Inventor Dean Kamen, regarded by Forbes magazine as the “Modern-day Edison,” and creator of the Segway and hundreds of other innovations, will share the stage with other keynote speakers from industry powerhouses including AMD, Applied Materials, IBM, and Synopsys at the 49th SEMICON West, July 9-11, 2019, at the Moscone Center in San Francisco.
 
Back by popular demand, the AI Design Forum returns on July 9 for its second year at SEMICON West. SEMI Americas, the Electronic System Design Alliance and Applied Materials are partnering to stage the event with speakers representing the entire computing ecosystem. The AI era is widely expected to become the largest of any in industry history, and the speakers will present new approaches for the future of computing – from materials to systems.
 
The AI Design Forum keynote lineup includes:

• Dr. Lisa Su, president and CEO of Advanced Micro Devices (AMD). Named last year by Fortune magazine as one of the “World’s 50 Greatest Leaders,” Su will describe a growing consensus that 2019 promises a historic inflection point for high-performance computing, enabled by new design approaches that go beyond node shrinking;
• Dr. Aart de Geus, co-founder, chairman and co-CEO of Synopsys, a leading expert on logic synthesis and software simulation, will address how the industry can benefit from co-optimization – from silicon to software – to fulfill the promise of AI;
• Gary Dickerson, president and CEO of Applied Materials, has been recognized by Barron’s as one of the World’s Best CEOs.       

SEMICON West keynotes on Wednesday, July 10 include:

• Dr. Jeff Welser, VP and lab director at IBM Research - Almaden, will lay out the Future of Computing, including the growth of the quantum computing ecosystem, and where microelectronics will find its greatest challenges and opportunities;    
• Bob Pearson, senior advisor for the W2O Group, author of four books about the role of technology for social commerce, will present From AI to Uh-Oh – Major Media Trends Shaping our Future
• Kamen, founder of DEKA Research and Development. His most recent enterprises include Kamen’s Advanced Regenerative Manufacturing Institute to biofabricate human organs.    

 “Innovation is so hard and so frustrating, it takes the intersections of people with courage, vision and resources,’” said Dave Anderson, president of SEMI Americas, quoting SEMICON West keynote speaker Kamen. “There’s no other community like SEMI for advancing the AI era, and the elite keynoters at SEMICON West promise to help the industry accelerate better business results with emerging technologies and applications.”