Speakers – Semiconductors Academy

Keynote Speakers

June 12, June 16

José Franca

Instituto Superior Técnico, U. de Lisboa.

Former CEO of CHIPIDEA

PORTUGAL

Opening Speech (June 12)

José Franca graduated in Electrical Engineering from Instituto Superior Técnico (1978), received the Ph.D. from Imperial College London (1985), and completed the executive program on Management of Research and Technology-based Innovation at the Sloan School of Management, MIT (1992)...

He is Professor at Instituto Superior Técnico. In 1997 José Franca co-founded and became CEO and Chairman of Chipidea Microelectronics which pioneered and became a worldwide leader in the Semiconductor Analog Mixed-Signal IP industry until his departure in 2008 upon the acquisition by MIPS Technologies. Currently with c. 700 engineers in Portugal, the former Chipidea operation is now the largest European engineering centre of Synopsys. In 2012 José Franca was appointed by the Government of Portugal Chairman of the Board and CEO of Portugal Ventures, which he served until 2015 with the mandate to establish a modern, internationally recognized technology-based entrepreneurial ecosystem in Portugal laying out solid foundations for the attraction of international venture capital and steady worldwide inflows of talent and experience.

Boris Glass

Microelectronics Engineer,
European Space Agency

The Netherlands

Ultra-Deep Submicron Technologies for European Space Sovereignty: Advancing Next-Generation Processors and System Integration (June 12)

Boris Glass is a physicist and microelectronic engineer working at the European Space Agency. He specializes in space-grade semiconductor technologies, focusing on Ultra-Deep Submicron (UDSM) processes, mixed-signal radiation-hardened electronics, and the development of radiation-hardened standard cells and platforms for space applications…

He plays an active role in advancing European sovereignty in space electronics through technology development programs and strategic collaborations. His work supports the next generation of high-performance and reliable microelectronics for future space missions.

Dymitro Cherniak

CTO at INFINEON TECHNOLOGIES

Austria

Circuits and Techniques for Next Generation Wireless (June 12)

Dr. Cherniak received B.S. and M.S. degrees in electronic engineering from the National Technical University of Ukraine, Kyiv, in 2008 and 2010, respectively, and a Ph.D. degree in electronic engineering from the Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy, in 2019...

He was with Intel Corporation from 2010 to 2011, and since 2011, he has been with Infineon Technologies, where he is currently the CTO of a central engineering wireless department. His research interests include digitally assisted analog, frequency synthesis, adaptive filtering, and stochastic processes. Dr. Cherniak was a recipient of the Dimitris N. Chorafas Award for the Best Ph.D. Thesis in 2019.

Ricardo Reis

Executive Director at SYNOPSYS

Portugal

Challenges of Advanced Circuit design of Giga Bit SerDes (Serializer De-Serializer) PHYs (June 12)

Graduated in IST in 1994, started in Microelectronics Design in an IST collaboration with Nokia on final thesis and continued as a founder of Chipidea (Portuguese company lead of Microelectronics IP design), leading Analog Mix Signal developments of IP such as Sigma-Deltas, RF design, and ADC-DAC based Analog front ends…

Chipidea has been acquired by MIPS and then by Synopsys, in 2009. Currently Leading the Analog Mix signal Design of SerDes PHYs IP (up to 64GBPs) in Synopsys. Managing a team of 350 engineers contributing to a Revenue of ~$200-Million.

Mirjana Banjevic

SENSIRION

Switzerland

Inside of the World of IC Design for Sensor Applications (June 12)

Mirjana Banjevic received M.Sc. Degree in Electronics from the School of Engineering, Montenegro, 2006, and PhD Degree in Microelectronics and Microsystems from Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, EPFL, in 2011 in the field of the integrated magnetic sensors based on Hall devices…

From 2012 till 2023 she has been with Sensirion AG, Zürich, R&D department, working on the new sensors systems in the gas, flow and optical sensors as the technical lead and chip owner. From 2023 to date she has been the Analog Team Leader. Her research and development interests are semiconductor physics, low noise and low power sensor interface electronics, analog building blocks, power management units, AMS verification, etc. She has been a member of the ESSDERC Technical Programme Committee 2012-2022, ESSDERC Steering Committee 2022- to date, ESSDERC track chair from 2015-2024, served in the IEDM Technical Programme Committee 2015-2016, and as ISCAS 2017 reviewer. She is currently TCAS-I Associate Editor.

Soumyajit Mandal

Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL), New York

USA

Extreme-Environment ASIC Design for Scientific Instruments (June 16)

Soumyajit Mandal received the B.Tech. degree from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur, India, in 2002, and the Ph.D. and S.M. degrees in electrical engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA, USA, in 2004 and 2009, respectively…

He was a Research Scientist with Schlumberger-Doll Research, Cambridge, MA, USA (2010–2014); an Assistant Professor with the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, USA (2014–2019); and an Associate Professor with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA (2019–2021). He is currently a member of the Research Staff with the Instrumentation Department, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY, USA, where he leads the Extreme Environments Research Group.