SILICON SUMMIT
Global Semiconductor Alliance hosts event in Spa City
SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. >> The Global Semiconductor Alliance hosted its first ever Silicon Summit in the Northeast on Tuesday at the Saratoga Springs City Center.
Saratoga County Prosperity Partnership hosted the event, which brought more than 150 leading semiconductor executives and technologists to the city center’s second floor.
Marty Vanags, president of the partnership, welcomed guests from all around the country, referencing John Lennon on his birthdate. Lennon cowrote “Revolution,” which led Vanags to explain to the audience that a few short miles away the turning point of the Revolutionary War happened at Saratoga National Battlefield. Vanags explained a different kind of revolution was taking shape, and it didn’t involve guitars or muskets.
“[It’s driven] by semiconductors, Nano electronics, artificial intelligence, big data, the internet of things and advanced manufacturing,” said Vanags.
The summit’s theme was “Harnessing Emerging Semiconductor Market Opportunities.” The event featured over a dozen speakers, the first being Global Foundries’ Gary Patton as
the opening keynote.
Patton, the CTO and Senior Vice President of Worldwide Research and Development at GlobalFoundries, spoke about technology at GlobalFoundries and the importance of Tuesday’s event.
“This industry is all about Innovation and collaboration, so it’s very important for us to come together — business leaders, technology innovators — and plan the future, to figure out where we are going and what we need to focus on to ensure that the roadmap continues forward,” he said.
Patton explained how exciting the technology industry has been with so much advancement. Patton referenced how 30 years ago when the PC was introduced it weighed 16 pounds with 256 kilobytes of memory. Now laptops weigh less than two pounds with 32 gigabytes of memory.
Mark Lipacis, Managing Director of Jefferies Group LLC and a top analyst in identifying semiconductor trends and opportunities, delivered the closing keynote speech.
Additionally, technology executives from IBM, Samsung, Micron, Rambus, Synaptics, DARP and others provided insight through presentations and panel discussions at the conference.
“Collaborating with the Saratoga Partnership to host the GSA Silicon Summit – East in Saratoga Springs has been wonderful,” said Dr. Shrikant Lohokare, Executive Director and Senior Vice President, GSA in a statement. “From the presence and participation of outstanding global semiconductor executives and companies, to the leading edge technology and emerging market presentations and discussions that open up definite opportunities for further innovation and collaboration, the inaugural GSA Silicon Summit – East was very purposeful and productive. We are already looking forward to next year.”