And IBM claims that it has developed the fastest silicon PNP positive negative positive configuration – transistor yet reported and sees the device as an important step toward significantly increasing the processing speed of future generations of large mainframes and supercomputers: the experimental PNP switch in half the time of previously reported devices of the kind, with circuits built with the bipolar PNP transistors switched on and off at 25GHz times per second; IBM reckons that complementary bipolar circuits employing both NPN and PNP devices will be able to outperform circuits based on NPN devices alone by supporting higher speed operation at lower levels of power consumption – a potential benefit that has yet to be demonstrated; IBM used existing silicon fabrication methods to make its PNP devices.
