herein fig1 illustrates semiconductor chips which use proximity communication in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention as illustrated in fig1 ic chip 110 contains transmitter circuitry 111 which feeds a signal into a capacitive transmitter region 112 in ic chip 110 this signal is capacitively transmitted to capacitive receiver region 122 and then passes into receiver circuitry 121 in ic chip 120 note that when the transmitter and receiver regions are properly aligned there is no direct physical contact between the transmitter and receiver regions and signals are communicated between transmitter and receiver regions through capacitive coupling fig2 illustrates a stack of semiconductor chips 205 which uses proximity communication between laminated chip assemblies in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention laminated chip assemblies 200 and 201 are multi chip assemblies wherein the constituent ic chips have been permanently laminated together using one of a number of known bonding techniques within laminated chip assemblies 200 and 201 communication occurs through direct electrically conductive connections in other words when chip 202 sends a signal to chip 203 the signal passes through a conductor directly from chip 202 to chip 203 note that these conductors can possibly include through chip vias in contrast laminated chip assembly 200 and laminated chip assembly 201 communicate with each other not through direct electrical connections but instead through proximity communication across proximity communication regions 204 since there is no physical wiring between laminated chip assembly 200 and laminated chip assembly 201 no mechanical attachment is required hence either laminated chip assembly 200 or laminated chip assembly 201 can be removed.