Japan's NEC Electronics announced on September 11 that it would join an IBM-led alliance devoted to the development of next-generation semiconductor core CMOS process technology at the 32nm node, Reuters reported. The agreement reached by both parties entails collaboration through 2010 on developing a common process platform as well as enhancing design and development capability in SoC (System-on-Chip).

The research will be carried out at IBM's Semiconductor Research and Development Center in East Fishkill, New York, and at the CNSE (College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering) of the University at Albany, State University of New York. NEC is the eighth member of the IBM-led alliance. Other partners include Toshiba, Samsung Electronics, STMicroelectronics, Infineon Technologies, Freescale Semiconductor, and Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing. Earlier this year, the alliance demonstrated the potential of a material called HKMG (High-K/Metal Gate), which, when applied to 32-nm technology, achieves up to 35% performance enhancement and 30% to 50% power reduction in comparison with 45-nm technology, according to a press release by NEC.