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16 October 2007
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News & Analysis
MIPS Technologies' $147 million acquisition last August of Chipidea Microelectronica, a privately held supplier of analog and mixed-signal intellectual property, advances both companies' ambitions of transforming SoC design.
Foreign nationals residing in the U.S. are contributing more to the country's intellectual property, stirring concern about maintaining its competitiveness and the debate over whether to relax immigration policy.
There is a budding realization that meeting Brazil's growing demand for ICs by developing them within its own borders could both stem the tide of illegal chips and bolster the country's competitiveness.
Researchers have reported advances in neural technology as well as the hurdles still ahead for delivering capabilities such as artificial limbs powered by implanted devices that read and harness subtle control signals in the brain.
The opening of the second phase of Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks Corp. last month brought a new sense of optimism to electronics design activities in Asia.
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Protecting a device's secret key and content as well as understanding the basic requirements of a secure SoC are vital to create leading-edge products.
This article discusses security measures for M-Commerce using mobile phones via an RF subsystem to authenticate a transaction.
A quick refresher on some essential elements of filter performance specifications can aid engineers in correctly choosing filters that meet the needs of their particular application.
We're inundated with too much information from too many sources. But there's one large area where we suffer from the opposite syndrome of too little information, the "Check Engine" light in the car.
Analog device makers are tailoring analog parts--from LED drivers to switching regulators--to meet automotive OEMs' requirements for automotives.
Developing a power supply circuit for portable electronic equipment requires design engineers to extend battery life by maximizing the power efficiency and minimizing power dissipation throughout the system.
Sharp Corp. has developed a 1-inch-thick LCD panel that it says will be integrated into mainstream displays produced at a tenth-generation fab scheduled to go online in 2010.
Actel Corp., in a bid to compete with its larger competitors, is pioneering new markets for FPGAs in automobiles, including design slots in control systems that can work in hybrids, electric vehicles or fuel cell-powered cars.
Cadence Design Systems Inc. and Mentor Graphics Corp. have joined forces to promote a common approach to the verification of design files based on SystemVerilog.
Tyco Electronics Corp. has released a quad small form-factor pluggable interconnect system that offers three times the density of traditional SFP ports and supports speeds up to 10Gbps per channel.
According to Databeans Inc., communications analog is an $11.5 billion market, and thanks to the increasing demand for communications equipment worldwide, it is expected to reach nearly $22 billion by 2012, with most of the new revenue growth coming from the Asia-Pacific region.
Technical Features
Embedded system designers are leveraging FPGA-based configurable processing solutions because they can be tailored to their specific application or product requirements. (PDF file)
HDMI has become the standard interface between any HDTV and media sources that provide the content displayed on the HDTV. The crisp, clear images made possible with the high-resolution video data promise to be even richer as new systems implement ver 1.3 of the HDMI standard. (PDF file)
Plastic optical fiber technology offers an attractive alternative to traditional glass optical fiber and copper wire for industrial, office, home and automotive networks. However, to become a mainstream alternative, POF needs to support Ethernet. Despite a lack of standards, interfacing POF to Ethernet can be a straightforward task. (PDF file)
Low-cost FPGAs can enable home appliance designers to implement energy-saving motor controls by using a flexible, integrated single-chip solution that incorporates a DSP algorithm. Moreover, these programmable devices used with an internal soft processor can help facilitate an appliance's user interface. (PDF file)
Although there are various ways to identify people, fingerprint identification has spread significantly due to the balance of features it offers, including high reliability, accuracy and solid cost performance. (PDF file)
Power sequencing is an important topic to consider when working with multiple voltage rail environments. Power sequencing is crucial to avoid costly latch-up problems, which can be avoided with the help of PMUs. (PDF file)
GPIB continues to serve as a reliable I/O interface for a vast number of instruments that are still in use. GPIB also provides a convenient way to manage complex hardware handshaking. (PDF file)
The verification of IP cores continues to become more complex and time-consuming, especially for processor cores such as CPUs, floating-point units and DSPs. The challenge is to design and verify a new embedded vector processor with significant enhancements over its predecessor. (PDF file)
Opinion
As an engineer, you would soon need to tune in to mobile TV design. But it's all going to be worth it if, as the European Commission expects, the market does reach 500 million viewers and $28 billion.
With security being a specialized domain, expertise is needed to correctly implement mobile device security and avoid inefficiencies. Clearly, security can no longer be an afterthought in application development for mobile devices.
Interview
To capture what he sees as new revenue opportunities in next-generation communications and data management activities, the chairman and CEO of Cisco Systems Inc. wants to deploy the strategy that drove his company's explosive growth in its early years.
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