  The inability of Moore's Law and other figure-of-merits (FOMs) to accurately
explain the technology development of the semiconductor industry demands a
holistic merit to guide the industry. Here we introduce a FOM termed CLEAR that
accurately postdicts technology developments since the 1940's until today, and
predicts photonics as a logical extension to keep-up the pace of
information-handling machines. We show that CLEAR
(Capability-to-Latency-Energy-Amount-Resistance) is multi-hierarchical applying
to the device, interconnect, and system level. Being a holistic FOM, we show
that empirical trends such as Moore's Law and the Makimoto's wave are special
cases of the universal CLEAR merit. Looking ahead, photonic board- and
chip-level technologies are able to continue the observed doubling rate of the
CLEAR value every 12 months, while electronic technologies are unable to keep
pace.
