In the meeting hall of the YSU Academic Council, Joachim Kunkel, a leader at Synopsys, delivered a presentation titled "The Changing Semiconductor Industry Landscape".
Strengthening the enterprise-university connection has always been a strategic priority for the Information Technologies Educational and Research Center (IT ERC) to enhance the quality of education. To achieve this, the IT ERC regularly invites specialists from leading companies in the IT sector to share their experiences, providing students with insights into successful career journeys and examples of how to embrace and overcome challenges. Kunkel's presentation was particularly effective in this regard.
Joachim Kunkel served for a long time as the General Manager of the Intellectual Property (IP) business unit at Synopsys, where he significantly increased IP revenue to 2 billion US dollars, positioning Synopsys as the second-largest semiconductor IP company in the world. With nearly three decades of experience at Synopsys, J. Kunkel has acquired a wealth of knowledge and leadership expertise.
Before joining Synopsys, J. Kunkel co-founded CADIS GmbH in Aachen, Germany, where he served as CEO and handled various responsibilities in engineering, sales, and marketing. Prior to co-founding CADIS, he was a research assistant at Aachen University of Technology, focusing on system-level simulation techniques for digital signal processing, with a special emphasis on parallel computing.
Joachim Kunkel holds a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering (M.S.E.E.) and a Diploma in Communication Technology (Dipl.-Ing. der Nachrichtentechnik) from Aachen University of Technology.
During the presentation, the speaker addressed various aspects of the global semiconductor market, including market segmentation by country, market challenges, features of the semiconductor industry, and the main development directions. He also discussed a recently adopted legal document by the US government aimed at increasing the US's share of the global semiconductor market to 13-14% by 2030. American IT companies have made substantial financial investments to support the implementation of this initiative. The topic was both comprehensive and educational.
Among the attendees were prominent specialists in microelectronics Yervant Zorian, Doctor of Sciences, Professor, Founder-President of the Armenian Virtual University, President of Synopsys Armenia, President of the AGBU’s Silicon Valley branch, and a foreign member of the RA National Academy of Sciences, and Samvel Shoukourian, Doctor of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Academician of the RA National Academy of Sciences, YSU Professor Emeritus, and Scientific Leader of the YSU IT Educational and Research Center.
Additionally, students and lecturers from Yerevan State University, the American University of Armenia, and the Educational Department of Synopsys Armenia participated in the event, listening to the lecture with great interest.
The presentation was organized through the initiative of the IEEE CS Armenia chapter and the YSU IT Educational and Research Center.
