portabledesign

With over 5000 catalog products, Micrel offers a broad range of high-performance analog, mixed signal and digital ICs that address high-growth markets including cellular telephones, portable electronics, set-top boxes, desktop and notebook computers, networking and communications. The majority of the company’s revenue is derived from power management standard products that largely target portable designs.

Ray Zinn is a cofounder of Micrel and has been its President, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of its Board of Directors since the company’s inception in 1978. Like many of Silicon Valley’s founders, Ray began his career at Fairchild Semiconductor. In those days you couldn’t just call up Applied Materials if you needed tools, you had to make them yourself. Ray invented the wafer stepper in 1974, a basic technology that has been in use ever since. That process orientation and drive to invent new technologies has been a constant at Micrel ever since.

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Interview conducted by Portable Design Editor-in-Chief John Donovan December 3, 2007.

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Right after choosing a CPU for a new design, the next thing most designers then turn to the memory subsystem. With a wide—and rapidly evolving—range of choices between memory types, interfaces and devices, there is a lot to sort through. Denali Software sits right at this decision point, providing models for simulating and verifying most memory devices; verification IP for validating compliance with complex interface protocols; NAND flash management software; and memory controller IP for PCI Express, DDR-SDRAM, and Flash.

Portable Design sat down with Denali’s CEO Sanjay Srivastava, as well as Brian Gardner, Denali’s VP for IP Products, and Marc Greenberg, Technical Marketing Manager, to discuss the ins and outs of memory modeling and management in portable designs.

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Alereon is an Austin semiconductor firm specializing in high-bandwidth, low-power Wireless USB and WiMedia UWB chipsets for PCs and portable products. Alereon’s AL5000 Worldwide Wireless USB Chipset is currently the only silicon that operates over the full 3.1 to 10.6 GHz spectrum, giving developers all 49 UWB channels across all 14 UWB bands over which to transmit.

Portable Design interviewed Alereon’s CEO Eric Broockman about his views on Ultrawideband, Wireless USB and a wide range of wireless issues that affect portable designs. Watch for the interview in a forthcoming issue of Portable Design.

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After inventing the planar semiconductor and giving birth to the semiconductor industry in Silicon Valley, Fairchild Semiconductor has gone on to become a premier power semiconductor company–and more, recently, an active advocate of green technology, an area where it’s well positioned to make some significant contributions.

Portable Design sat down with Fairchild’s CEO Mark Thompson to catch up with his views on portable power, green power, and where the semiconductor industry is headed. The podcast is an excellent primer on all three. The interview will appear in the February, 2008 issue of Portable Design.

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Portable Design interviewed Carl after his 2007 ConfigCon keynote, following up on some of the issues he raised and raising some of our own. Interesting, informative and relatively short (11 min.).

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On November 6, 2007 at the SDR Forum Tech Conference in Denver, Portable Design interviewed Joe Mitola of Mitre Corp. Mitola is–to understate his role–one of the originators of Software-Defined Radio and cognitive radio (CR). This interview runs 54 minutes, but it’s entertaining, wide ranging and an excellent update on SDR and CR theory and practice.

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ARC’s CEO talks about “Technologies Enabling the YouTube Generation” in the opening keynote to ARC’s annual ConfigCon in Santa Clara, CA December 4, 2007.

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Day one keynote at SDR Tech Forum, Denver, 5 November 2007. Dr. Kielman provides an overview of the Office for Interoperability and Compatibility (OIC) of the Department of Homeland Security, and current initiatives taking place within. As evidenced by its practitioner-driven approach, OIC supports the Software Defined Radio Forum’s efforts to involve emergency response practitioners by creation of a Public Safety Special Interest Group.

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