Spark Microsystems: LP On-Chip Radios


Spark Microsystems is taking aim at on-chip radios that continue to be the primary source of battery drain, even in power-conserving designs like Bluetooth Low Energy. "If you wear AirPods, something like 80% of the power is going to power the radio, not the sound. That's not the most efficient approach." according to Frederic Nabki, co-founder of Spark Microsystems, and a former professor o... » read more

Ayar Labs: Faster I/O


Startup AyarLabs is using a combination of high-bandwidth fiberoptics, low-cost CMOS fabrication and careful target selection to strike efficiently at the datacenter's worst bottleneck. "Moore's Law only covers the processor, not how we move data in and out of it during processing or how to get the processor and memory working at the same speed," according to Alexandra Wright-Gladstein, co-f... » read more

PowerDown: Power Efficiency


Power Down Semiconductor wants to make the batteries in smartphones and IoT devices last 10 times longer by not wasting power they’ve already used. Every time an intelligent device has a thought, it pulls power from a battery and sends it through its maze of wires and millions of gates to create a O or a 1 at key points in the control and logic circuits. “Think about how much energy... » read more

Performance-IP: Less Memory Latency


The combination of more functionality on chips plus more contention for memories is forcing companies to look at different ways to improve performance. Just adding more processing power doesn't guarantee improved performance, and throwing more memory at a problem—either SRAM or multiple levels of cache—is expensive and not always faster. There are too many processors and too many request... » read more

GMK: Rethinking The Audio Jack


The lowly audio jack, taken for granted since the days of the transistor radio, is getting a lot of attention these days. Apple thought so little of it, in fact, that it eliminated it altogether with its iPhone 7, choosing to run analog signals through the power cable rather than keeping a separate audio jack. Now GMK, a fabless semiconductor startup in Korea, is taking the reverse approach—r... » read more

Getting The Jump On Analog/RF IP


When Magma Design was sold to Synopsys in 2012, then-president and COO Roy Jewell sat down with VC Lucio Lanza to figure out what to do next. As Jewell tells it, Lanza convinced him not to take another job. While it’s too early to tell if that was sage advice, it did trigger a search for a new business and a way of funding it. Jewell said that when Magma went looking for money, it raised $... » read more

Semitrex: Efficient Power Conversion


Power conversion is becoming a very big deal in the IoT world, as companies seek to connect the analog/physical world with the digital processing world. Enter Semitrex, a Laguna Beach, Calif.-based startup led by Michael Freeman—the same guy who won Emmy awards for a mobile technology video. His latest incarnation uses what it describes as cascading capacitors in a multi-chip module (MCM)... » read more

sureCore: ULP SRAM


Ultra-low-power technologies are suddenly very much in vogue. While three years ago it was almost impossible to raise venture funding in this space, it has become far easier in the past year as power becomes both a stumbling block and a competitive differentiator in the Internet of Things world. This is particularly true for wearable electronics such as multi-function watches. The ability to... » read more

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