Patent ID: 6845047

Claim:
A read circuit of a nonvolatile semiconductor memory comprising: at least one sense amplifier; and a read control signal generating circuit for supplying a first signal to said at least one sense amplifier, wherein said at least one sense amplifier has a first current path comprised of a first P-channel MOS transistor having a source electrically connected to a first power supply node and a gate applied with said first signal, and a first N-channel MOS transistor connected between a drain of said first P-channel MOS transistor and a memory cell and having a gate applied with a second signal, and said read control signal generating circuit has a second current path comprised of a second P-channel MOS transistor having a gate and a drain connected to the gate of said first P-channel MOS transistor and a source electrically connected to said first power supply node, and a second N-channel MOS transistor connected between the drain of said second P-channel MOS transistor and a reference cell and having a gate applied with said second signal.