Pre-compliance testing is a phenomenon that should be a no-brainer, but for lots of reasons—none of them good—it’s not always done. When you’re doing a design that requires RF and you don’t do the testing, you’re really asking for trouble. That goes double for a product that’s going to ship into multiple geographies. To understand how this process should occur, I spoke to Paul Denisowski, a Product Management Engineer at Rohde & Schwarz, on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast ....
Apr 24, 2024•8 min
Engineers are usually good at engineering, but writing? That’s a different story. In many cases, lacking the ability to write well can hurt engineers. This rears its ugly head when these engineers are job hunting. Having mis-spellings and bad grammar on a resume is a huge red flag. This is particularly true for some real cherry jobs attracting numerous applications. To understand what this means and the effect it could have on an engineer’s future, I brought back Marcus Webster, who is the princ...
Apr 17, 2024•11 min
AI MCU vendors have mostly been putting themselves into two camps when it comes to the ecosystem. On one side, the vendor is providing everything themselves. In the other camp, the vendor is relying on partners and the community at large to provide the ecosystem. I recently spoke to Steve Tateosian, SVP of Industrial MCUs, IoT, Wireless, and Compute Business at Infineon, as the company just announced a bunch of AI MCUs and I wanted to find out which camp he was residing in. Find out on this week...
Apr 10, 2024•11 min
In a rare move, I had two guests join me for this week’s Embedded Executives podcast , but for a good reason. I was joined by Mohammed Dogar, Vice President and Head of Global Business Development and Ecosystem at Renesas Electronics , and Sakya Dasgupta, Founder and CEO of EdgeCortix . I asked them to join me together because they have partnered on some interesting Edge AI technologies. We walked through the Renesas vision and strategy for AI and machine learning (ML) and how that led to the pa...
Apr 03, 2024•26 min
The Embedded Kit recently conducted a survey to understand the biggest challenges facing an embedded developer. You would think those challenges are obvious, and some of them are, but the survey uncovered some fairly interesting areas that are not so obvious. If you’re interested in finding out where those not-so-obvious challenges exist, check out this week’s Embedded Executives podcast with Pierre Gal, Head of Product Development at The Embedded Kit....
Mar 27, 2024•9 min
Do you understand the metrology that applies to semiconductor manufacturing? I know I certainly didn’t, and found out how little I knew about this essential technology when I spoke to David Doyle, the President and Managing Director of Heidenhain Corp . While mostly applying to semiconductors, the technology can be deployed on any manufacturing platform. But semiconductor manufacturing has to be so precise, and that’s putting it mildly, that things are measured in terms of microns and nanometers...
Mar 20, 2024•14 min
The LoRa Alliance recently conducted a user study to see how far LoRaWAN technology has penetrated into the community. If you’re not familiar, LoRaWAN is a low-power wide-area network that has a range that can be measured in miles. I wanted to understand what the results of the user study showed. Do developers feel confident in deploying the technology? How does it work globally? To understand more I spoke to the Alliance’s Chairwoman and CEO, Donna Moore, on this week’s Embedded Executives podc...
Mar 13, 2024•11 min
Are SOMs and COMs the same thing? Some people would say yes, but in reality, they are not. So, what’s the difference. To get a better understanding of the matter, I spoke to Matthew Burns, a Global Director at Samtec on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast . The second part of this discussion is which is appropriate for your application. Tune in to find out.
Mar 06, 2024•8 min
Have you ever heard of an isolator without a power supply? I hadn’t either, until now, sort of. That’s not exactly what Infineon is launching, but it’s close enough that I needed to have a conversation with Daniel Callen, Infineon’s Sr. Manager in the Power IC Group to understand exactly what the company is launching. If your application is in solid-state relays, industrial automation (PLCs), or commercial HVAC controllers, this is a conversation you should hear. Check out this week’s Embedded E...
Feb 28, 2024•10 min
MEMS have been used in lots of sensors and even in microphones. But, until now, I hadn’t seen them used in speakers. xMEMS Labs is one vendor that’s doing just that, and the sound is incredible. When you hear how it works, it really makes a lot of sense. And if you listen to this podcast, you will hear exactly how it works. Check out my discussion with Mike Housholder, the Vice President of Business Development at xMEMS Labs in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast ....
Feb 21, 2024•12 min
There’s a new sheriff in town when it comes to the Z-Wave Alliance , a newly formed standards development organization. The new Chairman of the Board of Directors at the Z-Wave Alliance is Avi Rosenthal, whose day job is the Managing Partner of bluesalve partners . I know Z Wave has been around for quite some time, but the Alliance was previously a manufacturer-owned group, and now it’s independent. That “launch” comes on the heels of a second supplier being added to the mix. Previously, you had...
Feb 14, 2024•11 min
COM Express has been around for at least a decade. While many people think of it as a standard architecture (it is), it can be customized in lots of different ways. To understand how a standard can be made custom while remaining standard, I spoke to Earle Foster, a Senior Vice President, Sealevel Systems in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast . It’s actually easier than you might think....
Feb 07, 2024•10 min
A few years ago, Microsoft acquired Express Logic, who’s key product was the ThreadX operating system . Fast forward to today, and Microsoft has released that operating system to the open-source community. Why did they do that? And what does that mean to the development community? I was really curious about these issues, so I spoke to Frédéric Desbiens, who manages the embedded, IoT, and Edge computing programs at the Eclipse Foundation on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast ....
Jan 31, 2024•16 min
We appear to be over the hump between hype and reality when it comes to GaN technology. Components and end products are readily available. But according to David Snook, the product line manager for GaN products at Texas Instruments (TI), we are just scratching the surface of where GaN’s potential lies. Hear more in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast ....
Jan 24, 2024•12 min
Timing devices within embedded systems are likely the most important components that you don’t know anything about. That’s a paraphrase from Piyush Sevalia, a Vice President at SiTime , and it’s certainly very true. When you get into 5G applications, the effects are often working against you, like use in extreme temperatures, or in ruggedized applications. This makes the tolerances even more difficult to match. What to do? Your first step is to check out this week’s Embedded Executives podcast ....
Jan 17, 2024•8 min
I feel like we have been two years away from fully autonomous vehicles for the last five years. It gets difficult to differentiate between what’s accurate and what’s fiction. To try to get at the truth, I spoke to Avijit Sinha, the newly appointed President of Wind River for this week’s Embedded Executive podcast . We get into the hardware, the software, and the standards. Note that Avijit was promoted just after we recorded this podcast!...
Jan 10, 2024•12 min
Are you familiar with Raspberry Pi ? Of course you are. But are you aware of all the things that you can do with it, or should do with it? First, if you think it’s a low-compute-power board, you are mistaken. Second, if you think you can’t go to production with a Pi, you’d be mistaken again. If you don’t believe me, listen to what Eben Upton, the Founder of Raspberry Pi had to say in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast ....
Jan 03, 2024•18 min
Memory is typically a very simple component in your embedded system—or is it? I spent some time with Barry Blixt, a Director for Microchip’s memory business . We went through a list of typical memory “myths” to determine what’s true and what’s not true. Does memory wear out? How about rotating memory? These are some of the topics we covered. Check out this week’s Embedded Executives podcast ....
Dec 20, 2023•12 min
When it comes to writing code, we have a manpower problem. While that’s true for most aspects of the embedded engineering/development space, it’s particularly true for those folks writing firmware, which is one of the most critical, yet least glamorous parts of our profession. What’s the solution? Is it AI, to have the code written for us? That’s one of the potential solutions. Listen to a few more in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast with Bill Merkel, Vice President of Business Developmen...
Dec 13, 2023•9 min
When it comes to the ecosystem, particularly around AI, you need all the parts to be available if you want to develop a system. We know that ecosystems forever continue to evolve, but it’s safe to dive into the waters at this point, according to Mohammed Dogar, the Vice President and Head of Global Business Development and Ecosystem at Renesas Electronics . In this week’s Embedded Executive podcast , we discuss, among other things, how the AI ecosystem has evolved, and what users can expect at t...
Dec 06, 2023•11 min
Wearable medical devices are poised to take off. I mean, really take off, thanks to a few different drivers, such as the aging population, the pandemic, and some concessions from the insurance companies. Manufacturers are ready to make these devices available, in a huge way. Think hundreds of millions. And if each one of those has an MCU, that’s a lot of MCUs. I got much more in depth in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast with Fritz Werder leads the Life business for Silicon Labs ....
Nov 29, 2023•13 min
Developers struggle with how to manage the power in their end devices. There’s obviously a tradeoff between performance and how much/how long to keep components powered up. It’s obviously application-specific, but it’s important to make the right decision. With Infineon’s PSoC device, those developers have some new choices, and are hopefully capable of simplifying the design at the same time. To understand more about the new device family, I sat down with Steve Tateosian, Senior Vice President o...
Nov 15, 2023•14 min
We talk about security a lot here at Embedded Computing Design. If it’s not the number one subject, it’s certainly in the top three. But the discussion I had with Thomas Rosteck, the Division President for Connected Secure Systems at Infineon Technologies went down a slightly different path, and that’s because, unfortunately, security is such a dynamic field, seemingly changing on a daily basis. Thomas walks me through the issues that are prevalent today, and I learned that those same issues may...
Nov 08, 2023•14 min
We have an engineering shortage. Anyone who's familiar with our space wouldn't dispute that. And if you look at the projections, we’re going to need a whole lot more of us going forward. Why is that the case, and more importantly, what are we going to do about it? To try and understand this dilemma and the potential solution(s), I spoke to Marcus Webster, who is the principal of Webster & Webster Associates and a recruiter for most of the companies that you’re aware of. Check out this week’s...
Nov 01, 2023•13 min
Quantum computing raises the potential for anything to be hacked, and that includes government systems. Hence, the people behind the CHIPS Act want to make sure that the money that’s used for semiconductor development is being used in the areas that it deems most important. To understand how that works, I spoke to Reza Azarderakhsh, the Founder and CEO of PQSecure Technologies on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast . Reza is tied pretty closely to this initiative, as his company specializes ...
Oct 25, 2023•11 min
Quantum computing can be a very complex area. Many experts will tell you that it could be as long as a decade before quantum computers actually appear on the scenes. This week’s Embedded Executives podcast guest says that his company is providing quantum computing today. Hear it directly from Chris Balance, the co-founder and CEO of Oxford Ionics .
Oct 18, 2023•11 min
If you’re a consumer, 5G is likely in your universe. If you’re working on the industrial side, you’re likely not seeing 5G at all. And it may be many years before it’s even available in limited deployments. Why is that? That’s the question I asked of Olivier Pauzet, the EVP of Strategy for Sequans Communications in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast .
Oct 11, 2023•13 min
Sustainability continues to be a topic of interest. First, what does sustainability actually mean? Second, what are some of the industry giants doing about it? In our space, STMicroelectronics would be one of those giants, so I spoke to Mahesh Chowdhary, an STMicroelectronics Fellow and the Senior Director of MEMS Software Solutions, about what’s happening at his company in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast ....
Oct 04, 2023•10 min
Bringing all the different elements together for an AI-based hardware platform is harder than it sounds, especially when you start considering the environmental conditions. Getting it to work in the lab is one thing, but the real world presents challenges you may not have thought of. SparkCognition has developed a test environment that considers everything because they are testing in the field, literally. To understand what that means, I spoke to Milton Lopez, the head of design for SparkCogniti...
Sep 27, 2023•13 min
There are better ways to write embedded code than the traditional methods. Doing it in a visual fashion is one of those ways. But how does that work, and how does it adapt specifically to my hardware? While you might have thought such technology was already available, Duncan Haldane, the CEO of JITX says that’s not the case. Hear what he has to say on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast ....
Sep 20, 2023•10 min
