Electronic Business articles from November 2004

Electronic Business archives from November 2004

Chip implants: dead on arrival: the VeriChip is good for controversy but does little for patients.(Editorial)
November 1, 2004... Every once in a while, a new technology comes along that gets everyone fired up while the smoke of controversy masks the underlying problem. The latest example of this phenomenon is the Food and Drug Administration's recent approval of the...

Shining a different light on LCOS.(Letter to the Editor)
November 1, 2004... As a developer of LCOS optical engine and HD projection TV systems, I believe that you didn't get the whole story from your sources for "New Window for Old Display Technology" (October 2004, page 60). There's a view that's completely different...

ODM and EMS Companies face more competition.(Letter to the Editor)
November 1, 2004... Dennis Normile's article "These Slim Margins Are Not by Design" (September 2004, page 47) provided good insight in a fine portrait of how the industry is taking shape. Our firm provides confidential management services to OEMs and EMS and ODM...

EDA: clunky or smooth?(Letter to the Editor)
November 1, 2004... I agree with Geoffrey James' assessment that the EDA industry needs standardization to enable tool interoperability ("Package Deal," September 2004, page 36). But we also need to streamline that standardization. Right now we have OpenAccess and...

We can, but should we?(Letter to the Editor)
November 1, 2004... I enjoyed Russ Arensman's article on consumer electronics (www.eb-mag.com) and particularly the points made toward the end on the complexity that convergence creates, resulting in buyer resistance. This is even more clearly described by...

Humanizing the chip industry: one small step for marketing, one big leap for the electronics industry.(Commentary)
November 1, 2004... Semiconductor chips can be viewed as cryptic curiosities, tough to describe in an intriguing or lucid way to the average Joe or Mary and sometimes even to those of us who've been in the chip business for several years. Such chips can be cryptic...

Big bucks from little screens: competition beats up as more players enter the OLED display market.(Display Technologies)
November 1, 2004... The market for organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays is brightening, attracting several Asian manufacturers and causing established providers of the technology, such as Eastman Kodak, to rethink their strategies. Mobile phones,...

A bill to bring home billions: a new law immediately lowers the tax on foreign earnings from 35 to 5.25 percent.(Legislation)
November 1, 2004... Congress giveth, and Congress taketh away. It did both to the technology industry this fall, taking away a popular export subsidy but also reducing taxes on corporate earnings for domestic manufacturers and creating a one-year tax holiday that...

OK, don't show me the money: executive salaries at tech startups stall.(Finance)
November 1, 2004... Modest. Fair. Rational. These words would not have appeared in a discussion of executive salaries only a few years ago. After three years of sluggishness, salaries for executives at startup technology firms leveled off in 2003, according to a...

Kick-start or kindergarten? Despite a steep downside, it can be effective to chastise workers in public view.(Management)
November 1, 2004... After a series of product delays and manufacturing missteps, one CEO issues an angry e-mail--leaked to the press--to his 80,000 employees, declaring their performance to be unacceptable. After a bad quarter, another CEO publicly fires three of...

World economic growth begins to slow: as the world goes, so goes the electronics industry.(Economic Outlook)
November 1, 2004... Although the electronics industry frequently traverses its own peaks and valleys, its journey is still linked to the overall global economy. As the global economy downshifts from its current growth, it will influence the electronics industry in...

Holiday shopping starts early.(Business Barometer)(Illustration)
November 1, 2004... This month's polling of purchasing managers shows some encouraging signs for November. At least one in four believe that overall business conditions will improve in the next 30 days. Hoping for a strong fourth quarter, businesses are bullish on...

Roller-coaster blues: avoid the next boom and bust? Yeah, right.(Semiconductors)
November 1, 2004... Semiconductor demand, like the economy, is cyclic. When the economy turns upward, people buy more products, creating more chip demand. And vice versa, of course. That's true of other markets too, but the semiconductor industry is particularly...

Shared fabs catching on: chip companies cooperate to shrink the cost of development.(Partnerships)
November 1, 2004... Matrix Semiconductor built the prototypes of its three-dimensional memory chips at Stanford University, where its cofounder was an engineering professor. But company officials knew that bringing their novel technology to market would require a...

Desperately seeking sales: what went awry at Synopsys?(Electronic Design Automation)
November 1, 2004... Synopsys recently revised its 2005 forecast from the $1.4 billion it once promised analysts to an unimpressive $900 million--about what the company booked way back in 2002. Missed forecasts are nothing new in EDA, of course, but this is such a...

LCD supply chain: reservations welcome: Chi Mei secures glass supply in prepayment to Corning.(Supply Chain Management)
November 1, 2004... A deal such as the one recently inked between LCD maker Chi Mei Optoelectronics and glass supplier Coming is nearly unheard of in the electronic components supply chain. In July Chi Mei agreed to prepay Corning $510 million for "a significant...

Where is the intelligent fab? Bringing the industry into the 20th century.(Capital Equipment)
November 1, 2004... So when is the intelligent fab going to get here? At least until the 300-millimeter wafer era finally got started, it's always been the great irony of the semiconductor industry: The engines that make the world's cutting-edge technology are...

Renesas merges East and West: new chip firm's management finds that creating a global culture is tougher than blending two Japanese companies.(Profile)
November 1, 2004... Midway through Renesas Technology's first year, the Japanese company's executives determined that the flash memory market would grow faster than they had expected. Because it produces two types of flash, Renesas was uniquely positioned to cash...

Hard sell for manufacturing software: vendors must overcome preference for in-house code.(Industry Software)
November 1, 2004... ON THE FAB FLOOR, time is money and people can be slow. When a polishing tool has veered even subtly awry and wafers have begun to go to waste, a chip maker needs to get the process back on track as soon as possible. Software that continuously...

Small ideas for a big market: molecular-level technologies are aiming to replace today's memory chips, but will they work and be cheap enough?(Nanotechnology)
November 1, 2004... LSI Logic officials were skeptical when startup Nantero inquired in early 2003 about using LSI's Gresham, Ore., chip fabrication plant to develop a manufacturing process for carbon nanotube (CNT) memory chips. CNTs, minuscule yet remarkably...

Staying power and superb offerings: TI is in the Standard Linear market to stay.(Safe bet series: a special series from TI Standard Linear and Logic)
November 1, 2004... Texas Instruments introduced its first standard linear device in the 1970s. In the ensuing years, the company has grown to dominate this market. TI remains a top analog supplier in the world, with more than 30 years of analog experience....

Communications processors find their niche: it's still survival of the fittest, as the market discovers the limitations and opportunities of these processors.(Leadership Series)
November 1, 2004... MOST LARGE STRUCTURES rest on massive foundations of .stone or concrete. Among the tiny slivers of semiconductors supporting the global Internet, perhaps the most important chips are the network and communications processors that help move...

Network processors gain new ground: hard hit by the downturn in the telecom sector, network processors are finding new hope in the fast-growing multiservice space.(Leadership Series)
November 1, 2004... AN OLD JOKE ABOUT A COUPLE EATING in a restaurant actually says a lot about the network processor business: "What a disappointment," says the man. "This restaurant has a great reputation. But the service is slow, the food tastes terrible...

Embedded connectivity reaches out: thanks to more powerful processors, greater bandwidth and wireless advancements, embedded processors are finally making the network connection.(Leadership Series)
November 1, 2004... TRUE EMBEDDED CONNECTIVITY, made possible by the marriage of network and communications processors along with ever-growing wireless capacity, is making a reality out of many functions long considered the stuff of science fiction. Witness the...