The Massachusetts Microelectronics Center: a partnership for technology education

A description is given of the mission and programs of the Massachusetts Microelectronics Center, a partnership of state government, industry, and ten engineering universities. The center supports educational programs in semiconductor design and processing, and operates a central facility as well as satellite laboratories at each university. Total capacity investment is approximately $50 million, and enrollments in the 1988-89 academic year total approximately 2500 students. The combination of shared access, shared funding, and shared governance has made possible a range of educational opportunities which would have been beyond the reach of any single university. Operations are organized into four major elements: (1) a VLSI CAD (computer-aided design) network; (2) a professionally staffed, state-of-the-art captive IC fabrication facility (ICFF); (3) distributed VLSI test laboratories at each university; and (4) distributed semiconductor instructional processing laboratories (SIPLs)