ASIC

An application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) is an integrated circuit (IC) customized for a particular use, rather than intended for general-purpose use. For example, a chip designed solely to run a cell phone is an ASIC.

The initial ASICs used gate array technology. Ferranti produced perhaps the first gate-array, the ULA (Uncommitted Logic Array), around 1980. An early successful commercial application was the ULA circuitry found in the 8-bit ZX81 and ZX Spectrum low-end personal computers, introduced in 1981 and 1982.