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Headlines and summaries from the pages of Electronic Engineering Times . Previous editions are available from the 1994 , 1995 , 1996 , 1997 , and 1998 News Archives.
Friday, March 6, 1998Intel warns Pentium II chip set makers(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/6/98)Suppliers preparing PC chip sets for Pentium II systems could face legal action from Intel Corp., which has vowed to protect intellectual property it says is necessary for the chip sets. Three suppliers have announced plans for Pentium II chip sets, but none has obtained a license for Intel's intellectual property, according to Intel. Lunar Prospector aided by engineering, and luck(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/6/98)As the Lunar Prospector changes forever our view of the Moon, credit luck, timing and extraordinary engineering. NIMA completes digital-video specs(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/6/98)The Pentagon may approve as early as today video standards for high-definition imagery after completing a detailed analysis of Defense Department requirements for digital TV in military applications. Infrastructure takes shape for flip-chip and chip-scale packaging(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/6/98)The infrastructure for flip-chip and chip-scale packages is rapidly taking shape as equipment makers and packaging firms hustle to prepare for the high-density successor to ball-grid arrays (BGAs). Companies touted their efforts to meet rising demand for flip-chip and chip-scale packages earlier this week at the Nepcon conference here. Chip makers seek help for MPEG-2 Advanced Audio Coding(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/5/98)With the Japanese government's endorsement last month of the newly standardized MPEG-2 Advanced Audio Coding (AAC) as the audio coding algorithm for digital TV in Japan, IC vendors are beating the bushes for information on AAC and are seeking partners who will give them access to AAC intellectual property. To date, no o ne has launched a chip capable of processing AAC, and there is no one-stop shop for licensing the IP. Boards make a run at telecom(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/5/98)Computer board and system makers previewed their coming wares at the Computer Telephony Expo conference in Los Angeles this week, as they attempted to wedge their way into the explosive telecommunications equipment market. Hot-swap boards and systems, auxiliary computer-telephony buses and gear for a new integrated-telephony software specification were all present on the show floor, with availability promised by the middle of this year. Gates gets grilled by Senate Judiciary Committee on Microsoft's practices(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/5/98)For a man and a company used to calling the shots, Bill Gates and Microsoft Corp. must have felt they were in alien territory at this week's Senate hearing on Microsoft's domination of the U.S. s oftware industry. Thursday, March 5, 1998Mentor scraps Precedence Inc.(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/5/98)Mentor Graphics Corp. (Wilsonville, Ore.) will cease operations of Precedence Inc. and phase out that company's SimMatrix simulation backplane, after Precedence failed to capture the interest of the venture capital community. Brit firm demos radio triangulation method to locate cellular 911 callers(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/5/98)A requirement that U.S. cellular telephone handsets provide location information automatically--under the FCC's so-called E911 directive--could provide a boost to a small Cambridge, England, company. EEs lobby lawmakers to boost R&D funding(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/5/98)More than 200 engineers, scientists and businesspeople stopped by congressional offices late last month to urge lawmakers to bo ost R&D spending. Aart de Geus adds chairman's post at Synopsys(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/5/98)Aart de Geus, founder, president, and chief executive officer of Synopsys Inc., has been voted the company's chairman of the board, following an annual shareholder's meeting this week. Toshiba will transfer TFT display technology to Taiwanese company(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/4/98)Toshiba Corp. will transfer its front-edge TFT-LCD production technologies using 550 x 650-mm substrates to Washin Lihwa Corp. (Taipei, Taiwan). Digital cameras captured the gold at Nagano(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/4/98)Along with Tara Lipinski and the U.S. women's hockey team, a few other winners have stepped into the spotlight in the wake of the 1998 Winter Olympic Games. But despite their success at Nagano, technology go ld medalists such as digital cameras must now prove themselves in the real world--no easy task given their hefty price tags and a few nagging technical problems. 'Dog' sniffs out EEs(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/4/98)Collaborative recruiting of engineers and other high-tech workers is one of the new recruiting trends of the later 1990s. Joining San Jose, Calif.; San Diego; Richardson, Texas; and other high-tech regions is Rochester, N.Y., which is taking a more humorous tack in attempting to lure EEs and software types to the shores of Lake Ontario. Managers told to ditch old rules(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/4/98)Everything you've been told about managing a project is wrong. Or at least not entirely relevant. Flash driver model extends high-voltage predictions(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/4/98)Sony Semiconductor, Cadence Design Sys tems Inc. and BTA Technology will announce a new model for embedded flash memory drivers next week. The jointly developed model extends the accuracy of the techniques used to model high-voltage MOS transistors, the companies said. Wednesday, March 4, 1998Acer plans takeover of TI-Acer joint venture(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/4/98)Stymied in its desire to buy a used 6-inch IC fabrication line, Acer Inc. has agreed to buy out Texas Instruments Inc.'s entire holdings in TI-Acer Inc. Acer and TI today agreed that Acer will purchase the Dallas company's shares in their memory-chip joint venture.
Philips earns right to wear royal crown(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/4/98)Philips Electronics NV, the Dutch consumer-electronics giant, is set to change its name to Royal Philips Electronics.
Anadigics lays off close to 100 workers( 3:00 p.m. EST, 3/4/98)Anadigics Inc., a maker of high-frequency GaAs chips, surprised financial analysts with an announcement that it would take a $1.1 million charge in the first quarter of 1998, and lay off approximately 100 of its 580 workers. A combination of factors hit the company, according to market analysts, including declining defense/aerospace orders as well as a collapse in orders from Asian manufacturers of wireless handsets.
Deal could integrate RF ID chips into paper-based tags(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/4/98)SCS Corp., a developer of radio-frequency ID chips for contactless smart cards, has signed a manufacturing and technology integration deal with Hitachi Maxell Ltd. that will allow SCS's spread-spectrum chips to be embedded in an ultrathin card format. Maxell's manufacturing process is not only appropriate for contactless smart cards, but can also be used with standard lithographic printing processes. That means it might be poss ible to embed the RF ID chips in high-volume printed matter such as baggage tags and bar-code labels.
Unitrode, Benchmarq in power merger(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/4/98)Unitrode Corp. and Benchmarq Microelectronics Inc. (Carrollton, Texas) have agreed to merge in a deal that will have major ramifications for the power-management IC business.
IBM bolsters ASIC library with picoJava core(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/3/98)In one fell swoop, IBM Microelectronics today turned its ASIC library into a powerful base from which it can deliver Java-capable systems-on-a-chip to OEMs building embedded and intelligent-networked applications.
Holographic printers prepare for mass-market launch(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/3/98)Industry researchers say they're close to commercializing the fruits of a long-term MIT Media Lab project to devel op low-cost, practical holographic printers that yield high-quality holograms.
3-D chip-stacking scheme targets terabit networking(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/3/98)Using its 3-D chip-stacking technique to shrink optoelectronic switching components, Irvine Sensors Inc. is embarking on a development project that targets the network off-ramps of office trunk lines.
Compatibility quirks dog CompactPCI(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/3/98)At the very moment the CompactPCI standard is set to become a mainstay of embedded design, engineers are beginning to question its compatibility. At best, backers say CompactPCI-derived from the Peripheral Component Interconnect specs-is showing its flexibility in a varied market for embedded systems. At worst, would-be implementers are throwing up their hands at a host of incompatible implementations they say have become a nightmare.
Tuesday, March 3, 1998Intel pushes notebooks toward sub-$1,000 hot spot(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/3/98)Prices on notebook computers must come down if the mobile computer industry is to continue its growth, said an Intel Corp. executive at the Mobile Insights conference this week. But Intel is not yet ready to detail all of its plans to push notebooks into the so-called segment zero--the sub-$1,000 market hot spot pioneered by desktop PCs last year.
IBM shows tiny 1-inch 'consumer' disk drive(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/3/98)IBM Corp. disclosed work on a 1-inch hard disk drive at the Mobile Insights conference here yesterday. The matchbox-sized prototype drive, which fits into a new form factor defined by the CompactFlash Association, could carry as much as 400 Mbytes and cost $200, if IBM moves ahead with plans to produce the drive next year.
Cadence acquires U.K. en gineering consultancy(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/3/98)Cadence Design Systems Inc. (San Jose, Calif.) has expanded its design-services operation with the acquisition of Symbionics Ltd., a 120-person engineering consultancy in Cambridge, England. Privately held Symbionics had sales for the year ended March 1997 of about $17 million, and profits of about $3.7 million.
Millitech, Stanford Telecom win contracts for Denver's LMDS trial(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/3/98)Millitech Corp. and Stanford Telecommunications Inc. will provide equipment to establish a local multipoint-distribution service (LMDS) broadband pilot system here, under contracts from Formus International Inc.
PCMCIA may embrace fledgling 1394 and USB(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/3/98)Taking a long view of the future of the PCMCIA bus, a working group within the PC-card organization is considering a proposal that would also emb race the Universal Serial Bus and 1394. The forward-looking proposal comes at a time when mobile systems developers are distressed by the slow progress with the new serial buses.
Trio establishes interoperability test program for ADSL(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/2/98)Three sellers of Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL) silicon have established interoperability testing for their chip sets to promote wider usage of the technology. Texas Instruments Inc., Analog Devices Inc. and the telecom sector of Alcatel Altsthom will initially test the Discrete Multitone line codes specified for ADSL's physical layer. Later, the companies will move to higher-layer link and network testing, such as Point-to-Point Protocol over Asynchronous Transfer Mode.
Digital cameras expect big exposure in '98(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/2/98)With more than 100 different digital-camera model s offering improved image quality, ease of use and cheaper prices than older designs, the market for digital cameras is poised for explosive growth in 1998.
AMD may get copper technology from IBM(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/2/98)While IBM Corp.'s recent agreement with Advanced Micro Devices Inc. was properly described as a means for AMD to gain much-needed foundry capacity, the partnership could also allow AMD to gain access to IBM's groundbreaking copper-interconnect technology, which AMD could use in future processors, the companies said.
Monday, March 2, 1998VLSI Technology renews its efforts with ASICs(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/2/98)Having presented itself lately as a communications-market specialist, VLSI Technology Inc. returned to its roots today when it debuted an ASIC services division.
Natural Microsystems rolls CompactPCI c ards for telephony(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/2/98)Natural Microsystems Corp. (Framingham, Mass.) will take a leading role in promoting CompactPCI for telephony applications at Computer Telephony Expo, which opened in Los Angeles today. Barbara Loonam, product manager for the CompactPCI line at Natural Microsystems (NMS), said that plans to support the extension of PCI were in place almost two years ago, but the company had to await the completion of the H.110 telephony bus spec.
Analog Devices' converters pave way for 'software radio'(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/2/98)Given the choice, today's cellular-basestation suppliers would much rather convert an analog RF signal directly to the digital domain than downconvert it to IF and baseband frequencies. Even without direct conversion, basestation manufacturers will digitize an IF signal where they can.
IBM set to tape out merged DRAM/logic IC(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/2/98)The foundry operation within IBM Microelectronics will tape out its first merged DRAM-with-logic IC next month for a communications-systems customer, showing that "the time for embedded DRAM technology has finally arrived," said Ken Torino, director of semiconductor contract manufacturing at IBM.
Microsoft to broker in-home networking standard(11:45 p.m. EST, 2/27/98)Microsoft Corp. will attempt to place its imprint on yet another market in March when it announces plans to broker a standards effort in the emerging field of in-home networking. The software giant has been testing products from multiple suppliers in an effort to pick the ones it thinks should be the technology leaders. By summer, Microsoft hopes to hammer out interoperability standards that would range across systems using telephone lines, power lines, coaxial cables and wireless links.
WDM fiber takes one giant leap for MANs(11:45 p.m. EST, 2/27/98)Optical networks took a leap forward at the Optical Fibers Conference when several vendors detailed a new generation of wavelength-division multiplexing systems that make the "dense" WDM implementations of the past seem sparse by comparison. WDM systems with 50 wavelength-separated light channels are becoming commonplace, and Lucent Bell Labs reported on multi-terabit systems with up to 100 simultaneously operating channels.
Alliance pushes RJ-45-sized fiber connectors(11:45 p.m. EST, 2/27/98)An alliance of opto-component makers pushed transceiver miniaturization to a new level at this year's Optical Fibers Conference, proposing a connector module for multimode and single-mode fiber that fits the space constraints of an RJ-45 jack for twisted-pair copper. The intent is to make fiber lines as simple to insert into computers and networks as telephone lines.
In-vehicle PCs face bumpy road ahead(11:45 p.m. EST, 2/27/98)The PC moved into the driver's seat at the Society of Automotive Engineers show in Detroit in late February, where PC makers discussed products that would extend the computer's reach into the car for navigation, entertainment and many of the offerings of the Internet. If their scenarios play out as planned, drivers will get up-to-the-minute traffic info, check e-mail and make phone calls from a PC that will also be their radio.
Altera, Xilinx split over growing reconfigurable market(11:45 p.m. EST, 2/27/98)The two leaders of the programmable-logic industry--Altera Corp. and Xilinx Inc.--are taking starkly different approaches toward what may be the fastest-growing area in the high-density PLD market. The strategies, spotlighted at the Association for Computing Machinery's FPGA'98 conference in Mon terey, Calif., are gambles for both parties and could either cement or overturn Altera's regained market-share dominance.
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