Thomson Components-Mostek Corp of Carrollton, Texas and VLSI Technology Inc of San Jose, have signed a comprehensive second-source agreement that also includes Paris-based Thomson Semiconducteurs, covering five applications-specific memory circuits, and to derive further products from them. All five are either recently-introduced products or ones due out in the near future, and the partners look for a fillip from the fact that there is a worldwide second source agreement in force for the circuits so early in their life cycle. The five products are FIFOs – first-in first-out buffers, dual-port RAMs, cache-tag RAMs and lithium cell-powered non-volatile static RAMs. The agreement also establishes a timetable for the co-development of future memory devices and permits the products to be developed into megacells for use in the application-specific product family of either company. The devices from VLSI Technology are the existing VT16DP8, a 1K by 16/2K by 8 dual-port RAM and its multiplexed-port version, the VT16AM8, and forthcoming 2K by 8 dual-port RAMs; a 1K by 8 FIFO with a 70MHz serial output read port; a 512 by 9, 20ns cache tag RAM; and a 2K by 9, 20ns cache tag RAM. The Thomson-Mostek devices are the currently available MK48T02 Timekeeper 2K by 8 non-volatile static RAM with integrated real-time clock and lithium cell power, the MK41H80 Tagram 20ns 16K static RAM for cache-tag applications, and the MK4511 B1PORT 512 by 9, 120ns dual-port RAM, as well as the soon-to-be-introduced MK48Z08 Zeropower 8K by 8 non-volatile static RAM, which has an integrated lithium cell and the MK4505 lK by 5, 25ns FIFO. Financial details of the pact have not been disclosed.
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