Chip Industry Week In Review


By Susan Rambo, Karen Heyman, and Liz Allan. Renesas plans to acquire Altium, maker of PCB design software, for $5.9 billion. In a conference call, Renesas CEO Hidetoshi Shibata cited Altium's PCB design software and digital twin virtual modeling as key components of its future strategy. "I believe it will generate transformational value for our combined customers and our stakeholders," Shib... » read more

Week in Review – IoT, Security, Autos


Products/Services Arm TechCon got under way with a series of announcements. Arm is a founding member of the Autonomous Vehicle Computing Consortium, along with General Motors, Toyota Motor, DENSO, Continental, Bosch, NXP Semiconductors, and Nvidia. More information on the consortium is available here. “Imagine a world where vehicles are able to perceive their dynamically changing environment... » read more

Week in Review: IoT, Security, Autos


Products/Services Arm released a survey of 650 industry representatives about eSIM and iSIM technology. Ninety percent of the respondents were aware of eSIM, while 43% were unaware of iSIM. Vincent Korstanje, vice president and general manager, Emerging Businesses at Arm, cites the leading three obstacles to large commercial deployments: Resistance from traditional stakeholders (69% of respond... » read more

Week in Review: IoT, Security, Auto


Internet of Things Microsoft has new services and capabilities for Azure-connected Internet of Things devices. There’s a new IoT security tool called Azure Security Center for IoT, which ties in with other tools within Azure IoT Hub. Azure Security Center for IoT uses Azure Security Center, Microsoft’s threat intelligence offering. The new IoT security tool also hooks into Azure Sentinel, ... » read more

Explosive Growth Ahead


Over the next five years, sales across the semiconductor supply chain will double from $2 trillion to $4 trillion, said Ajit Manocha, president and CEO of SEMI, during the opening presentation at Semicon West this month. These are gigantic numbers, and they reflect some massive shifts now underway across the semiconductor industry. Many chipmakers have been trying to figure out the next big ... » read more

Will 5G Enable Connected Cars?


As the telecom, automotive and semiconductor ecosystems rally to develop solutions for next-generation mobile networks for the connected car, 5G technology has emerged as a strong contender. Fifth-generation mobile networks will enable data transmission rates of more than 10Gps, connecting machines to machines, as well as everything else, including smartphones, IoT devices that require a... » read more

Week 21 – Visiting Detroit


Who would have thought I’d end up sitting outside in the sunshine in downtown Detroit writing the first draft for my next blog. I’m here with a few of my Mentor colleagues to attend SAE Convergence and to have a discussion with GM about a possible DAC keynote. Stay tuned (and keep your fingers crossed) — I hope to tell you more about that at a later time. SAE Convergence is a two-day conf... » read more