Welcome from the general chair

Welcome to the 20th IFIP/IEEE International Conference on Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI-SoC) in Santa Cruz, California. VLSI-SoC was inaugurated 30 years ago and has been held 20 times in numerous international cities. The diverse and rich set of locations parallel the diverse and rich set of participants. The previous conference locations have included: Edinburgh, Scotland (1981); Trondheim, Norway (1983); Tokyo, Japan (1985); Vancouver, Canada (1987); Munich, Germany (1989); Edinburgh, Scotland (1991); Grenoble, France (1993); Chiba, Japan (1995); Gramado, Brazil (1997); Lisbon, Portugal (1997); Montpellier, France (2001); Darmstadt, Germany (2003); Perth, Australia (2005); Nice, France (2006); Atlanta, U.S.A. (2007); Rhodes Island, Greece (2008); Florianopolis, Brazil (2009); Madrid, Spain (2010); and Kowloon, Hong Kong (2011). During this time, VLSI-SoC has only been held in the United States once and has never been held on the West Coast. As the general chair this year, I am proud to add Santa Cruz, U.S.A. (2012) to this elite list.