ST Exec Joins Board of Network-on-Chip Start-up

Online staff -- Electronic News, 12/21/2004

Paris-based network-on-chip (NoC) IP start-up Arteris SA today announced that Philippe Geyres, corporate VP and general manager of the consumer and microcontroller groups at STMicroelectronics, has joined its board of directors.

Arteris announced its intent to solve complex SoC challenges earlier this year by detailing its plans for improving performance and system-level integration. The company’s NoC approach advances current design techniques that rely on bus-based technologies, and is meant to allow designers to build a true NoC to connect the variety of subcomponents and IP blocks on a SoC.

“Arteris is addressing a challenge that is one of the fundamental limitations to realizing the full potential of system on chip architectures. Their approach is both a natural progression over bus-based techniques but also a major enhancement over current ways to design a highly integrated SoC,” Geyres said in a statement.

The company also said it is completing initial product development and beginning commercial relationships.

“Having someone of Philippe’s caliber and background on our team is a coup for Arteris. He brings a new perspective and dimension to our board and advisory teams. His understanding of both the business and technology dynamics of complex SoC design will be invaluable as we prepare to bring our first products to market,” said Alain Fanet, president and CEO of Arteris, in a statement.

“We are looking forward to leveraging Philippe’s knowledge in developing our strategies for this exciting emerging market opportunity,” Fanet added.

Geyres began his career in 1973 with IBM at Corbeil-Essonnes, near Paris, before joining the Schlumberger Group in 1980, working first in its petroleum equipment operations and then at Fairchild Semiconductors, which was owned by Schlumberger at the time.

In October 1983, Geyres was appointed director of Thomson Semiconductor’s bipolar IC division. Following the merger in June 1987 of Thomson and SGS Microelettronica, he was nominated corporate VP of strategic planning of SGS-Thomson Microelectronics, the company that changed its name to STMicroelectronics in May 1998.

In 1990, he became general manager of the company’s programmable products group. Following reorganization in 1998, this group became known as the consumer and microcontroller groups (CMG) and includes differentiated products for digital consumer, cameras, TV and monitors as well as microcontrollers. Most recently, Geyres played a key role in establishing ST’s design and application centers in Rabat, Morocco, and Tunis, Tunisia, to develop advanced SoC products for digital consumer.

Geyres graduated from the Ecole Polytechnique of Paris in 1973. He is a member of ISTAG, the Advisory Group to the European Commission on Information Society.