Hillsboro, Oregon-based Lattice Semiconductor Corporation (LSCC) is a fabless original equipment manufacturer (OEM) of programmable logic devices (PLDs), including in-system programmable (ISP) devices. Lattice also provides related software development tools and other programmable analog and mixed-signal devices. The company has entered the high-growth FPGA market through the acquisition of Agere's FPGA division. Management expects to make significant inroads into the low-end, high-volume segment of the FPGA market.

Semiconductor devices are broadly divided into three categories analog, digital and radio frequency (RF). Analog semiconductors condition and regulate real world information such as light, temperature, speed, pressure, power and electrical currents. Digital logic semiconductors process information in only two states. Mixed-signal semiconductors combine both analog and digital technology into a single device. Typically, an analog sensor samples real world information, and then converts the input into an electronic analog signal, which is converted into a digital format for further digital processing. The analog and mixed-signal markets tend to be more varied and specialized, with customized products that have longer life cycles than those in the digital industry segment. There is an ongoing drive to decrease the number of discrete devices, lessen power requirements and shrink the size of the existing devices, which correspondingly increase performance and reliability. Consequently, a greater amount of functionality is being consolidated into increasingly smaller devices.

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