Paul Clifton

Dr. Clifton has broad experience in semiconductor process and device engineering, simulation and optimization gained over more than thirty years in industrial and academic R&D. Prior to joining Acorn Technologies, he worked on performance optimization, reliability, variability and yield ramp of multiple CMOS technology nodes as a semiconductor device specialist at PDF Solutions, a Silicon Valley-based provider of advanced process-design integration solutions to the IC industry. Before PDF Solutions, he held senior application engineering roles in TCAD at Silvaco, TMA, Avant! and ISE. He has specific process engineering expertise in plasma etch, CVD, MBE, including compound semiconductors and strained silicon. Paul has also worked as research team leader at the University of Newcastle on a pioneering development program for strained Si technologies in Europe. In addition, he has wide international experience having worked at ISE AG (Zurich, Switzerland), PDF Solutions (Munich, Germany) and held research fellowships at the Universities of Southampton (UK), Tohoku (Sendai, Japan), and at the CNRS (Toulouse, France) and a lectureship in Microelectronics at the University of Durham (UK).