Celebrating Nearly 50 years - 2000's

Corporate Highlights

• National completed the sale of the assets of the Cyrix stand-alone microprocessor business to VIA Technologies, Inc., but retained the integrated MediaGX microprocessor as the core of its Geode family.
• National and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation (TSMC) announced an agreement that gives National the use of TSMC's advanced manufacturing process to produce chips at the company’s plant in South Portland, Maine.

Product Highlights

• In May, 2000 National introduced the industry's first complete low-power Gigabit Ethernet solution that supports networking speeds of 10, 100, and 1000 megabits per second. The new single-chip solution is compatible with existing and future networks.

Corporate Highlights

• National and IBM announced new technologies for joint development of home gateways, which enable pervasive Internet access throughout the home, as well as remote management of functions such as lighting, security, utilities, entertainment and climate control systems.
• National announced an agreement to acquire Wireless Solutions Sweden AB.
• The company also announced its acquisition of InnoCOMM Wireless, a leading developer of chipsets for wireless networking.
• National announced it acquired the operations of Vivid Semiconductor, a flat-panel display design company.

Product Highlights

• National announced its complete Bluetooth® solution designed to enable wireless communications between consumer devices such as PCs, cell phones and peripherals.

Corporate Highlights

• In March 2002, National announced it had created reference designs for smart display devices that support Microsoft's Windows® Powered Smart Displays-a set of Windows software technologies aimed at extending Windows XP through the home.

Product Highlights

• National introduced a GSM chipset that integrates a complete mobile phone solution into four tiny silicon chips.
• The company announced three new LMH amplifier products for the high-speed analog market based on National's industry-leading VIP10 manufacturing process.
• During the year, the company entered the Gigabit Ethernet™ switch market by unveiling the industry's fastest and most cost-effective 16-port switch for local area networks. In other developments, National added seven new imaging sensors to its CMOS imaging portfolio and introduced a new family of column drivers for flat-panel displays.

Corporate Highlights

• National and the UK-based ARM Ltd. announced a strategic business relationship to jointly develop and market power-efficient systems based on the ARM embedded processor. New systems using National's PowerWise™ technologies are expected to increase the battery life of handheld portable devices in several phases from 25 percent up to 400 percent.

Product Highlights

• National introduced the LM5000 family, the first fully integrated switching regulator circuits that operate from 10 to 100 volts for high voltage power conversion applications. This high-voltage product capability is critical in base stations, servers, cars, and other systems that have demanding power needs.
• National launched complete analog power management and lighting solutions for handheld devices. These innovative, mixed-signal power and lighting management circuits are designed for cell phones and other portable devices such as personal digital assistants (PDAs).
• National introduced a revolutionary "amplifier in a microphone" technology that expands our market opportunities to provide world-class sound systems for microphones, headsets, telephone handsets, and other portable applications. This new technology enables us to provide customers with a complete audio integration platform inside a microphone that provides crystal-clear sound and replaces older JFET amplifier technologies.
• Working with Microsoft, National created a custom multi-chip solution for Microsoft's new Smart Personal Objects Technology (SPOT) initiative. National's reference platform solution uses power management and amplifier chips and also includes a custom baseband processor with digital signal processing (DSP) accelerators built on an industry-standard ARM7 core and a custom-designed radio chip. Thanks to National's ultra-small chip packaging, the entire solution fits handily into a wristwatch.

Corporate Highlights

• National's Board of Directors approved a buy back of up to $400 million of National's common stock, and a 2-for-1 stock split in the form of a 100% stock dividend to shareholders of record on April 29, 2004.
• National opened its first Korean design center. The Seoul center develops power management circuits and subsystems for portable applications, flat-panel displays and LCD TVs.
• National sets single-year patent record, receiving 221 US patents in 2004, the most it has received in a single year since its founding in 1959.
• National opened its first manufacturing plant in China, an assembly and test facility in Suzhou Industrial Park, near Shanghai. The plant tests and assembles products for mobile phones, displays, large screen LCD-TVs, automobiles, notebooks and PCs.

Product Highlights

• National offers lead-free packages for all IC products, enabling more environmentally neutral electronic components.
• National introduces the world’s thinnest integrated circuit (IC) packages. The same thickness as four sheets of paper, new micro SMD (Surface-Mount Device) and LLP® (Leadless Leadframe Packages) enable smaller, thinner and lighter cell phones, displays, MP3 players, PDAs and other devices.
• National's launches its new ADCO8D1000 dual high-performance analog-to-digital converter. This  revolutionary ADCsaves power and provides gigahertz speeds necessary for reliable measurements of high-frequency signals in oscilloscopes, set-top boxes and communications systems.
• National announced the LM5070, the first single-chip to feature the high performance and tiny package footprint that dramatically simplify the design of systems that use Power over Ethernet (PoE).
• National's new (LMP™) family of high-precision, high-performance amplifiers to herald its entry into the burgeoning precision market.  The first parts are the LMP2011, LMP2012 and LMP2014, are for broad-based applications in industrial, medical and automotive electronics.

Corporate Highlights

• National announced plants to close its assembly and test plant in Toa Payoh, Singapore to maximize resources and support for the company’s analog businesses.
• National sold its PC Super I/O business to Winbond Electronics Corporation, based in Hsinchu Science Park, Taiwan.
• National announced a $1 million initiative, "Science in Action," to help improve hands-on science instruction in classrooms.
• National named Chief Operating Officer Donald Macleod to the new position of President and COO. Macleod served as National's executive vice president, COO and general manager since 2001.

Product Highlights

• In a breakthrough for thermal management accuracy, National announced TruTherm™ thermal management technology. It uses a new measuring technique to provide pinpoint-accurate temperature measurement for chips with integrated thermal diodes.
• National introduced a new family of 36 analog-to-digital converters with guaranteed performance across speeds from 50 KSPS to 1 MSPS. These pin- and function-compatible ADCs allow easy migration across resolutions and speeds, minimizing engineering costs and development time.
• National introduced two new high-speed amplifier products that break the gigahertz speed barrier. Based on National’s high-speed VIP10 manufacturing process, the 1.2 GHz amplifier and programmable gain buffer enable improved performance in video, test and measurement, and other industrial applications.

Corporate Highlights

• National's continued investment in new, value-added analog products resulted in the highest gross margin (61.4 percent) in company history. In FY06, National's return on invested capital (ROIC) was above 20 percent for the third straight year.
• Building upon decades of packaging innovation, National launched a new generation of ultra-miniature, high pin-count integrated circuit packages, Micro SMDxt (micro Surface Mount Device extended technology). These tiny packages have a very small footprint and thin profile.
• National equipped all 8,500 employees worldwide with 30-gigabyte video iPods. The popular Apple MP3 players will be used as a new training and communications tool.
• Electronics Weekly presented National with the "Investing in People" Award acknowledging the company's effective engineering development program.

Product Highlights

• National announced two, single-chip Power over Ethernet (POE) device controllers.  These represent the industry's first single-chip POE controllers --one for low-power applications and one for higher-power POE applications.
• Built on its proprietary VIP50 BiCMOS process technology, National launched nine new precision and low-voltage amplifiers that dramatically improve accuracy and power efficiency in numerous electronic systems.
• National introduced an advanced serializer/deserializer (SerDes) for next-generation base station architectures. This new CPRI® (common public radio interface) SerDes is the world's first to guarantee plus or minus 800 ps delay calibration accuracy and exceed all CPRI signal voltage and jitter requirements.
• National launched a family of 8-bit ultra high-speed analog-to-digital converters (ADCs) that set a new performance standard for sampling speed, delivering 6 giga-sample per second (GSPS) data capture at 3.6 watts.  In addition, the company demonstrated a new family of precision clock conditioners that accurately clock National's advanced ADCs. These clock conditioners integrate all functions required to clean and distribute ultra-low-noise clock signals throughout a system.

Corporate Highlights

• Through its focus on high-value analog products, National enabled electronic systems to have greater energy efficiency, vibrant graphics/displays and high-fidelity sound. Analog comprised 90 percent of the company's sales.
• National launched its PowerWise® brand to reflect the company's energy-efficient product portfolio. These products with outstanding performance-to-power ratios help design engineers identify optimal solutions for energy-efficient systems.
• National was named as "one of the Top 10 best corporate citizens" by Corporate Responsibility Officer Magazine (CRO), the second most innovative technology organization in the U.S. by InfoWeek and "One of the Top 20 Corporate Philanthropists" by the Silicon Valley Business Journal.
• Its Board of Directors authorized $2.0 billion to repurchase stock.
• In 2007, nearly 215,000 designs were created using National's online tools. It added a performance enhancement to its WEBENCH® online design environment enabling power supply designers to easily "dial-in" their size and efficiency requirements while also realizing fast time to market. It also introduced LED WEBENCH to help engineers select from and design with more than 200 high-brightness LEDs in minutes.

Product Highlights

• Two LED drivers from National's PowerWise family of energy-efficient products power 1W to 5W, high-brightness LEDs found in industrial and automotive applications as well as general illumination applications. Each offers a wide input voltage range and provides a constant current to regulate the LED brightness and low feedback voltage to minimize power dissipation.
• A new member of National's Mobile Pixel Link (MPL) family, the LM2512, is a high-speed serial host device that supports a video mode interface bridge between the processor and the display in multimedia mobile handsets. MPL products stream large quantities of data to the display while maximizing battery life.
• National introduced a high-performance Low Temperature Polycrystalline Silicon (LTPS) display driver, the narrowest glass-mounted device available for half-VGA format. Just 0.9 mm wide, it lets manufacturers maximize the active area of the display glass on handheld multimedia devices.
• Three energy-efficient, high-speed differential amplifiers from National's PowerWise family of products combine with National's ADCs, clock conditioners and power management ICs as part of an analog signal-path solution to help system designers jump start development and accelerate their designs.
• National launched a programmable quad equalizer that extends the reach of high-speed serial buses up to 10 Gbps data transmission rates, while consuming only 94 mW per channel.

Corporate Highlights

• Chairman of the Board and CEO, Brian Halla introduced key "megatrends" that will drive chip industry growth, including renewable energy (solar), fully featured personal mobile devices, portable medical equipment for home diagnosis as well as enhanced security and surveillance devices.
• National announced SolarMagic™ technology to maximize solar panel energy production. SolarMagic technology extracts significantly more energy is various lighting conditions and recoups up to 50 percent of energy lost due to real-world condition such as shade and debris.
• National donated $1.2 million in Power of Education grants to encourage math and science learning in K-12 classrooms in Silicon Valley, Calif., Tarrant County, Texas, and Maine. Through its Community Care Giving Program, U.S. employees donated over $1 million to numerous non-profit organizations, universities, and schools.
• InformationWeek named National the most innovative technology organization in the U.S., topping a list of 500 organizations.

Product Highlights

• Adding to the PowerWise® product family, National introduced the industry's first high-speed, continuous-time sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter. The ADC12EU050 consumes 25 percent less power than competitive pipeline devices and was a finalist in EDN Magazine's "Innovation Awards" for 2008.
• National introduced WEBENCH® Sensor Designer, the industry's first online tool for developing sensor signal path solutions for medical, industrial and high-end consumer products. The design tool, which was named Electronic Products Magazine's "Product of the Year," allows engineers to move from concept to simulation to prototype in a few keystrokes.
• National's PowerWise® LMV1088 dual-input microphone array amplifier was named a finalist in EDN Magazine's "Innovation Awards" for 2008. It reduces background noise and delivers higher quality sound in mobile phones, two-way radios and powered headsets.
• New SIMPLE SWITCHER® regulators and controllers were added to National's Design-Made-Easy® family of products. The 11 new step-down switching regulators are well-suited for a wide variety of applications including automotive, industrial and communication. The four SIMPLE SWITCHER® controllers are easy-to-use components to design an efficient, medium-current, step-down power controller.
• During the 2008 Convergence Conference National showcased energy-efficient analog products that enable emerging applications in LED lighting, powertrain, safety, and infotainment systems.
• National introduced the industry's first high-current LED driver that enables dual LED operation for a cameras flash function in portable multimedia devices. The LM3553 is a member of National's PowerWise® energy-efficient product family.