LSI Corporation
Encyclopedia
LSI Corporation is an electronics company based in Milpitas, California
that designs semiconductors and software that accelerate storage and networking in datacenters and mobile networks.
as a semiconductor
ASIC
company after he left as CEO of Fairchild Semiconductor
in 1979. The other three founders were Bill O'Meara (marketing and sales), Rob Walker (engineering) and Mitchell "Mick" Bohn (finance). The firm was initially funded with $6 million from noted venture capitalists including Sequoia Capital
. A second round of financing for an additional $16M was completed in March 1982. The firm went public as LSI on Nasdaq
on Friday May 13, 1983 - netting $153M, the largest tech IPO up to that date.
LSI built its own wafer fabrication, packaging and testing facilities in Milpitas as well as utilizing excess capacity at Toshiba
for manufacturing - an early example of the fabless semiconductor manufacturing model. LSI Logic expanded world wide by establishing stand-alone affiliate companies in Japan, Europe and Canada. Nihon LSI Logic based in Tokyo, Japan was financed in April 1984 through a $20M private offering. LSI Logic Ltd based in Bracknell UK was financed in June 1984 by an additional $20M private placement and LSI Logic Canada based in Calgary, Alberta went public on the Toronto stock exchange. Each affiliate sought to develop independent manufacturing facilities through alliances, purchases or independent development. In 1985, the firm entered into a joint venture with Kawasaki Steel - Japan's third largest steel manufacturer - to build a $100M wafer fabrication plant in Tsukuba, Japan.
The firm developed the industry's first line of ASIC
products which let customers create custom 'gate array' chips by use of leading-edge proprietary CAD tools (called LDS for 'Logic Design System'). The initial product lines were based on high-speed ECL (Emitter Coupled Logic) technology but soon switched over to high-speed CMOS
(Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor) which offered much lower cost and lower power requirements to system designers. Over time, LSI Logic increased its product offerings and IP library through pioneering efforts in the areas of standard cells, structured arrays, DSPs
and microprocessors (MIPS
and SPARC
) as it moved toward the complete design and development of "System on a Chip" solutions.
As the ASIC market matured, third party design tools became preeminent and with the very high cost of fab development, the foundry fab model gained momentum and LSI returned in 2005 to a fabless semiconductor business. During its ASIC years, LSI Logic invested in core technologies such as microprocessors, communication devices, and video compression devices such as MPEG. These core technologies have been used together with acquisitions to better place the firm as an intellectual property owner. In 1998 it bought Symbios Logic
from Hyundai
. In March 2001 LSI acquired C-Cube
for $878M in stock. In 2006, the firm celebrated its 25th year of business.
On April 2, 2007, LSI completed its merger with Agere Systems
, and rebranded the firm from LSI Logic Corporation to LSI Corporation. It is listed on the NYSE with the ticker symbol LSI.
Milpitas, California
Milpitas is a city in Santa Clara County, California. It is a suburb of the major city of San Jose, California. It is located with San Jose to its south and Fremont to its north, at the eastern end of State Route 237 and generally between Interstates 680 and 880 which run roughly north/south...
that designs semiconductors and software that accelerate storage and networking in datacenters and mobile networks.
History
LSI Corporation was founded under the name LSI Logic in 1981 in Milpitas, CA by Wilfred CorriganWilfred Corrigan
Wilfred J. Corrigan is a British engineer and entrepreneur, known for founding and running LSI Logic Corp. He was the chairman and chief executive of LSI for over two decades until 2005, during the earlier part of which he made made vital contributions to the company. He was the founder and served...
as a semiconductor
Semiconductor
A semiconductor is a material with electrical conductivity due to electron flow intermediate in magnitude between that of a conductor and an insulator. This means a conductivity roughly in the range of 103 to 10−8 siemens per centimeter...
ASIC
ASIC
ASIC may refer to:* Application-specific integrated circuit, an integrated circuit developed for a particular use, as opposed to a customised general-purpose device.* ASIC programming language, a dialect of BASIC...
company after he left as CEO of Fairchild Semiconductor
Fairchild Semiconductor
Fairchild Semiconductor International, Inc. is an American semiconductor company based in San Jose, California. Founded in 1957, it was a pioneer in transistor and integrated circuit manufacturing...
in 1979. The other three founders were Bill O'Meara (marketing and sales), Rob Walker (engineering) and Mitchell "Mick" Bohn (finance). The firm was initially funded with $6 million from noted venture capitalists including Sequoia Capital
Sequoia Capital
Sequoia Capital is a Californian venture capital firm located on Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park, California. The Wall Street Journal has called Sequoia Capital "one of the highest-caliber venture firms", and noted that it is "one of Silicon Valley's most influential venture-capital firms"...
. A second round of financing for an additional $16M was completed in March 1982. The firm went public as LSI on Nasdaq
NASDAQ
The NASDAQ Stock Market, also known as the NASDAQ, is an American stock exchange. "NASDAQ" originally stood for "National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations". It is the second-largest stock exchange by market capitalization in the world, after the New York Stock Exchange. As of...
on Friday May 13, 1983 - netting $153M, the largest tech IPO up to that date.
LSI built its own wafer fabrication, packaging and testing facilities in Milpitas as well as utilizing excess capacity at Toshiba
Toshiba
is a multinational electronics and electrical equipment corporation headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. It is a diversified manufacturer and marketer of electrical products, spanning information & communications equipment and systems, Internet-based solutions and services, electronic components and...
for manufacturing - an early example of the fabless semiconductor manufacturing model. LSI Logic expanded world wide by establishing stand-alone affiliate companies in Japan, Europe and Canada. Nihon LSI Logic based in Tokyo, Japan was financed in April 1984 through a $20M private offering. LSI Logic Ltd based in Bracknell UK was financed in June 1984 by an additional $20M private placement and LSI Logic Canada based in Calgary, Alberta went public on the Toronto stock exchange. Each affiliate sought to develop independent manufacturing facilities through alliances, purchases or independent development. In 1985, the firm entered into a joint venture with Kawasaki Steel - Japan's third largest steel manufacturer - to build a $100M wafer fabrication plant in Tsukuba, Japan.
The firm developed the industry's first line of ASIC
ASIC
ASIC may refer to:* Application-specific integrated circuit, an integrated circuit developed for a particular use, as opposed to a customised general-purpose device.* ASIC programming language, a dialect of BASIC...
products which let customers create custom 'gate array' chips by use of leading-edge proprietary CAD tools (called LDS for 'Logic Design System'). The initial product lines were based on high-speed ECL (Emitter Coupled Logic) technology but soon switched over to high-speed CMOS
CMOS
Complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor is a technology for constructing integrated circuits. CMOS technology is used in microprocessors, microcontrollers, static RAM, and other digital logic circuits...
(Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor) which offered much lower cost and lower power requirements to system designers. Over time, LSI Logic increased its product offerings and IP library through pioneering efforts in the areas of standard cells, structured arrays, DSPs
Digital signal processor
A digital signal processor is a specialized microprocessor with an architecture optimized for the fast operational needs of digital signal processing.-Typical characteristics:...
and microprocessors (MIPS
MIPS architecture
MIPS is a reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by MIPS Technologies . The early MIPS architectures were 32-bit, and later versions were 64-bit...
and SPARC
SPARC
SPARC is a RISC instruction set architecture developed by Sun Microsystems and introduced in mid-1987....
) as it moved toward the complete design and development of "System on a Chip" solutions.
As the ASIC market matured, third party design tools became preeminent and with the very high cost of fab development, the foundry fab model gained momentum and LSI returned in 2005 to a fabless semiconductor business. During its ASIC years, LSI Logic invested in core technologies such as microprocessors, communication devices, and video compression devices such as MPEG. These core technologies have been used together with acquisitions to better place the firm as an intellectual property owner. In 1998 it bought Symbios Logic
Symbios Logic
Symbios Logic was a manufacturer of SCSI host adapter chipsets and disk array storage subsystems. It was originally established as a division of NCR Corporation in 1972, before NCR's takeover by AT&T in 1991....
from Hyundai
Hyundai
Hyundai ) is a global conglomerate company, part of the Korean chaebol, that was founded in South Korea by one of the most famous businessmen in Korean history: Chung Ju-yung...
. In March 2001 LSI acquired C-Cube
C-Cube
C-Cube Microsystems was a pioneer in video compression technology as well as the implementation of that technology into cost-effective semiconductors...
for $878M in stock. In 2006, the firm celebrated its 25th year of business.
On April 2, 2007, LSI completed its merger with Agere Systems
Agere Systems
Agere Systems Inc. was an integrated circuit components company based in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Spun out of Lucent Technologies in 2002, Agere was merged into LSI Corporation in 2007....
, and rebranded the firm from LSI Logic Corporation to LSI Corporation. It is listed on the NYSE with the ticker symbol LSI.
Markets
- LSI designs custom silicon (ASICASICASIC may refer to:* Application-specific integrated circuit, an integrated circuit developed for a particular use, as opposed to a customised general-purpose device.* ASIC programming language, a dialect of BASIC...
s), host bus adapters, RAIDRAIDRAID is a storage technology that combines multiple disk drive components into a logical unit...
adapters, expanders and software. LSI Storage Products - Merging with Agere also adds VoIP, modemModemA modem is a device that modulates an analog carrier signal to encode digital information, and also demodulates such a carrier signal to decode the transmitted information. The goal is to produce a signal that can be transmitted easily and decoded to reproduce the original digital data...
chipsets, hard disk drives, USB, and other networking products to its portfolio. LSI Networking Products
Mergers and acquisitions
- August 1998 - LSI acquired Symbios LogicSymbios LogicSymbios Logic was a manufacturer of SCSI host adapter chipsets and disk array storage subsystems. It was originally established as a division of NCR Corporation in 1972, before NCR's takeover by AT&T in 1991....
from HyundaiHyundaiHyundai ) is a global conglomerate company, part of the Korean chaebol, that was founded in South Korea by one of the most famous businessmen in Korean history: Chung Ju-yung...
. - March 2001 - LSI acquired C-CubeC-CubeC-Cube Microsystems was a pioneer in video compression technology as well as the implementation of that technology into cost-effective semiconductors...
in a stock-for-stock transaction - September 2001 - LSI acquired AMIAmerican MegatrendsAmerican Megatrends Incorporated is an American hardware and software company that specializes in PC hardware and firmware. The company was founded in 1985 by Pat Sarma and S. Shankar, who was chairman and president...
's RAID adapter division in a cash transaction. - September 2002 - LSI acquired Mylex from IBMIBMInternational Business Machines Corporation or IBM is an American multinational technology and consulting corporation headquartered in Armonk, New York, United States. IBM manufactures and sells computer hardware and software, and it offers infrastructure, hosting and consulting services in areas...
. - December 2006 - LSI announced its intention to merge with AgereAgere SystemsAgere Systems Inc. was an integrated circuit components company based in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Spun out of Lucent Technologies in 2002, Agere was merged into LSI Corporation in 2007....
in an all stock transaction - February 2007 - LSI acquired SiliconStor for approximately $55 million in cash.
- April 2, 2007 - LSI completed its merger with Agere SystemsAgere SystemsAgere Systems Inc. was an integrated circuit components company based in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Spun out of Lucent Technologies in 2002, Agere was merged into LSI Corporation in 2007....
. - June 27, 2007 - LSI announced a deal under which Magnum Semiconductor, Inc.Magnum SemiconductorMagnum Semiconductor Inc. is a video compression technology company. The headquarters of the company is in Milpitas, California. The company has an engineering branch at Waterloo, Ontario, Canada....
, a spin-off of Cirrus LogicCirrus LogicCirrus Logic is a fabless semiconductor supplier specializing in analog, mixed-signal, and audio DSP integrated circuits . They are presently headquartered in Austin, Texas. Their audio processors and audio converters are found in many professional audio and consumer entertainment products,...
's Video group, acquires the LSI consumer products business. - September 5, 2007 - LSI announced plans to Acquire TarariTarariTarari is a company that spun out of Intel in 2002 . It has created a range of re-programmable silicon based on Virtex-4 FPGA and ASICs that offload and accelerate really complex algorithms such as XML Parsing, scanning for Computer viruses, email spam and intruders in Intrusion-prevention...
for $85M in cash - October 24, 2007 - LSI completed its sale of its Mobility Division to Infineon Technologies AG
- March 10, 2008 - LSI announced an agreement to purchase Infineon's hard disk drive business.
- April 28, 2008 - LSI completed its purchase of Infineon's hard disk drive business.
- April 28, 2009 - LSI bought the 3ware3ware3ware was founded in February 1997 by Mitch Altman, J. Peter Herz and Jim MacDonald. In April 2006, Applied Micro Circuits Corporation acquired 3ware for $150 million in cash and became a AMCC product line brand...
RAID adapter business of Applied Micro Circuits CorporationApplied Micro Circuits CorporationApplied Micro Circuits Corporation is a fabless semiconductor company designing network and embedded Power Architecture , and server processor ARM , optical transport and storage solutions... - July 22, 2009 - LSI announced an agreement to acquire ONStor, Inc.
- March 9, 2011 - LSI announced its sale of its external storage systems business to NetApp, Inc.
- May 9, 2011 - LSI completed its sale of its external storage systems business to NetApp, Inc.
- October 27, 2011 - LSI acquired flash storage processors maker SandForceSandForceSandForce is an American "fabless" semiconductor company based in Milpitas, California, that designs and manufactures flash memory controllers for solid-state drives . On October 26th 2011 it was acquired by LSI Corporation....
for $370 million.