SiTime Corporation is a publicly traded

fabless Fabless manufacturing is the design and sale of hardware devices and semiconductor chips while outsourcing their fabrication (or ''fab'') to a specialized manufacturer called a semiconductor foundry. These foundries are typically, but not exclu ...

chipmaker based in

Santa Clara, California Santa Clara (; Spanish for " Saint Clare") is a city in Santa Clara County, California. The city's population was 127,647 at the 2020 census, making it the eighth-most populous city in the Bay Area. Located in the southern Bay Area, the cit ...

that develops micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS), used for timing devices in electronics.

History

SiTime was founded in Santa Clara, California in 2005 by researchers Marcus Lutz and Aaron Partridge. In 2014, the company was acquired for $200 million by Japanese fabless semiconductor company MegaChips. In 2016, the company launched its Elite platform of Super-TCXOs (temperature compensated

crystal oscillator A crystal oscillator is an electronic oscillator circuit that uses a piezoelectric crystal as a frequency-selective element. The oscillator frequency is often used to keep track of time, as in quartz wristwatches, to provide a stable clock ...

s). In November, the company announced its Emerald line of MEMS timers designed for 5G equipment. In November 2019, SiTime was spun off and went public. MegaChips is a shareholder that owns 25%. In August 2020, the company announced its Cascade family of

system on a chip A system on a chip or system-on-chip (SoC ; pl. ''SoCs'' ) is an integrated circuit that integrates most or all components of a computer or other electronic system. These components almost always include a central processing unit (CPU), memor ...

(SoC), its first clock chip product. In October, the company introduced ApexMEMS

resonator A resonator is a device or system that exhibits resonance or resonant behavior. That is, it naturally oscillates with greater amplitude at some frequencies, called resonant frequencies, than at other frequencies. The oscillations in a reson ...

s, designed for high volume, space constrained applications. In January 2021, based on SiTime's 2020 stock gain, ''

Investors Business Daily ''Investor's Business Daily'' (''IBD'') is an American newspaper and website covering the stock market, international business, finance and economics. Founded in 1984 by William O'Neil as a print news publication, it is owned by News Corp and is ...

'' included the company on its list of the 100 best stocks of 2020. In January 2022, CEO Vashist credited its relationship with its

foundry A foundry is a factory that produces metal castings. Metals are cast into shapes by melting them into a liquid, pouring the metal into a mold, and removing the mold material after the metal has solidified as it cools. The most common metals ...

partners and the small size of its chips for helping it avoid the chip shortages faced by other chip companies at the time, due to 2021–22 supply chain issues. In February, the company introduced its XCalibur line of active resonators. In July 2023, SiTime released the SiT5543, part of its Endura family of MEMS ruggedized Super-TCXOs and in September the Epoch Platform MEMS OCXOs, the holdover oscillator to deliver this accuracy in real world environments.

Products

SiTime manufacturers silicon-based MEMS timing devices, used as an alternative to quartz timers in precision timing applications such as controlling the timing of electronic systems, managing electronic transfer of data, setting radio frequencies or measuring time. It provides MEMS resonators, oscillators and clocks. The company's XCalibur line of MEMs-based active resonators are designed to replace quartz resonators. The company's Elite Platform of Super-TCXOs (temperature compensated crystal oscillators) includes the Elite and Elite X. The devices are designed for harsh environments, such as with extreme temperatures, thermal shock and vibration. The company's Cascade family is a MEMS clock system-on-chip (SoC), with an integrated MEMS resonator, oscillator and clock integrated circuit (IC). The company also develops MEMs oscillators by integrating MEMS resonators with oscillator circuits and a

phase-locked loop A phase-locked loop or phase lock loop (PLL) is a control system that generates an output signal whose phase is related to the phase of an input signal. There are several different types; the simplest is an electronic circuit consisting of a ...

. The company's Emerald platform is an oven-controlled crystal oscillator (

OCXO A crystal oven is a temperature-controlled chamber used to maintain the quartz crystal in electronic crystal oscillators at a constant temperature, in order to prevent changes in the frequency due to variations in ambient temperature. An oscilla ...

), which includes an on-chip heater, for extreme temperature environments. The platform is designed for 5G networks and edge computing, where the equipment sits closer to customers, and must maintain precise timing in the face of environmental stressors such as airflow, temperature perturbation, vibration, shock, and

electromagnetic interference Electromagnetic interference (EMI), also called radio-frequency interference (RFI) when in the radio frequency spectrum, is a disturbance generated by an external source that affects an electrical circuit by electromagnetic induction, electrost ...

(EMI). In July 2023, SiTime released the SiT5543, part of its Endura family of MEMS ruggedized Super-TCXOs and in September the Epoch Platform that delivers a stable clock to datacenter and network infrastructure equipment..

Applications

SiTime products and services focus on three main market segments—automotive, aerospace and defense and enterprise.

Operations

SiTime is headquartered in Santa Clara, California. In its 2021 annual report, the company reported 279 full time employees in the

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, the

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Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northe ...

, Japan and

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. It also reported its top customers as Apple, Fitbit, Garmin, Samsung, Google, Microsoft, Dell, HiKVision and Huami. The company has three customer segments: The Mobile, IoT and Consumer segment develops high-volume, lower-cost devices for products like smartphones and fitness trackers. The Communications and Enterprise segment develops products for networking, telecom and data center products. Its Industrial, Automotive and Aerospace segment includes chips for electric vehicles, satellites and missiles. German industrial company

Robert Bosch Robert Bosch (23 September 1861 – 12 March 1942) was a German industrialist, engineer and inventor, founder of Robert Bosch GmbH. Biography Bosch was born in Albeck, a village to the northeast of Ulm in southern Germany as the eleventh of ...

and Taiwanese semiconductor company

TSMC Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (TSMC; also called Taiwan Semiconductor) is a Taiwanese multinational semiconductor contract manufacturing and design company. It is the world's most valuable semiconductor company, the world' ...

are the company's foundry partners.

References

External links