Maxim Integrated Products
Encyclopedia
Maxim Integrated Products is a publicly traded company that designs, manufactures, and sells analog and mixed-signal semiconductor
products. Maxim develops integrated circuit
s (ICs) for the industrial, communications, consumer, and computing markets.
Headquartered in Sunnyvale, California
, Maxim has design centers, manufacturing facilities, and sales offices throughout the world. In 2011 Maxim had $2.47 billion in sales, 9,300 employees, and 35,000 customers worldwide.
products. After that, Maxim designed proprietary products that offered greater differentiation and higher profits.
Maxim recorded its first profitable fiscal year in 1987, and posted a profit every year since it went public in 1988. Annual revenue reached $500 million in fiscal year 1998 and in fiscal 2011 totaled over $2.47 billion.
the company sold a wide variety of analog
and mixed-signal devices, with thousands of different products. Of about 9,300 employees, approximately 4,500 were employed in the United States.
Tunç Doluca became chief executive officer in January 2007.
1990: Purchased first wafer fabrication (fab) facility in Sunnyvale, California.
1994: Acquired Tektronix
Semiconductor Division in Beaverton, Oregon, giving Maxim high-speed bipolar processes for wireless RF and fiber-optic products.
1997: Purchased an additional wafer fab from IC Works in San Jose, California, to increase fab capacity.
2001: Acquired Dallas Semiconductor
in Dallas, Texas, to gain expertise in digital and mixed-signal CMOS
design, as well as an additional wafer fab.
2003: Purchased submicrometre CMOS fab from Philips
in San Antonio, Texas, to ramp up capacity and support processes down to the 0.25-micrometre level.
2007: Purchased 0.18-micrometre fab from Atmel
in Irving, Texas, approximately doubling fab capacity.
2007: Acquired Vitesse Semiconductor’s Storage Products Division in Colorado Springs, Colorado, adding Serial ATA
(SATA), Serial Attached SCSI
(SAS), and enclosure-management products to Maxim’s product portfolio.
2008: Acquired Mobilygen in Santa Clara, California, to add H.264 video-compression technology to its portfolio.
2009: Acquired Innova Card, headquartered in La Ciotat, France, for the financial transaction terminal semiconductor market.
2009: Acquired two product lines from Zilog
, Inc. Maxim purchased the Secure Transactions product line, featuring the Zatara family of single-chip solutions, and the hardware portion of Zilog's Wireless Control product line, whose Crimzon and classic IR solutions are commonly found in universal remote controls.
2010: Acquired privately held Teridian Semiconductor
Corporation for approximately $315 million in cash. Teridian was a fabless semiconductor company located in Irvine, California, supplying systems on a chip
(SoC) for the smart meter
market.
2010: Maxim acquired the technology and employees of Trinity Convergence Limited, a software company based in Cambridge, U.K. Trinity was part of the ecosystem to bring Skype
video conferencing to the LCD TV market.
2010: Maxim acquired Phyworks, a supplier of optical transceiver chips for the broadband
communications market.
2011: Maxim acquired SensorDynamics, a semiconductor company that
develops proprietary sensor and microelectromechanical (MEMS) solutions.
and iButton devices; amplifier
s and comparator
s; analog switches and multiplexer
s; audio/video; automotive; clock generation and distribution; analog-to-digital converter
s; digital-to-analog converter
s; digital potentiometer
s; analog filters; high-frequency ASIC
s; hot-swap and power switching; interface and interconnect; memories (volatile, nonvolatile, multifunction); microcontroller
s; military/aerospace; optoelectronics
; battery and power management
; powerline networking; protection and isolation; real-time clock
s; storage products; microprocessor supervisors; T/E carrier and packetized communications; thermal management; voltage reference
s; wireless, RF, and cable.
Starting in 1990, the company made the transition to using over 160 fabrication processes for its wafers in its own facilities.
and quoted on the Pink Sheets
until the company completed its restatement in 2008. Maxim's founder and CEO, Jack Gifford
and CFO Carl Jasper resigned due to an investigation into the issue by Maxim's board of directors.
Maxim restated its earnings in September 2008 and was relisted on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange on October 8, 2008.
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...
products. Maxim develops integrated circuit
Integrated circuit
An integrated circuit or monolithic integrated circuit is an electronic circuit manufactured by the patterned diffusion of trace elements into the surface of a thin substrate of semiconductor material...
s (ICs) for the industrial, communications, consumer, and computing markets.
Headquartered in Sunnyvale, California
Sunnyvale, California
Sunnyvale is a city in Santa Clara County, California, United States. It is one of the major cities that make up the Silicon Valley located in the San Francisco Bay Area...
, Maxim has design centers, manufacturing facilities, and sales offices throughout the world. In 2011 Maxim had $2.47 billion in sales, 9,300 employees, and 35,000 customers worldwide.
History
Maxim Integrated Products was founded in April 1983. Its nine initial team members had a variety of experience in semiconductors design and sales. Based on a two-page business plan, they obtained $9 million in venture capital to establish the company. In the first year, the company developed 24 second sourceSecond source
In the electronics industry, a second source is a company that is licensed to manufacture and sell components originally designed by another company ....
products. After that, Maxim designed proprietary products that offered greater differentiation and higher profits.
Maxim recorded its first profitable fiscal year in 1987, and posted a profit every year since it went public in 1988. Annual revenue reached $500 million in fiscal year 1998 and in fiscal 2011 totaled over $2.47 billion.
the company sold a wide variety of analog
Analogue electronics
Analogue electronics are electronic systems with a continuously variable signal, in contrast to digital electronics where signals usually take only two different levels. The term "analogue" describes the proportional relationship between a signal and a voltage or current that represents the signal...
and mixed-signal devices, with thousands of different products. Of about 9,300 employees, approximately 4,500 were employed in the United States.
Tunç Doluca became chief executive officer in January 2007.
Acquisitions
Maxim has said it eschewed a strategy of growth through acquisition. Nonetheless, the company has made the following acquisitions:1990: Purchased first wafer fabrication (fab) facility in Sunnyvale, California.
1994: Acquired Tektronix
Tektronix
Tektronix, Inc. is an American company best known for its test and measurement equipment such as oscilloscopes, logic analyzers, and video and mobile test protocol equipment. In November 2007, Tektronix became a subsidiary of Danaher Corporation....
Semiconductor Division in Beaverton, Oregon, giving Maxim high-speed bipolar processes for wireless RF and fiber-optic products.
1997: Purchased an additional wafer fab from IC Works in San Jose, California, to increase fab capacity.
2001: Acquired Dallas Semiconductor
Dallas Semiconductor
Dallas Semiconductor, now a subsidiary of Maxim Integrated Products, designs and manufactures analog, digital, and mixed-signal semiconductors...
in Dallas, Texas, to gain expertise in digital and mixed-signal 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...
design, as well as an additional wafer fab.
2003: Purchased submicrometre CMOS fab from Philips
Philips
Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V. , more commonly known as Philips, is a multinational Dutch electronics company....
in San Antonio, Texas, to ramp up capacity and support processes down to the 0.25-micrometre level.
2007: Purchased 0.18-micrometre fab from Atmel
Atmel
Atmel Corporation is a manufacturer of semiconductors, founded in 1984. Its focus is on system-level solutions built around flash microcontrollers...
in Irving, Texas, approximately doubling fab capacity.
2007: Acquired Vitesse Semiconductor’s Storage Products Division in Colorado Springs, Colorado, adding Serial ATA
Serial ATA
Serial ATA is a computer bus interface for connecting host bus adapters to mass storage devices such as hard disk drives and optical drives...
(SATA), Serial Attached SCSI
Serial Attached SCSI
Serial Attached SCSI is a computer bus used to move data to and from computer storage devices such as hard drives and tape drives. SAS depends on a point-to-point serial protocol that replaces the parallel SCSI bus technology that first appeared in the mid 1980s in data centers and workstations,...
(SAS), and enclosure-management products to Maxim’s product portfolio.
2008: Acquired Mobilygen in Santa Clara, California, to add H.264 video-compression technology to its portfolio.
2009: Acquired Innova Card, headquartered in La Ciotat, France, for the financial transaction terminal semiconductor market.
2009: Acquired two product lines from Zilog
Zilog
Zilog, Inc., previously known as ZiLOG , is a manufacturer of 8-bit and 24-bit microcontrollers, and is most famous for its Intel 8080-compatible Z80 series.-History:...
, Inc. Maxim purchased the Secure Transactions product line, featuring the Zatara family of single-chip solutions, and the hardware portion of Zilog's Wireless Control product line, whose Crimzon and classic IR solutions are commonly found in universal remote controls.
2010: Acquired privately held Teridian Semiconductor
Teridian Semiconductor
Teridian Semiconductor or TSC, a subsidiary of Maxim Integrated Products located in Irvine, California, designs and sells mixed-signal ICs, primarily for energy management markets.-Products:...
Corporation for approximately $315 million in cash. Teridian was a fabless semiconductor company located in Irvine, California, supplying systems on a chip
System-on-a-chip
A system on a chip or system on chip is an integrated circuit that integrates all components of a computer or other electronic system into a single chip. It may contain digital, analog, mixed-signal, and often radio-frequency functions—all on a single chip substrate...
(SoC) for the smart meter
Smart meter
A smart meter is usually an electrical meter that records consumption of electric energy in intervals of an hour or less and communicates that information at least daily back to the utility for monitoring and billing purposes. Smart meters enable two-way communication between the meter and the...
market.
2010: Maxim acquired the technology and employees of Trinity Convergence Limited, a software company based in Cambridge, U.K. Trinity was part of the ecosystem to bring Skype
Skype
Skype is a software application that allows users to make voice and video calls and chat over the Internet. Calls to other users within the Skype service are free, while calls to both traditional landline telephones and mobile phones can be made for a fee using a debit-based user account system...
video conferencing to the LCD TV market.
2010: Maxim acquired Phyworks, a supplier of optical transceiver chips for the broadband
Broadband
The term broadband refers to a telecommunications signal or device of greater bandwidth, in some sense, than another standard or usual signal or device . Different criteria for "broad" have been applied in different contexts and at different times...
communications market.
2011: Maxim acquired SensorDynamics, a semiconductor company that
develops proprietary sensor and microelectromechanical (MEMS) solutions.
Products
Maxim designs, manufactures, and sells analog, mixed-signal, high-frequency, and digital circuits. Its product portfolio includes categories serving industrial, communications, consumer, and computing markets. Maxim’s product lines include: 1-Wire1-Wire
1-Wire is a device communications bus system designed by Dallas Semiconductor Corp. that provides low-speed data, signaling, and power over a single signal. 1-Wire is similar in concept to I²C, but with lower data rates and longer range. It is typically used to communicate with small inexpensive...
and iButton devices; amplifier
Amplifier
Generally, an amplifier or simply amp, is a device for increasing the power of a signal.In popular use, the term usually describes an electronic amplifier, in which the input "signal" is usually a voltage or a current. In audio applications, amplifiers drive the loudspeakers used in PA systems to...
s and comparator
Comparator
In electronics, a comparator is a device that compares two voltages or currents and switches its output to indicate which is larger. They are commonly used in devices such as Analog-to-digital converters .- Input voltage range :...
s; analog switches and multiplexer
Multiplexer
In electronics, a multiplexer is a device that selects one of several analog or digital input signals and forwards the selected input into a single line. A multiplexer of 2n inputs has n select lines, which are used to select which input line to send to the output...
s; audio/video; automotive; clock generation and distribution; analog-to-digital converter
Analog-to-digital converter
An analog-to-digital converter is a device that converts a continuous quantity to a discrete time digital representation. An ADC may also provide an isolated measurement...
s; digital-to-analog converter
Digital-to-analog converter
In electronics, a digital-to-analog converter is a device that converts a digital code to an analog signal . An analog-to-digital converter performs the reverse operation...
s; digital potentiometer
Digital potentiometer
A digital potentiometer is a digitally controlled electronic component that mimics the analog functions of a potentiometer. It is often used for trimming and scaling analog signals by microcontrollers. It is either built using an R-2R integrated circuit or a Digital-to-analog converter...
s; analog filters; high-frequency 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...
s; hot-swap and power switching; interface and interconnect; memories (volatile, nonvolatile, multifunction); microcontroller
Microcontroller
A microcontroller is a small computer on a single integrated circuit containing a processor core, memory, and programmable input/output peripherals. Program memory in the form of NOR flash or OTP ROM is also often included on chip, as well as a typically small amount of RAM...
s; military/aerospace; optoelectronics
Optoelectronics
Optoelectronics is the study and application of electronic devices that source, detect and control light, usually considered a sub-field of photonics. In this context, light often includes invisible forms of radiation such as gamma rays, X-rays, ultraviolet and infrared, in addition to visible light...
; battery and power management
Power management
Power management is a feature of some electrical appliances, especially copiers, computers and computer peripherals such as monitors and printers, that turns off the power or switches the system to a low-power state when inactive. In computing this is known as PC power management and is built...
; powerline networking; protection and isolation; real-time clock
Real-time clock
A real-time clock is a computer clock that keeps track of the current time. Although the term often refers to the devices in personal computers, servers and embedded systems, RTCs are present in almost any electronic device which needs to keep accurate time.-Terminology:The term is used to avoid...
s; storage products; microprocessor supervisors; T/E carrier and packetized communications; thermal management; voltage reference
Voltage reference
A voltage reference is an electronic device that produces a fixed voltage irrespective of the loading on the device, power supply variations, temperature changes, and the passage of time. Voltage references are used in power supply voltage regulators, analog-to-digital converters and...
s; wireless, RF, and cable.
Starting in 1990, the company made the transition to using over 160 fabrication processes for its wafers in its own facilities.
Temporary delisting
From October 2007 to October 2008, Maxim's common stock was delisted from the Nasdaq Stock Exchange due to the company's inability to file financial statements related to stock option backdating. Maxim's stock was traded over-the-counterOver-the-counter (finance)
Within the derivatives markets, many products are traded through exchanges. An exchange has the benefit of facilitating liquidity and also mitigates all credit risk concerning the default of a member of the exchange. Products traded on the exchange must be well standardised to transparent trading....
and quoted on the Pink Sheets
Pink Sheets
OTC Markets Group, Inc., informally known as "Pink Sheets", is a private company that provides services to the U.S. over-the-counter securities market including electronic quotations, trading, messaging, and information platforms. According to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, OTC...
until the company completed its restatement in 2008. Maxim's founder and CEO, Jack Gifford
Jack Gifford (businessman)
John "Jack" F. Gifford was an American engineer and businessman best known as a founder and former CEO, President and Chairman of the Board of Maxim Integrated Products, an analog semi-conductor company, located in Sunnyvale, California...
and CFO Carl Jasper resigned due to an investigation into the issue by Maxim's board of directors.
Maxim restated its earnings in September 2008 and was relisted on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange on October 8, 2008.