VietNamNet Bridge – Chip SG8V1 designed by ICDREC Center, an arm of the HCM City National University, has become the first product to be commercialized. An order of 150,000 chips has been placed, which would serve the electronics manufacturing and serve the learning and research at Vietnamese universities.

The project on designing and making 8-bit RISC microchip SG8V1 was implemented by ICDREC in November 2008. The project got completed in 2010, but ICDREC could not have the specimen manufactured. As such, the Vietnam designed chip has been late for two years to hit the market.

Ngo Duc Hoang, MA, Director of ICDREC, explained that foreign partners refused to manufacture the chips two years ago, because they were overloaded with too many orders.

Hoang admitted that the biggest problem here is that 150,000 products is a too small batch of goods, which leads to the high production costs. TSMC, a chip manufacturer in Taiwan, said it would take it one day to install the production line to manufacture new products. Meanwhile, the production line would run only one hour to generate 150,000 products. Therefore, they decided to refuse the tiny order.

Over the last two years, when SG8V1 still looked for manufacturers, it has been re-designed with upgraded features to improve the competitiveness.

According to Hoang, SG8V1 has experienced three or four specimen re-designing. “Now we can absolutely make products in high quantities for commercialization,” he said.

However, the scientist said that the group of engineers still wants to consult with other scientists and the community so as to make a perfect product.

On January 9, 2013, VMAC 1, the microchip application competition, the first competition of its kind, took place in HCM City. It was called a competition, but in fact, this is an open invitation for contributing ideas to design new SG8V1 chips and discover the errors of the existing SG8V1.

“We will put SG8V1 open for the community’s opinions and we welcome all ideas,” Hoang said.

The fact that a research work is opened for public opinions has been rarely seen in Vietnam. Vietnamese scientists don’t want to wash their dirty linen in public and they try to hide the problems. Therefore, the inquiring mind of the research center has been applauded by the community.

“We will welcome derogative marks, and we will rewards the reasonable remarks,” Hoang said, adding that the first prize for the competition has the value of VND15 million.

8-bit chip is believed to have low technology, but it still has been largely utilized in making household goods, including electric fans, air conditioners and washing machines.

A research work by the US Renesas showed that the market revenue of 8-bit chips would still reach $6 billion by 2015.

Another version of an 8-bit chip which has similar code as SG8V1 has been used to make the positioning device for motorbikes at Saigon Track Company, a joint venture between ICDREC and the Saigon Industry Corporation, in which the former contributes capital in technology.

Saigon Track plans to create 20,000 positioning devices in 2013, which means that 20,000 8-bit chips made in Vietnam would be used.

Tia Sang