According to a study released on the eve of CES by Accenture “heightened data security concerns, falling demand for smartphones and tablet PCs, and stagnant growth in the Internet of Things (IoT) market” are combining to stymie consumer electronics industry growth. While slow uptake of new products is normal, data security concerns… Read More
Honda Driver-aware Connected Car Insights from Patents
Honda patent applications US20130245886, US20140276112, US20140309881, US20140303899, US20140371984, US20150126818, US20160001781 and patent US8698639 describe systems implementing state monitoring of a driver for automatically adjusting the operation of a vehicle in response to the driver state (e.g., driver’s… Read More
The Best Analyst Presentation at SEMI ISS 2016!
The problem I have with semiconductor analysts and media today is that they rarely have depth in what they are talking about. Some because they have never actually worked in the industry and others because they have not worked in the industry since the 1970s. One famed analyst even repeated the mythical “Fabs cost $10B” generalization… Read More
Microsoft Cloud-based Connected Car Service Insights from Patents
Microsoft patent application US20150262486 and patents US9092984 and US9218740 illustrate a cloud computing service to assist drivers with respect to improving driver safety. The cloud-based driver assistive system can warn drivers upon impending collisions.
The cloud-based driver assistive system includes many grid… Read More
Chips on the road to deep learning
CES has been morphing into an automotive show for several years now. Chipmakers were pitching control solutions, infotainment solutions, then connectivity solutions. Phone makers pitched device integration. Automotive electronics suppliers pitched MEMS sensors and cameras. Now, with a lot of pieces in place, the story … Read More
What’s Eating Silicon Valley
Like most people, I look up to and admire the heroes of Silicon Valley (the real ones, not the ones from the TV show). They’ve given rise to services (e.g., Google, Facebook, Uber, LinkedIn, Airbnb) that we use every day and make the world a better place. They’ve created value, wealth, and opportunity at unprecedented historic levels.… Read More
Freescale: The End of a Long Journey – Part II
There is a famous story about Bill Gates’ mother, Mary Maxwell Gates, asking guests on a dinner table about the single biggest factor that contributed to their success. The answer of Bill Gates and Warren Buffet was the same: Focus.… Read More
Internet of Things 2015 Year End Review (2): A Patent Perspective of Emerging IoT Products
Smart Home Robots
US20140207282 illustrates a household robot that can take care of your home. The household robot can monitor the state of a home, clean the home and turn on/off various appliances for you automatically and transmit the surveillance data to you in an emergency condition detected by the robot. As illustrated in … Read More
Urban Mobility – Innovative Solutions to Tough Challenges
Challenges of urban mobility are not only traffic congestion and accidents, but also pollution level, energy efficiency, cleaner, safer, and reliable environment. Cities in Asian region, specifically India and China are struggling to control extra-high level of pollution on this date. In Delhi, the first brute force attempt… Read More
VW at CES – a Mea Culpa and a Bid for Redemption
There must be few less enviable jobs right now than Chairman and CEO of VW. According to Dr. Herbert Diess who has that dubious honor, the VW board debated whether they should attend CES this year and decided that on balance it was better to be visible, face the music and present their technology progress and visions than to lay low.… Read More
Will 50% of New High Performance Computing (HPC) Chip Designs be Multi-Die in 2025?