A key attribute in the design of the Cyclone® III devices is its low power consumption. The design process of the Cyclone® III focused first on the silicon process used. Using TSMC’s low power 65nm process offered a huge return in lowering power consumption. This is the first time Intel has designed a family using TSMC’s low-power process, which was chosen because of its proven performance in leading cellular phone manufacturer’s designs. Using multiple transistor threshold voltages provides the opportunity to use higher threshold voltages for non-critical transistors to reduce leakage current. At times the choice was made to use a lower transistor threshold voltage for higher performance, but increased the channel length to reduce leakage current. Using a thicker gate oxide for non-critical speed transistors lowers the performance of the transistors but also reduces the leakage current flow.