China: A Growing Market And Competitor
China continues to make inroads on the rest of the high-tech world, as a market and in a competitive sense. It's growing so rapidly, a number of U.S. industry executives believe China is challenging India as the global low-cost center for software development and Taiwan for original design manufacturing (ODM). Consumer electronics is particularly strong in China. Haier (Qingdao), China's largest electronics company, makes TVs, wireless handsets, PCs, and some white goods. The...
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Ron Schneiderman
Tomorrow's Markets
What's next? What will make and shake tomorrow's high-tech markets? Guessing has become more difficult, but some candidates stand out. Like nanotechnology. The list of potential applications for nanotech is already huge and continues to expand throughout a litany of industries. The HPs, IBMs, and Intels are already talking about handheld devices with terabyte memories, and carbon nanotubes replacing silicon-based chips. But these developments may be 10 to 15 years off....
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Ron Schneiderman
[Technology Report] Homeland Security Sparks Innovation—And Market Success
Just when you thought you were more secure than ever, several government reports suggest terrorists may have developed new ways to attack the U.S. After studying the terrorism issues in depth, the Government Electronics and Information Technology Association (GEIA) paints a grim picture of possible results from such attacks. It sees potentially crippling damage wrought from nuclear, radiological, biological or chemical weapons of mass destruction and from cyber attacks on...
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Ron Schneiderman
[Technology Report] Drinking From The Firehose: Broadband Opens The Floodgates
We take the ability to pour water into a cup for granted. Similarly, we're taking images, music, and video for granted. We treat this content like a liquid, pouring it around our homes via wired and wireless networks. We're tapping the water mains—broadband networks—to get our share of the content. We carry it in containers like memory cards, homemade CDs or DVDs, MP3 players, PDAs, and laptops. And this trend is only accelerating as networks run faster and larger...
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Dave Bursky
[Technology Report] The Pulse Of Our Industry
One of the strongest industries in terms of actual growth and the ability to continually create new, innovative products is consumer electronics. Sales this year should top $125 billion. "We are hot," says Gary Shapiro, president and CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA). "Our industry may be dramatically changing the way consumers receive information and entertainment." Home networking is one example. Digital radio represents another arena with...
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Ron Schneiderman
[Technology Report] Megatrends: Where Are We Going?
Yogi Berra, the erstwhile N.Y. Yankee catcher, is reputed to have said, "the future ain't what it used to be." Sure, we laughed, but deep down inside we knew what he meant. He was talking about changes. Certainly in the last five years, our industry has been all about changes. In the run-up years preceding this millennium, the electronics industry was on fire. Executives, managers, and engineers received signing bonuses for taking new jobs. There were five job listings for every...
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Rob Brownstein
[Technology Report] Sci-Fi Robots Edge Closer To Reality
Robots are already performing real work, but look for more new technologies to add more robustness. Robots conjure up images of science-fiction wonders and horrors. Though they have yet to reach the pinnacle of self-awareness and understanding, robots have been performing tasks for many years, from moving products around warehouses to vacuuming floors. Robots are practical tools today, though emerging technologies likely will move them from the backroom to the forefront. Problems...
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William Wong
[Technology Report] Power Issues May Hamper The Portable's "Smart" Future
Back when I was an executive of two major technology corporations, I was always fascinated by the strategic planning process. That's where we attempted to predict which future technologies would make an impact on us and what our new products would be two, five, and 10 years out. In the two-year timeframe, our predictions were pretty good—most big trends are relatively easy to spot. The tough part was reacting fast enough to get a piece of the action before the...
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Louis E. Frenzel
[Technology Report] The Internet's Next Evolution Beckons
If you think the Internet and World Wide Web are big now, just wait. With the forthcoming Internet Protocol (IP) services and the phenomenon of machine-to-machine communications (M2M), a thundering quake looms just around the corner. Can the Internet handle it? Can we? Thanks to electronics technology, the answer is yes in both cases. How is the Internet expanding? First, take Internet audio. Some have said that music downloads consume roughly one half of the Internet's...
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Louis E. Frenzel
[Technology Report] Autos Head Down Electric Avenue
The future car is going more electric for better fuel efficiency, economy, safety, convenience, and entertainment as well as for a smoother ride. The challenge auto designers face is how to store and manage all of this electricity. Just go back 20 years to see the difference. Then, electronics primarily worked the radio, the windows, and maybe the seats—and that was it. Today, electronics have turned the car into a highly intelligent entity. Electronics...
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Roger Allan
[Technology Report] Lifesavers Come In Many Technological Flavors
Already playing a leading role, MEMS, nanotechnology, and robotics are rapidly marching toward more effective medical diagnostics, drug delivery, organ replacements, patient monitoring, and prosthetics. There's no question that science is destined to improve and extend the human life experience. Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), microfluidics, nanotechnology, lab-on-a-chip devices, DSPs, implantable genetic chips, and robotics are all combining to ensure our health. The...
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Roger Allan
[Technology Report] Biometrics Wields A Double-Edged Sword
More than ever before, we need to verify our identities. But the trend toward biometrification raises some worrisome issues about others invading our personal lives. Identity theft, terrorism, and fraud permeate our society. Biometrics addresses the urgent need for identification with a number of impressive technological advances. But what about privacy issues? Do we really want "Big Brother" tapping into our lives without permission? Databases of biometric...
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Roger Allan
[Technology Report] Green Piecemeal: A Mix Of Technologies Fuel Alternative Power
No subset of technology permeates the electronic industry more than power. More than any other characteristic, it defines the design engineer's job. And it's on the verge of some very big changes. Breakthroughs at several scales are about to alter the power landscape. On the small scale, galvanic battery technology has struggled to get past the limitations of lithium cells. On a larger scale, we're still refining the lead-acid battery, which is inherently handicapped by the...
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Don Tuite
[Technology Report] New Modes Of Air transport Awaken A Slumbering Industry
New winds flowing through aviation hope to whirl some good in the direction of electronics designers in an industry segment that's seen little growth since the 1970s. If these trends continue apace, the entire air-traffic-control infrastructure will get a facelift. The deregulation of the airline industry in 1978 led to an infrastructure based on large aircraft hauling hundreds of passengers at a time between hubs and dispersing them to their destinations via regional jets....
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Don Tuite
[Editorial] When Global Winds Blow Set The Course For Tomorrow
In an issue-to-issue basis, Electronic Design aims to help you stay focused at the micro level. We're typically writing to an audience that's head-down at the workbench or eyes-glued to the computer screen, intently contemplating solutions for circuits that are smaller, faster, and more efficient. Drilling down to the submicron level, you readers accomplish great things, creating the tools and toys that drive remarkable improvements in business productivity, healthcare, convenience,...
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Mark David
[Design FAQs] Digital Potentiometers Sponsored by: ANALOG DEVICES
What is a digital potentiometer? A conventional potentiometer or "pot" is an analog device used to vary, or control, the amount of current that flows through an electronic circuit. It's a mechanical device with a wiper that's used to select the value of the variable resistance desired. A digital potentiometer is either a volatile or nonvolatile device. The former consists of resistors or resistor arrays. It also has other electronic circuit elements like switches, logic...
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Roger Allan
[Design FAQs] FPGA Startup And Configuration Issues Sponsored by: ACTEL
What are the configuration programming differences between antifuse, flash, and SRAM-based FPGAs? Antifuse-based field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) use one-time programmable elements called antifuses because they form a conductive path between two points. The FPGA configuration pattern is programmed into the antifuses, which are tightly integrated into the FPGA logic fabric. Once programmed, antifuses permanently retain their programmed state and cannot be...
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Dave Bursky
