Irvine, California-based Microsemi Corporation (MSCC) was formed in 1960. Formerly known as Microsemiconductor Corporation, the company changed its name to Microsemi Corporation in 1983. It offers a broad range of semiconductor integrated circuit (IC) products, broadly categorized into the high reliability and analog/mixed signal categories. The high reliability products are primarily targeted at military, aerospace and medical markets, while the analog/mixed signal products are targeted at LCD TVs, monitors, notebooks, PDAs, cell phones, automotive and other markets. The company's products find application in desktops, mobile computing platforms such as notebook computers and PDAs, data storage devices, wireless LAN, LCD backlighting in LCD TVs and LCD monitors, automobiles, telecommunications products, test instruments, defense and aerospace equipment, and high-quality sound reproduction and data transfer equipment.

Generally, semiconductor devices are 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 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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