Mikroelektronik#

Microelectronics, branch of electronic engineering based on miniaturisation of high-performance components and on semiconductor and integrated circuit technology that was developed from approximately 1959 onwards. Austria's contribution was the creation of the first electronic computing system, which was developed in 1955-1958 at the Vienna University of Technology under the direction of H. Zemanek. In this system, electronic tubes were for the first time replaced with transistors. Because of their small band width computation was still slow (hence the name "Mailuefterl" - May breeze). Semiconductor circuits with several transistors on silicon were first developed in 1959. This technology permitted autonomous information processing, low-cost mass production and wide application owing to the small size and low energy consumption of the new components.

Electronic components are a particularly important area of production and a key technology to ensure competitiveness in all fields of industrial activity. Manufacturing processes and products are increasingly characterised by the use of electronic components. As the size of chips is steadily being reduced while storage and processing capacity increased, new applications are constantly being found. The share of microelectronic components in total Austrian production increased from 6.5% to 12% between 1983 and 1993. Austrian output can be broken down as follows: active electronic components make up 61%, passive components 17 %, circuit boards 12 %, electromechanical components 10 %. The export ratio is approximately 90 %. Side by side with the mass production of standard chips, Austrian manufacturers also concentrate on custom-made hybrid circuits and application specific integrated circuits (ASICs) for telecommunications, the motor-car industry and industrial electronics.