The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Oct. 05, 2004
Filed:
Aug. 13, 2003
Kanji Natori, Fujimi-machi, JP;
Seiko Epson Corporation, Tokyo, JP;
Abstract
A voltage generation circuit of the invention applied for a non-volatile semiconductor memory device has a memory cell array including multiple non-volatile memory elements. The voltage generation circuit includes a booster circuit having at least a first booster module that boosts a power supply voltage and outputs a first boosted voltage corresponding to either of a program mode and an erase mode, and a second booster module that boosts the power supply voltage and outputs a second boosted voltage, which is different from the first boosted voltage, corresponding to a verify mode. The voltage generation circuit also includes a control voltage generation circuit that generates at least a voltage corresponding to the program mode, based on the first boosted voltage, in the program mode, a voltage corresponding to the erase mode, based on the first boosted voltage, in the erase mode, and a voltage corresponding to the verify mode, based on the second boosted voltage, in the verify mode, as control voltages to control operations of each of the multiple non-volatile memory elements. This arrangement effectively shortens each erase/program access time.