Dave Yang co-founded Vimicro in 1999, and is currently CTO and Vice President of the Company. He has been instrumental in taking the Company from a start-up to a leading Chinese semiconductor design company. Vimicro designs and develops advanced multimedia processors for PC cameras and mobile phones. It owns more than 700 patents, and dominates the PC camera processor market with 60 percent global market share. Dr Yang himself holds many patents and has won numerous awards, including Chinese National First Class Award for Science and Technology. Excerpts from his interview with EDN Asia:

EDN Asia: What are the main challenges China faces in IC design?
Yang: Getting the right kind of people is the biggest challenge. We have a lot of engineering graduates, but they don’t have the appropriate experience. In 1999, when OEM/ODM market started opening up in China, we felt it was a good time to go into IC design, even though the infrastructure was virtually non-existent. But now the infrastructure is developing rapidly. The reverse brain-drain of Chinese designers returning to China has already begun, and will grow. As of today, China does not have the accumulated knowledge-base that companies in the US like Intel have. However, in the next five years I envisage China teeming with very capable designers.

EDN Asia: China has over 500 design houses, but reports say that financially most of them are doing badly. Any comment?
Yang: Companies labeling themselves as design houses are not necessarily IC design houses. There are some very small companies that do not make money. However, financially IC design houses are getting better.

EDN Asia: How do you compare China with India, Taiwan, and Korea in design strengths?
Yang: Each country has its own strengths. India is strong in software, but I don’t think it is as strong in semiconductor design. Taiwan is strong in PCs and MP3 mobile phones. In Korea design companies latch themselves to major OEMs such as Samsung, Hynix, and LG and emerge strong in designing products of these companies. With huge manufacturing operations in China, China has a wide range of design operations, and has emerged especially strong in designing MP3, mobile phones, and PC peripherals that do not go inside the PC.

EDN Asia: What are Vimicro’s plans for expanding outside China?
Yang: Vimicro already has a design center in the Silicon Valley. Currently we are focusing on having design activities in China, though our markets are worldwide. In the short run we shall expand only in China.

EDN Asia: Can you please elaborate on Vimicro’s concept of pervasive multimedia?
Yang: The convergence of multimedia can be found in the office, at home, and while on the road. This widespread use and seamless interaction of multimedia throughout our daily life shows us that multimedia has become pervasive. In other words, multimedia is influencing people’s life anywhere, anytime. Vimicro has formed strategic alliances with leading global companies such as Microsoft, Samsung, Sony, Philips. HP, Logitech, and Lenova, and also with China Mobile and China Unicom, to promote Vimicro’s chip technologies and solutions, and promote open standards for interface to mobile application processors.

EDN Asia: What kind of high-end design activities are being done at Vimicro and what are your competitive strengths?
Yang: We are working on 90nm designs. We make MPUs, audio codec, mixing-chips, power management interfaces, etc. We are looking at 65nm designs next year. Our solutions include semiconductors, software, and system-level reference designs. They support a broad range of standards, baseband platforms, and components to match customers' designs, and assembly and supply chain management processes. Being based in China, we can offer a number of scompetitive advantages.

EDN Asia: What do you think of the fab vs fabless issue?
Yang: There is surplus foundry worldwide. We don’t want to get involved in the manufacturing business. Unless you have a history in foundry, it is very difficult to succeed in making money.