Hitachi, Ltd.

Hitachi Vlsi Engineering Corp.

Other

Hitachi Ulsi Engineering Corp.

Renesas Technology Corp.

Hitachi Ulsi Systems Co., Ltd.

Hitachi Microcomputer Engineering, Ltd.

Ps4 Luxco S.a.r.l.

Renesas Electronics Corporation

Elpida Memory, Inc.

Vlsi Engineering Corporation

Hitachi, Ltd., Hitachi Vlsi Engineering Corporation

Hitachi Usli Systems Co., Ltd.

Hitoshi Tanaka

Kiyoo Itoh

Yoshinobu Nakagome

Masakazu Aoki

Masashi Horiguchi

Takao Watanabe

Jun Etoh

Kazumasa Yanagisawa

Kazushige Ayukawa

Ryoichi Hori

Ryo Fujita

Eiji Kume

Hiroyuki Mizuno

Mitsuru Hiraki

Satoshi Noda

Ryotaro Sakurai

Shin'ichi Ikenaga

Takaaki Noda

Koji Shigematsu

Norio Miyake

Takeshi Sakata

Toshio Sasaki

Takashi Miyamoto

Yoshiki Kawajiri

Yuji Tanaka

Jun Sato

Masanori Isoda

Koichiro Hayashi

Satoru Nakanishi

Mariko Ohtsuka

Eiji Yamasaki

Tomonori Sekiguchi

Hiromasa Noda

Shinichiro Kimura

Osamu Nagashima

Yasushi Watanabe

Sadayuki Morita

Tatsumi Uchigiri

Koji Kawamoto

Masafumi Ohi

Kazuhiko Kajigaya

Takayuki Kawahara

Katsutaka Kimura

Katsuhiro Shimohigashi

Tsugio Takahashi

Masaya Muranaka

Yukihide Suzuki

Hiroshi Kawamoto

Toshiyuki Sakuta

Kan Takeuchi

Yoshitaka Kinoshita

Hiromi Matsuura

Shigeki Ueda

Katsumi Matsuno

Kenji Nishimoto

Shin Ichi Ikenaga

A supply voltage generating circuit that enables a reduction in chip area includes: a booster for outputting a boosted voltage upon generating the boosted voltage by charge pumping of a capacitor element; a power-supply step-down unit for stepping down voltage of an external power supply to a voltage within a breakdown-voltage range of the capacitor element, and applying the stepped-down voltage to the power supply of the booster; and a switch element for switching between application of the external power supply to the power supply of the booster directly or via the power-supply step-down unit. The booster comprises multiple stages of booster circuits. The thicknesses of gate oxide films of capacitor elements constituted by MOS transistors included in respective ones of the booster circuits are the same and are made smaller than the thickness of a gate oxide film of a MOS transistor included in a load circuit having the output of the booster at its power supply.

Supply voltage generating circuit

An electrically programmable and erasable non-volatile semiconductor memory such as a flash memory is designed into a configuration in which, when a cutoff of the power supply occurs in the course of a write or erase operation carried out on a memory cell employed in the non-volatile semiconductor memory, the operation currently being executed is discontinued and a write-back operation is carried out to change a threshold voltage of the memory cell in the reversed direction. In addition, the configuration also allows the number of charge-pump stages in an internal power-supply configuration to be changed in accordance with the level of a power-supply voltage so as to make the write-back operation correctly executable. As a result, no memory cells are put in deplete state even in the event of a power-supply cutoff in the course of a write or erase operation.

Non volatile memory

A semiconductor integrated circuit device having an internal voltage generating circuit which generates a voltage two or more times higher than an operating voltage while at the same time reducing the voltage applied to a device, thereby ensuring the device reliability. In a charge pump circuit driven by supply voltage VDD, a maximum of 2VDD or a similar level voltage is applied between the drain and source of a MOSFET, the MOSFET being connected in series with a conduction MOSFET of the same type, the gate of which is supplied with VD-VDD, or a potential which is VDD lower than VD, the drain potential before its connection. The gate potential is obtained directly from a node in said charge pump which generates a voltage pulse synchronized with the voltage between the drain and source of that MOSFET, or through another rectifier device branched via a capacitor from the node.

Charge pump with improved regulation

A semiconductor device having a first circuit block supplied with a first operating voltage, a second circuit block supplied with a second operating voltage, a voltage generating circuit for generating a third operating voltage in response to the first operating voltage, and a third circuit block supplied with the third operating voltage. Preferably, the third operating voltage is generated such that the first operating voltage is increased to a fourth operating voltage by a voltage-up converter, and then the fourth operating voltage is dropped to the third operating voltage by a voltage down-converter. Hence, a power supply operating internally stably in spite of use of a relatively fluctuating voltage can be provided even in the case where a power-supply voltage is dropped.

Semiconductor device

An electrically programmable and erasable nonvolatile semiconductor memory such as a flash memory is designed into a configuration in which, when a cutoff of the power supply occurs in the course of a write or erase operation carried out on a memory cell employed in the non-volatile semiconductor memory, the operation currently being executed is discontinued and a write-back operation is carried out to change a threshold voltage of the memory cell in the reversed direction. In addition, the configuration also allows the number of charge-pump stages in an internal power-supply configuration to be changed in accordance with the level of a power-supply voltage so as to make the write-back operation correctly executable. As a result, no memory cells are put in deplete state even in the event of a power-supply cutoff in the course of a write or erase operation.

A semiconductor integrated circuit device having an internal voltage generating circuit which generates a voltage two or more times higher than an operating voltage while at the same time reducing the voltage applied to a device, thereby ensuring the device reliability. In a charge pump circuit driven by supply voltage VDD, a maximum of 2 VDD or a similar level voltage is applied between the drain and source of a MOSFET, the MOSFET being connected in series with a conduction MOSFET of the same type, the gate of which is supplied with VD&#x2212;VDD, or a potential which is VDD lower than VD, the drain potential before its connection. The gate potential is obtained directly from a node in said charge pump which generates a voltage pulse synchronized with the voltage between the drain and source of that MOSFET, or through another rectifier device branched via a capacitor from the node.

Semiconductor integrated circuit device

It is an object of the present invention to allow a voltage generating section which produces a high voltage to efficiently produce a high voltage, and to reduce a layout area of a semiconductor chip. An intermediate voltage charge pump circuit is provided in a voltage producing section of a flash memory. The intermediate voltage charge pump circuit comprises switching elements, a first charge pump circuit comprising capacitors, a second charge pump circuit comprising switching elements, capacitors and an equalizer comprising switching elements. These elements are driven by driving signals. A period during which all of one contacts of parasitic capacities Capacitor are brought into floating state temporarily is formed. After corresponding parasitic capacities are short-circuited by the switching elements, nodes thereof are electrically charged or discharged, and a high voltage is produced while reusing electric charge while using electric charge discharged to a reference potential by next cycle.

Nonvolatile memory and processing system

A semiconductor integrated circuit device having an internal voltage generating circuit which generates a voltage two or more times higher than an operating voltage while at the same time reducing the voltage applied to a device, thereby ensuring the device reliability. In a charge pump circuit driven by supply voltage VDD, a maximum of 2VDD or a similar level voltage is applied between the drain and source of a MOSFET, the MOSFET being connected in series with a conduction MOSFET of the same type, the gate of which is supplied with VD&minus;VDD, or a potential which is VDD lower than VD, the drain potential before its connection. The gate potential is obtained directly from a node in said charge pump which generates a voltage pulse synchronized with the voltage between the drain and source of that MOSFET, or through another rectifier device branched via a capacitor from the node.

Charge pump with improved reliability

A semiconductor IC device is designed using a memory core with a plurality of I/O lines, a transfer circuit module and a logic library which are produced beforehand and stored in a data base. The memory core and a logic circuit are arranged so that their I/O lines extend in the same direction. A transfer circuit including plural stages of switch groups is arranged between the I/O lines of the memory core and the I/O lines of the logic circuit. Switches forming each stage of switch group are formed between the I/O lines of the memory core and the I/O lines of the logic circuit. When one stage of or a small number of stages of switch groups are turned on, the I/O lines of the memory core and the I/O lines of the logic circuit are turned on, thereby forming a desired transfer pattern. The memory core is constructed by the combination of functional modules such as an amplifier module, a bank module and a power supply module. In the bank module are arranged row-system circuits which operate independently of each other and a multiplicity of I/O lines which extend in a bit line direction.

Semiconductor IC device having a memory and a logic circuit implemented with a single chip

A reference voltage generation circuit is provided which includes a p-channel type MOSFET used as an input transistor to allow a sufficient current to flow through a differential amplifier even if the threshold voltages of MOSFETs used in the differential amplifier significantly increase. A push-pull conversion circuit is coupled to the differential amplifier and has a double end configuration to provide a sufficiently high level to drive a p-channel output buffer. This arrangement allows a stable operation at a sufficiently low power supply voltage even if the threshold voltages of the MOSFETs forming the differential amplifier are high. It also allows quick activation when the power is turned on and provides high stability.

Reference voltage generator permitting stable operation

Growing community of inventors

Ome, Japan

Hitoshi Tanaka