Lattice Semiconductor made clear in 2011 that it wanted to excel in the mid-range sector of the FPGA market.  It launched the ECP4 family (still considered mid-range) in the fourth quarter of 2011, and acquired startup Silicon Blue Technology soon after (http://www.fpgagurus.edn.com/blog/fpga-gurus-blog/lattice-picks-siliconblue-62-million).

This month, Lattice made clear that the existing ECP3 family is far from being a sunset product.  The company simultaneously launched versions of the ECP3 optimized for low power, higher speed, and ultra-tiny packages – the latter in a 10-mm-square BGA package (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/three-new-devices-extend-the-power-efficiency-package-size-and-performance-of-the-popular-latticeecp3tm-fpga-family-2012-01-24?reflink=MW_news_stmp).

The tiny FPGAs don’t sacrifice much, by the way, since they include 3-Gbit Serdes modules and a DDR3 memory interface.  Given the tight real estate constraints in many new designs, the miniature FPGA may be the one with the fastest ramp in design wins.  Nevertheless, we don’t want to neglect the other two families. The Low Power derivatives are offered in three speed grades (-6L, -7L, -8L), and use re-designed logic blocks to offer 40 percent reduction in static power, which translates to 30 percent reduction in overall power dissipation. These also include the Serdes and DDR3 interface in the small FPGAs.

The high-speed ECP3s represent a new grade, called the -9 family, which is 10 percent faster than the previous fastest ECP3, the -8 device.  This new speed grade is offered in four different FPGA devices, corresponding to 35K, 70K, 95K and 150K lookup tables.

Considered comprehensively alongside the products picked up from SiliconBlue, Lattice’s product portfolio proves the company is serious about dominating the midrange.  You don’t have to have the biggest FPGAs on the block to walk away with plenty of design wins.