Etron Technology's in-house developed KOOLDRAM products are being adopted by car vendors, a milestone for its entry into the automotive sector, according to the Taiwan-based niche-market memory IC design specialist.

Etron has enjoyed robust niche-market memory demand, while stepping up efforts to diversify its products, said company chairman Nicky Lu.

Etron has integrated controller and DRAM chips into a total solution, making ICs systematic, Lu indicated. The company's newly-developed KOOLDRAM is one of the solutions, and has attracted orders for automotive electronics applications.

Etron developed KOOLDRAM products through circuit designs, which can greatly extend the retention time of DRAM data under the definition of JEDEC standards, according to the company. The performance of DRAM can also be maintained under high termperatures of around 125-degree Celsius, Lu added.

For automotive, KGD and other high-temperature devices, Etron's KOOLDRAM solutions enable significant improvement in the overall performance, and can be applied to heterogeneous integrated packaging applications, the company disclosed.

Etron has been facilitating heterogeneous integration in its chip designs. The company previously promoted its reduced-pin-count (RPC) DRAM architecture designed mainly for integrating SoC and DRAM chips into a subsystem.

Etron's KOOLDRAM solutions will be adopted initially for automotive dashboards. The company has gained patents for the technology in multiple countries, it said.

In addition, Etron has struck a two-year supply agreement with foundry house Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (PSMC). The fabless maker expects the overall supply of niche-market memory to stay tight in 2022, with the tight supply likely to be partially relieved in the second half of next year.

By DIGITIMES