Electronics Weekly articles from January 2005

Electronics Weekly archives from January 2005

30% discount on EMC seminars.
January 12, 2005... Readers of Electronics Weekly are being offered a 30 per cent discount on the cost of seminars being run this year by EMC Resources. The seminars are intended to cover impending legislation and directives that will impact the electronics...

Europe's battery and accumulator Directive to get second reading.
January 12, 2005... The EU batteries and accumulators Directive is to get its second reading in the European Parliament in May. The current draft prohibits "the placing on the market" cells with more than 0.0005 per cent of mercury by weight, except button cells...

Mobile display is also loudspeaker.
January 12, 2005... Japanese telecoms firm NTT DoCoMo has announced a phone with a display that doubles as its loudspeaker. The flat-panel speaker was developed by UK-based NXT using NXT's distributed-mode loudspeaker technology in which a panel is designed so...

Chip design needs; business network.
January 12, 2005... Business networks supporting the semiconductor design community are top of the agenda for industry body, the NMI. The association, which has made a conscious effort in recent months to increase its membership within the design community, is...

Recruitment drives ring in New Year for upbeat firms.
January 12, 2005... A number of design and manufacturing firms are starting the New Year with recruitment drives coming from improved business opportunities. Newport Networks is looking to expand its High Wycombe-based R&D activities to support development of its...

Firms link up in powerline comms push.
January 12, 2005... Matsushita, Mitsubishi and Sony have set up an alliance for high-speed power line communications for audio, video and data networking. The companies said they have "tentatively" named the not-for-profit alliance the CE-Powerline Communication...

Magnetic sensor with 50[micro]tesla resolution is cut down to small size.
January 12, 2005... A magnetometer capable of resolving down to 50microtesla has been developed by NIST, the US standards institute. Based on NIST's miniature atomic clock (see EW, 08/09/04), the magnetic sensor is built on the chip-scale - at least 100 times...

Multi-billion investment in New York.
January 12, 2005... New York is set to benefit from a number of high-tech investments, including a chip fab being built by IBM, Toshiba and Sony. The fab is due to start running silicon in the second half of the year. Total commercial investment in the 380,000ft2...

UK digital TV software firm secures TI design-in.
January 12, 2005... Cambridge-based digital TV software firm ANT has scored a design-in success for its browser-based applications software with DSP supplier Texas Instruments. The firm's interactive TV applications software has been made available to run on TI's...

Fast packet access technology will quash data capacity fears.
January 12, 2005... The pressure to provide higher data capacity on mobile networks will push forward the deployment of HSDPA technology, according to test firm UbiNetics. "We know some people are already worried about running out of capacity," said Stirling...

Hitachi pushes hard drive limit to 500Gbytes.
January 12, 2005... Hitachi has pushed the limits on hard drive capacity with the release of a 500Gbyte drive due this quarter. A half terabyte drive will debut at the top end of Hitachi's Deskstar range. The 3.5inch drive is aimed at workstations, digital video...

IBM enrols for University investment.
January 12, 2005... A [pounds sterling]50m investment at Swansea University will include an IBM 'Blue C' supercomputer, capable of 2.7teraflops. Although aimed primarily at research in medical fields, the Institute of Life Science at Swansea will also consider...

Zetex offers digital audio amplifier IP.
January 12, 2005... Oldham-based chip firm Zetex has digital audio amplifier intellectual property (IP) to offer to hi-fi firms. "We could go to market quite quickly, licensing FPGA code for high-end audio," Zetex application engineer Isaac Sibson told EW. Called...

More university research funds depend on improved accounts.
January 12, 2005... UK universities will be given extra research funding next year, but will have to improve accounting practices to get it. From September 2005, "we are delighted to be able to announce that the Research Councils will pay 80 per cent of the full...

DTI streamlining makes Smart Award grant for R&D.
January 12, 2005... A "streamlining" of DTI technology funding has seen the old Smart Award combined with other shemes to become the Grant for R&D. The Smart Award has become one of nine "business support solutions", a move intended to streamline the number of...

US company takes licence for eye-tracking system.
January 12, 2005... A portable eye-tracking system, aimed at sporting and marketing applications, is being produced by US firm Applied Science Laboratories. Developed by UK research group Qinetiq, the system is attached to a pair of sunglasses, and does not...

China set to show largest chip market.
January 12, 2005... China will become the largest regional semiconductor market this year, according to IC Insights. The Chinese market will grow to over $34bn, about $1bn more than the US and Japanese markets. This is based on a worldwide chip market forecast of...

Thomson joins chip firm to produce tuner for US plug and play TV market.
January 12, 2005... French firm Thomson has teamed with Zarlink Semiconductor to produce what they claim is the first single-conversion tuner module to meet US rules for plug and play digital televisions. FCC rules define how digital televisions in the US must...

Characters keep their feet on the ground in Pompeii.
January 12, 2005... Oxford-based 2D3 is helping to put virtual life back into Pompeii. The software firm's contribution to the EU-funded project is to prevent virtual characters wobbling against their background reality when visitors walk around wearing VR...

China unveils digital TV standard in bid to climb industry pecking order.
January 12, 2005... China is moving to establish a standard in digital TV, introducing the country's first digital TV IC called Zhongshi 1. The move is part of a plan to change China's position in the electronics industry, from low-cost manufacturing to a...

A challenge for chip makers.
January 12, 2005... exas Instruments (TI) has been having a storming run since it set about its transformation strategy eight years ago. Now, driven by the DSP and analogue boom, it has risen again to the number three spot in the worldwide semiconductor industry....

Collaborations drive the industry forward.
January 12, 2005... his year will see semiconductor process technology move to 65nm device geometries, but along with 20 per cent performance gains over 90nm technology, standby leakage will continue to be the main issue. Semiconductor collaborations such as the...

Could this be the year for Bluetooth?
January 12, 2005... inally, after many years of waiting, 2004 actually saw Bluetooth making a real move into the mass market and CSR's faith in the technology is being rewarded. The Cambridge-based chip developer started off well in February 2004 with a successful...

Growing on a broader spectrum.
January 12, 2005... roadening the definition of test, especially in the area of embedded systems design, is the main ambition for benchtop and handheld test instrument suppliers at the start of what is expected to be a growth year for the industry. Developments in...

Working to keep Europe at the forefront of R&D innovation.
January 12, 2005... By Benoit Neel, general manager of Agilent Technologies' European field operations 2005 will see continuing efforts to maintain Europe's position as a centre of innovation for R&D. And the European Union's initiatives in this area will be at...

Opportunity in testing devices which create time varying ; RF signals.
January 12, 2005... By Neil Huddlestone, v-p EMEA sales, Tektronix The requirements for testing the wide range of devices which create transient or time varying RF signals is the key opportunity. Uses of RF are everywhere, from consumer electronics and industrial,...

Plan to overhaul electronics hopes to put key skills back into the workplace.
January 12, 2005... The Government's latest document on rejuvenating the electronics industry sees the Electronics Innovation and Growth Team (EIGT) point out five major areas from the boardroom to the factory which need changing. The scale of the problem is huge,...

University of Oxford sojourns to Cannes.
January 12, 2005... The University of Oxford is travelling to a warmer climate in February this year when it presents a series of courses at Cannes, in the south of France. The University is offering five telecoms courses in Cannes to coincide with the influx of...

Training courses awarded IEE quality endorsement.
January 12, 2005... The University of Oxford and ERA Technology have both achieved IEE Endorsed Provider status for their electronics and telecoms training courses. Endorsed Provider status is awarded after an assessment by engineering body, the IEE. The IEE...

Zetex sounds out high end of hi-fi market with all-digital feedback.
January 12, 2005... Zetex has added all-digital feedback to an all-digital audio power amplifier to cut non-linearities due to output power components and filters. "We have done quite a bit of listening and because of the quality we can now get, we could aim at...

Robocop comes to town.
January 12, 2005... Apache is a rugged robot from White Box Robotics of Pennsylvania. The firm's machines are PC chassis with standard PC components, sensors and a means of moving. "The Apache is one of our concept robots designed to illustrate the flexibility of...

EDA firm claims tool reduces static leakage by 70 per cent.
January 12, 2005... Buckinghamshire-based EDA firm In2Fab has released a static leakage reduction tool called Isis-Vt. "We have seen up to 70 per cent static power reduction on the logic section of a 90nm microprocessor core," CEO Robert Baker told EW. The tool...

Charities use UK satellite images for Tsunami aid.
January 12, 2005... The Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC), a group of satellites built by Surrey Satellite Technology (SSTL), is in use to aid Tsunami victims. Five charities including Oxfam are using the data, provided through the European Space Agency...

AlGaN/GaN mosfets grow on silicon; substrates.
January 19, 2005... Detailed work on buffer layers has enabled Matsushita to grow AlGaN/GaN power mosfets on silicon substrates. The devices not only function, but out-perform conventional high-voltage power Fets. Professor Takashi Egawa of the Nagoya Institute of...

Designs on a good year ahead.
January 19, 2005... he Australian firm Altium made a major push into development tools for FPGAs in 2004 with its Nexar system. Nexar starts at the system level and includes simulation, both in software and at the device level. To entice more people into using...

Electronics tops US patent system.
January 19, 2005... Electronics firms dominate the US patent system, with all of the top ten firms from the electronics sector in 2004. IBM has continued to lead, receiving 3,248 patents in 2004. However, five of the top ten are Japanese, with Matsushita and Canon...

Opto company wins major funding deal.
January 19, 2005... UK firm Afonics Fibreoptics has completed a multi- million dollar development funding round with Bank of Scotland Corporate Equity and is looking at further acquisitions to expand its business. "We're looking at acquisitions and are currently...

Abacus teams up with tool reseller.
January 19, 2005... Abacus Polar has teamed with development tool reseller, Kane Computing to provide technical support for the Texas Instruments range of fixed and floating point DSP tools. Abacus customers will be able to use Kane's free pre- and post-sale...

European start-ups hope to capitalise on Indian initiative.
January 19, 2005... An open-source programmable logic initiative announced in India last October has already granted several hundred licences and is now planning a venture conference. The Generalised Open Source Programming Logic (GOSPL) initiative will be holding...

Intel Q4 results hint at strong year for chips.
January 19, 2005... Intel's strong fourth quarter results suggest the chip industry inventory cut-backs have been overcooked, and the next problem could be shortages. "I expect we'll see many more announcements like Intel's," Malcolm Penn, CEO of Future Horizons,...

Ceramic sounds good for mobiles, say Japanese.
January 19, 2005... Ceramic piezoelectric loudspeakers save space and are as good as conventional moving coil types in phones, according to Japanese ceramics firm Taiyo Yuden. "I have heard a demonstration and it gives the kind of sound quality you get from a...

Designers upbeat over business.
January 19, 2005... More firms in the UK have told EW they are upbeat about business opportunities and will need to recruit staff to support new projects. Last week we listed six design and manufacturing firms which were actively looking for staff at the start of...

Cypress plans to cut 250 jobs after Q4 results show larger losses than forecast.
January 19, 2005... Cypress Semiconductor is planning to lay off up to 250 employees worldwide following a larger than expected Q4 loss after lower than expected fab utilisation. The lay-offs will be achieved by merging the timing technology division and the...

Infineon and ST warn over ; rising chip inventory levels.
January 19, 2005... Infineon Technologies has followed STMicroelectronics in warning that Q4 margins, and consequently earnings, would be weaker than expected. Like ST, Infineon blamed the weak dollar and rising inventories which reduced shipments and affected the...

Progress, but not solutions for roll-up displays, says CDT.
January 19, 2005... Cambridge Display Technologies, the OLED pioneering company which recently launched on the Nasdaq stock exchange, is rapidly advancing its technology but sees no solution yet to the problems of producing a roll-up, or fold-up, display. "Blue is...

PicoChip joins Chinese academy to crack 'biggest market for wireless and telecoms'.
January 19, 2005... Wireless baseband processing firm PicoChip has signed a partnership deal with the Institute of Computing Technology (ICT) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) to work on WiMAX technology. "China is the biggest market for wireless and...

Glasgow wireless test centre expands lab with RFID access.
January 19, 2005... Glasgow's Wireless Innovation Centre has expanded its test and demonstration lab, offering access to RFID, wireless modem technology and mobile phone networks. Launched last February, the Centre grants free access to its wireless systems and...

LSI Logic adds flexible memory architecture to platform Asics.
January 19, 2005... LSI Logic has stepped up its activity in the market for low entry cost platform Asics with design elements offering increased memory and improved I/O support. The launch of the RapidChip Integrator2 platform Asic family comes at a time when the...

Motorola adds to fixed wireless broadband products for Europe.
January 19, 2005... Motorola has expanded Canopy Advantage, its fixed wireless broadband system, to include products for use in Europe operating in the 2.4GHz, 5.4Gz and 5.7GHz frequency bands. "These products have been designed specifically for Europe - they have...

Firms collaborate to bring real data to comms design.
January 19, 2005... Test equipment firm Rohde & Schwarz has teamed up with tools firm Applied Wave Research to improve links between design and development. The firms said they will create a link for data between their products. This could allow real data from RF...

Government postpones WEEE dates following Directive legislation failure.
January 19, 2005... The Government has moved back UK target dates for compliance to the EU WEEE (waste) Directive. "At least this ends speculation," Claire Snow, director of the Industry Council for Electronic Equipment Recycling (ICER) told EW. According to the...

UK firm goes to China with Tetra radios.
January 19, 2005... Cambridge-based mobile phone firm Sepura has targeted the potentially lucrative China market with the demonstration of Tetra terminals working on the 800MHz frequency band. The firm's Tetra radios have been granted approval on the public safety...

Orange sees its data network as ideal for growing M2M telemetry market.
January 19, 2005... Mobile network operator Orange plans to take advantage of the expected growth in the machine-to-machine (M2M) telemetry communications market with what, it claims, is the "best data network in the country". "Our network was configured for voice...

Ruby ball luminescence sensor can measure temperature through fibre.
January 19, 2005... Faced with the problem of measuring temperature and humidity at multiple points in the confines of a prototype fuel cell, Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) has turned to luminescence-based measurement. The result is system based around a...

Steerable beams added to home Wi-Fi for video.
January 19, 2005... US start-up Video54 Technologies has added steerable beams to home Wi-Fi for video distribution. Called BeamFlex, the system automatically steers wireless signals around sources of changing interference using multi-bounce paths from internal...

In-car Mosfet rated 55V, 160A.
January 19, 2005... International Rectifier has introduced a pair of 55V-rated Q101-qualified D2Pak automotive HEXFET power Mosfets rated for continuous duty. The devices are designed to increase safety margin for specific load topologies where the higher voltage...

Signal control of DDR DRAM.
January 19, 2005... With double data rate (DDR) DRAM now being used in large capacity memory modules, Philips has a family of high-speed registers which are optimised for DDR2 DIMM loads. They offer a 1.8ns maximum propagation delay time, which is designed to meet...

Technical guide on thermal design.
January 19, 2005... The guide for engineers and managers with responsibility for thermal design of electronic hardware from the University of Limerick highlights technical issues that should be considered in purchasing thermal analysis software. It describes the...

Researcher 'cuts cost of seismometers'.
January 19, 2005... A researcher at Georgia's Mercer University claims to be able to cut the cost of seismometers. "Results point to the possibility of a volcanic eruption and earthquake detector for the masses," said the university. Based around a suspended...

Industry bodies will join forces to support design network cash call.
January 19, 2005... Three of the industry's most influential organisations are likely to put their combined political weight behind any new proposal to create a national semiconductor design network for the UK. Industry body Intellect, along with the IEE and the...

Distributed power is key to success.
January 19, 2005... or the first time distributed power bus design attracted both semiconductor and power module suppliers last year and there is no reason for the situation to change in 2005. Complex rack-based boards frequently use distributed power, with a...

Lead-free role for catalogue distribution.
January 19, 2005... he catalogue distributors will find themselves in the front line as the industry gets serious about designing and sourcing lead-free components in readiness for next year's EU Directive prohibiting the use of key hazardous substances - the RoHS...

Market gains lead to growth.
January 19, 2005... istributors' share of the components market is large as it has been at any time for as long as we can remember. The 2001 downturn in the electronics market took its toll in the distribution market, but one positive outcome has been an increase...

Bluetooth joystick debuts ; for mobile gaming market.
January 26, 2005... Eleksen has revealed its Bluetooth force-sensing joystick at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, aimed at games for mobile devices. The joystick is made from Eleksen's conductive elastic with a bend sensor measuring the degree and...

Chip benchmarking for entertainment.
January 26, 2005... A processor benchmarking suite has been released for processors aimed at entertainment products, along with results from several major chip makers. Called DENbench, the Digital Entertainment Benchmark Suite from benchmarking organisation EEMBC...

Electronics Leadership Council plans industry promotion timetable.
January 26, 2005... The UK's Electronics Leadership Council will start to discuss plans to promote the industry in three months time, according to David Kynaston, chairman of the Electronics Innovation and Growth Team (EIGT). The council, claimed Kynaston, will be...

Free space is best gate dielectric.
January 26, 2005... Researchers in the US have shown that free space is a more effective gate dielectric than silicon dioxide in single-crystal organic transistors. In a paper in the journal Advanced Materials, Etienne Menard and co-workers said that using free...

Glasgow photonics fab broadens focus into microsystems.
January 26, 2005... Photonix, the Glasgow fab previously known as CST, is shifting its business model from that of an open-access facility, to an operation offering both processes and services delivering chips. Frank Tooley, Photonix's CEO, said the generic tools...

North east gets design consultancy service.
January 26, 2005... Companies in the north east of England wanting to use electronics systems to help their business can now turn to a design and consultancy service based at the University of Durham. The Centre for Electronic-Nano Systems (CENS) is a...

Universities want design structure to aid research.
January 26, 2005... Representatives from UK universities have said that research activities need a design infrastructure which offers affordable access to design tools and prototyping facilities. A gathering of academics attending a "Common Vision" workshop at the...

Europeans to use EDGE GSM wireless in 3G network plans.
January 26, 2005... European mobile operators are about to start widespread use of the EDGE GSM enhancement technology in their networks as support for the rollout of 3G services over the next two years. During the rollout of 3G services it is inevitable that...

Antenova wins $12m funding for RF module with antenna.
January 26, 2005... Cambridge-based Antenova has secured funding of $12m which it will use to expand the company and develop products which will "change the electronics industry". Greg McCray, CEO of Antenova, said "a lot of the money" will go into developing a...

Group to represent micro and nano SMEs.
January 26, 2005... A new UK industry group called Micro & Nano UK SMEs Together (MUST) has been launched to represent the views, interests and issues facing SMEs involved in exploiting micro and nano technology (MNT). "Many other non SME organisations always seem...

Patent lawsuit success sees Canadian DRAM designer seek further compensation.
January 26, 2005... Canadian firm Mosaid is set to capitalise further on its patents in the DRAM industry after its recent success in a lawsuit with Samsung. This was closely followed by a new patent lawsuit brought against Samsung's fellow Korean DRAM...

Cadence improves ; wireless design with third parties.
January 26, 2005... Cadence has improved its support for wireless design from its Virtuoso platform, integrating tools from Agilent, CoWare, Helic and MathWorks. Also included are Cadence's Assura RF tool for parasitic extraction; two reference design flows for...

Government refuses to name analogue radio switch-off date.
January 26, 2005... The Government has backed off from suggesting a timetable for the switch-over from analogue to digital radio broadcasting claiming the technology is "too new" to do this yet. "We have not yet got the figures for the number of digital radios...

Lithography firm weighs up flat panel display move.
January 26, 2005... Dutch lithography equipment supplier ASML is evaluating a move into flat panel display production equipment. The company's CEO Eric Meurice said last week that there are significant cross-overs between the equipment used to pattern ICs and LCD...

Datacomms start-up raises $5.6m for R&D and marketing.
January 26, 2005... CacheLogic, the two year-old Cambridge start-up, has raised another $5.6m to expand its R&D and marketing operations in the peer-to-peer Internet datacomms industry. "Peer-to-peer traffic [data traffic which goes from one Internet user to...

Laser firm wins [pounds sterling]7m ; to expand.
January 26, 2005... Laser specialist Powerlase has secured [pounds sterling]7m of funding which it will use to expand its manufacturing facilities to deal with increased orders and also to develop products. "We're looking to extend the manufacturing area and staff...

Software firm offers 'no cure, ; no pay' verification service.
January 26, 2005... Verum Consultants has launched a software verification service that is free if the firm finds no bugs in a firm's code. The 'no cure, no pay' service is aimed at spotting and eliminating defects in code early in the design cycle. Verum said it...

Future of FPGAs lies in 'value devices' claims Actel.
January 26, 2005... Programmable logic firm Actel says the FPGA market will be controlled by 'value-based' devices in the coming years. "Value-based FPGAs are really attacking the Asic market," said Martin Mason, director of flash product marketing at Actel. The...

Analog Devices extends DSP family for IP uses.
January 26, 2005... Analog Devices has extended its Blackfin family of DSPs with four devices aimed at networked products. The devices are aimed at applications using Internet protocol (IP) and CAN-bus, such as set-top boxes, media players, automotive and...

EMC Directive passes into European law.
January 26, 2005... The revised EMC Directive has been published in the official journal of the EU, making it European law. "The actual [national] implementation has to be by 2007," Tim Williams of Chichester-based EMC consultancy Elmac Services told EW. According...

Altera to triple revenues via; structured Asic tape-outs.
January 26, 2005... This year Altera expects to triple revenues from HardCopy, its structured Asic replacement for FPGAs. "We've just exceeded 50 tape-outs and we're running at just over one per week," said Paul Hollingworth, senior director for HardCopy at...