Xilinx

Xilinx, Inc. () is a supplier of programmable logic devices. It is known for inventing the field programmable gate array (FPGA) and as the first semiconductor company with a fabless manufacturing model.

Founded in Silicon Valley in 1984, the company is headquartered in San Jose, California, U.S.A.; Dublin, Ireland; Singapore; and Tokyo, Japan. The company has corporate offices throughout North America, Asia and Europe.

History

Early days

Xilinx was founded in 1984 by two semiconductor engineers, Ross Freeman and Bernard Vonderschmitt, who were both working for integrated circuit and solid-state device manufacturer Zilog Corp.

While working for Zilog, Freeman wanted to create chips that acted like a blank tape, allowing users to program the technology themselves. At the time, the concept was paradigm-changing. "The concept required lots of transistors and, at that time, transistors were considered extremely precious – people thought that Ross's idea was pretty...
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