MOSIS

{{Short description|Semiconductor manufacturer}}

{{distinguish|Moses}}

MOSIS (Metal Oxide Semiconductor Implementation Service) is multi-project wafer service that provides metal–oxide–semiconductor (MOS) chip design tools and related services that enable universities, government agencies, research institutes and businesses to prototype chips efficiently and cost-effectively.

Operated by the University of Southern California's Information Sciences Institute (ISI), MOSIS combines customers' orders onto shared multi-project wafers that speed production and reduce costs compared with underutilized single-project wafers. Customers are able to debug and adjust designs, or to commission small-volume runs, without making major production investments. Fabrication costs are also shared by combining multiple designs from a single customer onto one "mask set," or wafer template. According to MOSIS, the service has delivered more than 60,000 integrated circuit designs.{{Cite web|url=https://www.mosis.com/what-is-mosis|title = MOSIS}}

Funded by DARPA,{{Cite web |title=The MOSIS Service of ISI and SkyWater Collaborate on Silicon IC Design Enablement and Manufacturing Service |url=https://viterbischool.usc.edu/news/2022/11/the-mosis-service-of-the-usc-information-sciences-institute-and-skywater-collaborate-on-silicon-ic-design-enablement-and-manufacturing-service/ |access-date=2024-05-30 |website=USC Viterbi {{!}} School of Engineering |language=en-US}} MOSIS was created in 1981 by ISI's Danny Cohen, an Internet pioneer who also developed Voice over Internet Protocol and Video over Internet Protocol.{{Cite magazine|url=https://www.wired.com/2012/11/he-engineered-the-internet-to-take-flight/|title=Danny Cohen Engineered the Internet to Take Flight|magazine=Wired}} It was based on the revolutionary VLSI design methodology of Carver Mead and Lynn Conway, who pioneered and/or popularized the use of technology-independent design rules and modular cell-based, hierarchical system design, testing this new approach to rapid prototyping and short-run fabrication at Xerox PARC.{{cite web|title=Lynn's Story|url=http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/LynnsStory.html|accessdate=2018-03-10}} One of the first e-commerce providers, MOSIS also launched the "fabless foundry" industry, in which vendors outsource chip fabrication rather than manufacturing them in-house.{{cite web |url=http://www.isi.edu/about/history/timeline/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131126032923/http://www.isi.edu/about/history/timeline/ |archive-date=2013-11-26 |title=Information Sciences Institute - Timeline}} Thousands of students also have learned chip design in MOSIS-associate programs.{{cite web |url=http://viterbi.usc.edu/news/publications/uscengineer/2005_fall/mosis_turns_25.htm/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060901114938/http://viterbi.usc.edu/news/publications/uscengineer/2005_fall/mosis_turns_25.htm |archive-date=2006-09-01 |title=USC Viterbi School of Engineering : MOSIS Turns 25}}

Many early MOSIS users were students trying IC layout techniques from the seminal book Introduction to VLSI Design ({{ISBN|0-201-04358-0}}) published in 1980 by Caltech professor Carver Mead{{cite web|title=Winners' Circle: Carver Mead |date= |accessdate=2005-04-28 |url=http://web.mit.edu/invent/a-winners/a-mead.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140305150838/http://web.mit.edu/invent/a-winners/a-mead.html |archive-date=2014-03-05}} and MIT professor Lynn Conway.{{cite web|title=M.I.T. VLSI Systems Design Class|accessdate=2018-03-10|url=http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/VLSI/MIT78/MIT78.html}}{{cite web|title=IEEE History Center - Lynn Conway |date=2003-01-02 |accessdate=2004-05-18 |url=http://www.ieee.org/organizations/history_center/conway.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060618183746/http://www.ieee.org/organizations/history_center/conway.html |archive-date=2006-06-18}} Some early reduced instruction set computing (RISC) processors such as MIPS (1984) and SPARC (1987) were run through MOSIS during their early design and testing phases.