IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine - March/April 2020 - 69

designs in January 2019. Based upon this workshop, the OCP foundation created an ODSA subproject. This group is defining an open interface
and architecture that will allow the mixing and
matching of silicon die from different suppliers
onto a single SoC. These SoCs are targeted for
data center applications.
The ODSA consortium believes that their
multidie system in package approach will
replace current SoC architectures. If so, this
would result in a 40% lower overall cost. Among
the options considered, the best approach in
terms of performance, cost, and energy efficiency appears to be in connection through the
package substrate. Other options include using
a silicon interposer and an embedded multidie
interconnect bridge.
Having an open interface is an important
key for an Open MCM design. This interface
should include a switch fabric interconnect
used to connect the Logic Blocks inside the
MCM. Figure 2 shows how this is done. In that
figure, it shows a near field polymer waveguide and a communications layer protocol,
similar to the OSI networking model.3 The substrate for the MCM is either a lower connection density organic package (like that used in
a PCB) or else a higher connection density silicon interposer.
As a result of an open standard for onmodule communication, this technology can
be used to create not only disaggregated processors, like those planned by Intel and AMD,

March/April 2020

but also embedded accelerators that can fit
into many products.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This article is based on an online column 2
from the same author.

& REFERENCES
1. T. Coughlin, "A road map for technologies that drive
consumer storage," IEEE Consum. Electron. Mag.,
vol. 8, no. 2, pp. 97-99, Mar. 2019.
2. T. Coughlin, "Memory dominates semiconductors,
driving packaging," Jul. 19, 2019. [Online]. Available:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomcoughlin/2019/07/
21/memory-dominates-semiconductors-drivingpackaging/#8c48bc76bc25Forbes.com
3. T. Coughlin, "Chiplets for all," May 11, 2019. [Online].
Available: https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomcoughlin/
2019/05/11/chiplets-for-all/#2145fbab5e13

Tom Coughlin is the president of Coughlin Associates. He is a digital storage analyst and business
and technology consultant. He has more than 37
years in the data storage industry with engineering
and management positions at several companies.
Coughlin Associates consults, publishes books and
market and technology reports, and puts on digital
storage-oriented events. He is a regular storage and
memory contributor for forbes.com and M&E organization websites. He is an IEEE Fellow, the President
of IEEE-USA, and is active with SNIA and SMPTE.
For more information, visit www.tomcoughlin.com.
Contact him at tom@tomcoughlin.com.

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https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomcoughlin/2019/07/21/memory-dominates-semiconductors-driving-packaging/#8c48bc76bc25Forbes.com https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomcoughlin/2019/07/21/memory-dominates-semiconductors-driving-packaging/#8c48bc76bc25Forbes.com https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomcoughlin/2019/07/21/memory-dominates-semiconductors-driving-packaging/#8c48bc76bc25Forbes.com https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomcoughlin/2019/05/11/chiplets-for-all/#2145fbab5e13 https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomcoughlin/2019/05/11/chiplets-for-all/#2145fbab5e13 http://www.forbes.com http://www.tomcoughlin.com

IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine - March/April 2020

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