My blog is the world's best!

Wow! I am overwhelmed!

This morning, when I stepped into the office, I'd no clue what lay ahead. This blog had been recently nominated in Electronics Weekly.com's first ever Electronics Blog Awards 2008, under the Electronic Hardware category.

My blog was declared the winner in this category!.

Several friends and well wishers have requested me to post an image about the winner's announcement page, so here it is!All of the other bloggers in the list are equally worthy, and they are all winners. My heartiest congratulations to all of my fellow nominees. I haven't even met anyone of you, ever! Hope I can, some time soon.

I've always maintained that love writing (or blogging) about things that are close to my heart. Semicon and telecom are prime in that category, two topics that I am really very fond of.

My blog -- well, it all started as a regular affair. There are a whole lot of great bloggers out there, who also write on similar topics. I was and am just one among those. Nor was and am I ever looking for traffic, etc., as it is my contention that people will only stop by and read your blog post or article IF there's something of interest to them. So, I was my only reader ;) I thought!

I didn't even realize that so many people would be reading my blog posts. Well, things changed somewhere, I don't know how. Wish I could thank everyone personally!

Thanks, dear friends, for stopping by my blog occasionally. I just don't have words to express myself.

All I can say is a big thank you to Electronics Weekly for picking up my blog. Thanks to the person who nominated my blog, as I've no idea who nominated it. Thanks also to Google for creating the Blogspot platform so that people like me can blog. Many thanks to all of those friends, well wishers and readers who voted for me. Hope you all find my blog useful.

Dear friends and readers, please keep those suggestions coming so I can strive to improve myself even further over time.

P.S. A former colleague and close friend, Debashish Choudhury, has also added a link on Global SMT site. The link is given here. Thanks Debu for the honor! ;)

Cybermedia/CIOL, very kindly, posted a news release announcing my victory. Many thanks for to CIOL and Cybermedia.

Later, in the evening, Pradeep Gupta, CyberMedia's managing director, sent out an email to the entire company, announcing my win. Thanks a lot for this very nice and touching gesture, Sir.

Finally, Electronics Weekly sent a mail to me saying: "You were the clear winner in your category, so congratulations! If I may, I'll send you a 'Blog Awards, Winner' badge for your blog, to commemorate the victory!" Thanks to Electronics Weekly again!

Four key drivers for Agilent!

Agilent has been a leader in T&M for quite some time, and India remains a key market for the company.

According to Venkatesh Valluri, President and Country General Manager, Agilent Technologies India, the global market size for T&M in electronics and life sciences is $43 billion. This includes $18 billion in electronics and $25 billion in life sciences. From the India side, the size is about $1 billion.

He says: "Testing is becoming a more integral part of the product development process, especially in general electronics. It is now coming of age. As for the rate of expansion, it is approximately 15-20 percent YoY, and it is higher in India than in other parts of the world."

Drivers for T&M
Telecom has been the leading driver. However, telecom growth may not be sustained YoY, for say, the next 10 years. "You can't get 100 million subscribers each year! The difference would be more in the quality of service (QoS). This automatically drives testing and measurement," he adds.

The second driver is the aerospace industry. The difference is through high-end technology. Agilent's ADC conversion technology is one of the best in the world. In the next few years, new programs will make this segment even more stronger.

The third driver is manufacturing electronics. In India, it is definitely not as aggressive as China, but it is coming up. Even most of the EMS players are present here. Therefore, some ecosystem is building up.

The fourth driver is the design validation process. As the global R&D centers start coming into India, the companies are also starting to do product design.

Agilent in solar
Hold it guys! Agilent is all set to play a big role in the emerging solar/PV segment as well. According to Valluri, in India, solar/PV is getting into a manufacturing transition.

He notes "Agilent plays strongly in the nanomeasurement area. As solar emerges in India, nanomeasurement technology will become important. Agilent has the AFM (atomic force microscopy), which is a leading product line."

Semicon in India
All of the large semiconductor companies are based in India. Also, a lot of high-end work is also happening here. The design validation market is slowly coming up.

Agilent feels that the semiconductor companies would need products with the right price points. There will be a need to build the right value at the right price points, says Valluri.

On the gloomy economic climate, he agrees that while the economic climate will not be so robust in 2009, Agilent operate in markets that are considered steady. "We believe that it will be reasonably okay to remain committed to such markets," he says.

China, India largest growth markets
Ron Nersesian, Vice President and General Manager, Wireless Business Unit, Electronic Measurements Group, Agilent, points out that it is good to see growth that has been happening.

He says: "Growth in our business has been exceptional. It is an opportunity to work with the local companies as well as the Nokias of the world. We also see opportunities in aerospace and defence, wireless R&D, and installation and maintenance areas. China and India are the largest growth markets."

Agilent's strategic intent is to become the leading test and measurement company.

"If you look at the new wireless standards, we would like to provide solutions for all of these standards. We are working on both WiMAX and LTE. We are working with the top wireless vendors as well, says Nersesian.

In aerospace, Agilent work on signal analyzers, signal sources, etc. It also makes network analyzers and component test products, as well as non-linear vector analyzers.

Agilent has also invested in the network surveillance area. "We are focusing on RF surveillance and solutions as well, which can be of great interest to the Indian government," adds Nersesian.

My blog's been nominated by Electronics Weekly!

It was indeed a pleasant surprise to receive an email from Electronics Weekly, yesterday evening, informing me that my blog was recently shortlisted/nominated in the 2008 ElectronicsWeekly.com Blog Awards by a reader of ElectronicsWeekly.com!

All of the nominated blogs have apparently been considered by the panel of judges at ElectronicsWeekly.com. The email said, "I am delighted to inform you that you have made the shortlist in the Best Electronics Hardware Blog category."

The entire list can be seen here!

Wow! I must add that here that there are such great blogs and bloggers in that list that I went dizzy for a few minutes!

I never expected my blog to reach this kind of appeal or level! Nor do I think I have that kind of traffic, as this blog has more to do with serious stuff, rather than talk about gadgets, etc. In fact, somebody once told me last year that no one would bother about a blog on semicon and electronics, nor would I get any traffic!

Well, all of this has never bothered me. I'm here to blog about what I feel is close to my heart! If folks happen to stop by, I am extremely grateful to all of them!

Irrespective of whether I win this award, it is just the right time to thank all of the readers of this blog! Thanks to all of you for choosing to stop by my blog occasionally! I sincerely hope you find the content interesting and appealing enough.

There's lots happening in the semiconductor, electronics and telecom industries, and hope that I am able to add my views on all of those in the coming months.

Thanks again, my dear readers. Please keep those suggestions coming. I will try to live up to your expectations. Have a great Halloween, everyone!

Motion sensors driving MEMS growth

In a recent report, iSuppli predicted that driven by new demand from consumer electronics (CE) and wireless applications, the global market for microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) will expand to $8.8 billion in 2012, up from $6.1 billion in 2006.

I caught up with Jérémie Bouchaud, Director and Principal Analyst, MEMS, iSuppli Corp., to find out more about the dip in the fortunes of the mainstay products and the latest trends in the MEMS market, especially, the significance of consumer electronics applications such as motion sensors for gaming, laptops and DSCs, and mobile handsets.

Will the mainstay products for MEMS actuators, inkjet heads and DLP chips, will lose market share? Or, is it a slight dip?

Jérémie Bouchaud says that MEMS actuators, include inkjet and DLP, and also RF MEMS switches. While selling prices stay constant, MEMS inkjet heads are losing shipments at a rate of 6 percent per year over the forecast period, so the market grows only slightly at 0.4 percent CAGR from 2006-2012.

DLP shipments continue to grow, but price erosion is running at 10 percent CAGR, which means that the market is shrinking at close to 5 percent per year to 2012. RF MEMS switches are the one bright spot that helps the market for this type of MEMS device to recover slightly in 2012. RF MEMS switches will grow at 100 percent CAGR over this time to top $260 million in 2012.

The new wave is partly founded in the rapid rise of consumer electronics applications such as motion sensors for gaming, laptops and DSCs, and mobile handsets. How much share are these segments likely to garner?

According to the analyst, all types of sensors in wireless communications and consumer electronics (inertial, pressure, microphones, filters, oscillators etc) exceed $1,5 billion: or 17 percent of the total MEMS market.

"Specifically, the motion sensing opportunity, including accelerometers and gyroscopes, for consumer applications like MEMS accelerometers for mobile phones (e.g., image rotation such as in iPhone and Nokia phones), gaming (Nintendo Wii, Playstation 3), etc., and gyros (mostly digital still cameras and camcorders, gaming like Playstation 3) will grow at over 20 percent CAGR from 2006 to 2012 to exceed $680 million, about 8 percent of the total market," he said.

iSuppli has also mentioned automotive as a key area for MEMS. What kind of growth does it see for automotive?

Bouchaud adds that automotive will grow at 8 percent CAGR to reach $2.1 billion in 2012, up from 1,3 billion in 2006. The market is largely driven by mandates for tire pressure monitoring, electronic stability control systems and reduced emissions, accelerating growth for pressure and inertial sensors.

So, will "new players have a chance to address a relatively open market", and if yes, what would those markets be?

Bouchaud indicates that the consumer electronics market is more open than the automotive sector, which features established, long-term supply arrangements, and production cycles lasting five or more years.

CE applications are characterized by fast time-to-market and short product lifetimes. For example, mobile phones that change yearly or even more frequently, and supply agreements satisfied by fast manufacturing ramp-up and ability to meet seasonal demand spikes, and often several suppliers in the same product, (e.g. ST and ADI in Wii). As sensor specifications are more relaxed than automotive, price and footprint are most decisive.

Will there be a growth in dedicated mass production facilities then?

According to him, several large MEMS players, e.g., STMicroelectronics, Freescale and Bosch Sensortec, have or are now invested in upgrading to 8" production facilities to meet the higher demand from the consumer sector. By 2011, at least 12 companies will operate at this larger wafer size.

"Some companies like Analog Devices are at the limit of their current capacity, due to its strong automotive sensor offering, and has recently decided to work with non-MEMS CMOS foundries like TSMC, a first in the industry. UMC will also join the MEMS community, partnering with Asian Pacific Microsystems," he says.

And, how would the new entrants be investing in R&D? Will they be doing enough?

The analyst says that R&D rates run high in automotive (12-15 percent of MEMS revenues) and even higher in consumer (can be 15-20 percent). The high R&D rate is needed to sustain leading edge products in fast moving markets. Deep R&D pockets are needed, a luxury that is not available to all.

Elaborating a bit more on the market consolidation, he says: " Today, the share of the MEM revenues in the hands of the top 30 MEMS companies grew at about the same rate as the market. The markets that drive growth in MEMS are consumer electronics and automotive sensors.

"The sensors will be increasingly commoditized due to extreme price pressure in both sectors, and iSuppli expects the production of MEMS devices for these two markets to be concentrated among fewer companies in the future. One facet is manufacturers attempting economies of scale by combining sales in automotive and consumer areas, e.g. at Bosch, and in future with Freescale and ST.

"Other companies are pioneers and hold a strong market position for a relatively long time. Examples are TI with DLP chips and Knowles with MEMS microphones. We also expect more M&As in the near future to exacerbate the consolidation."

ARPUs up for most CDMA2000 carriers; UMB needs push

This blog is a part two of my conversation with CDMA Development Group's (CDG) Executive Director, Perry LaForge.

With China Telecom now pushing CDMA in China, CDG views this initiative, as a tremendous opportunity for CDMA in China. It has been working closely with China Telecom, a CDG member, as the carrier transitions China Unicom's CDMA assets.

LaForge says: "Having China's largest wireline operator focused on expanding CDMA2000 services and bundling them within their telecommunications portfolio will only increase their opportunities for success. We also look forward to seeing China Telecom introduce into China a large variety of new mobile broadband services enabled by Rev. A."

Let us now look at global operators and how they have attempted to crack the ARPU (average revenue per user) challenge.

According to LarForge, looking at recently-announced Q2 numbers, ARPUs are up across the board for most leading CDMA2000 operators and a lot of what is driving that is wireless data ARPU.

* In the US, Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel have announced increased wireless data ARPUs in Q2 2008. Verizon's total data ARPU is up to $12.58, representing 24.41 percent of their total ARPU and a CAGR of 31.3 percent. The ARPU generated by Sprint's CDMA2000 subscribers has increased by 21 percent year-over-year to $14, representing 21.43 percent of their total ARPU.

* In Japan, KDDI continues to see wireless data ARPUs exceeding $20. LG Telecom increased its ARPU by 18 percent since launching Rev. A.

* In Europe and Russia, CDMA450 operators are seeing ARPUs well above $50. For example, Telefonica 02's non-SMS data ARPU now accounts for 43 percent of its total ARPU in the Czech Republic.

Since launching EV-DO, Skylink's profits from high-speed broadband data services in Russia have increased from 7 percent to 35 percent. In Norway, Rev. A is helping Nordisk Mobiltelefon get a 100 percent return on their investment in less than two years with only 100,000 subscribers.

* In Latin America, Centennial's ARPU from its Rev. A network in Puerto Rico is one of the highest in this market reaching $65 in a marketplace where the average for its competitors is somewhere in the $50s.

Data revenue is a key driver in delivering Centennial's competitive edge, currently accounting for approximately $7.50 per user on a monthly basis, and growing.

* In Africa, Starcomm's Rev. A subscribers in Nigeria generate in excess of $80 ARPU, which is more than three times higher than $24.25, which is the combined revenue they generate from voice and data from its average subscribers.

Clearly, technologies such as EV-DO Rev. A and HSPA are helping operators realize the expectations of 3G, which includes increased ARPUs from wireless data. CDMA2000 has cracked the ARPU challenge, for now, and is meeting the industry's expectations for 3G.

Finally, what's the status with UMB (ultra mobile broadband). Are the operators ready to embrace this technology?

As of now, no operators have made a commitment to UMB, yet.

LaForge says that LTE has garnered the most outspoken support when it comes to OFDMA-based mobile broadband technologies. The CDG is committed to assisting all of its members as they seek to complement their 3G CDMA assets through interoperability with LTE, Mobile WiMAX or UMB.

Make unique fashion statements with E Ink!

This is a continuation of my conversation with E Ink. An Electrophoretic Display (EPD) company and headquartered in Boston, the company makes rolls of EPD film that are later shipped to partners.

Founded in 1997 based on research started at the MIT Media Lab, E Ink Corp. is a leading supplier of electronic paper display (EPD) technologies. Products made with E Ink's revolutionary electronic ink possess a paper-like high contrast appearance, ultra-low power consumption and a thin, light form.

Recently, the company achieved a number of design wins in Japan. Throwing light on these developments, Sriram Peruvemba, Vice President of Marketing, E Ink Corp., said that the company's customers in Japan include Sony (for eBooks), Casio (for mobile phone the GzOne, most rugged version), Citizen (for signage products), Seiko (for wrist watches), Hitachi (for mobile phone, case art display), Teraoka (for Ink In Motion signs), Toppan (for train station arrival/departure information signs).

Based on E Ink's design wins in Japan, is there are a possibility that there will be more mobile phones using film-based displays?

Peruvemba said: "We see sub-segments of the mobile phone market that is disatisfied with the amount of use per battery charge with current LCD technology. We see opportunities for customers to make a unique fashion statement with their products by using our displays. Our displays are slightly thicker than a sheet of paper, so, it is easy to incorporate them as the outside skin of a mobile phone."

The display can be cut to any shape. The company encourage designers to "think outside the rectangle", the rectangle representing traditional display technologies, and there is no glass to break making E Ink's displays the most rugged.

Smart design trends
Given E Ink's vision of having a presence on every smart surface, it would be interesting to find out the company's views on the design trends among displays, and in semiconductors.

For starters, customers used to 30 hours of continuous operation on their eBooks will no longer accept two hours on their laptop battery or just a few hours on their cell phone battery, as the demand for lower power consuming displays will increase.

Peruvemba added: "Designers that hitherto designed their product to accommodate a rectangular display will seek displays that will work around their design, displays that offer unique shapes and sizes such as what is available with technologies like E Ink's EPD. Adoption of reflective display technologies into mobile phones, GPS, PDA's and laptop computers, will allow us to read the display outdoors without having to squint, shield the screen or seek shade."

This spring E Ink had announced new product advancements, like its next generation segmented display cells (SDC) and a new controller for active matrix displays that allows for menu options and pen-input. E Ink is offering a prototyping kit for each product line.

Elaborating on these developments, Peruvemba said that the segmented displays were relaunched with three major changes. They are now more flexible/bendable, they can tolerate a wider temperature range (-10 to +60 deg Centigrade)and are thinner (less than 400 micro meters).

"These features allowed E Ink to win designs with smart card makers, penetrate industrial market segments for battery indicators, and go where no display has gone before," he concluded.

CDG sees great opportunity for CDMA in India

Some time early this month, a very interesting development took place in Korea's telecom market. The CDMA Development Group (CDG) reported that LG Telecom's new CDMA2000 1x EV-DO Revision A (Rev. A) data service is flourishing in the Korean wireless services market, adding about 100,000 new data subscribers per month to its 3G data service, "OZ" ("Open Zone").

The OZ service has already resulted in a 14 percent increase in data average revenue per user (ARPU) from the previous quarter and a total of 287,000 OZ subscribers at the end of July.

Launched in April 2008, OZ gained market momentum by offering Korean consumers full-featured handsets with the compelling benefits of wireless broadband data services. The OZ service includes full browsing on the open Internet and unlimited fast data downloads, all at a flat-rate price. LG Telecom will expand its OZ service offering with 10 or more OZ-capable mobile handsets before the year end.

I caught up with Perry LaForge, executive director of the CDG, to find out a bit about the success of Rev A, and a little bit more about the global CDMA scenario, ARPUs, and his views on India, invariably!

Giving his overview of the global CDMA market, he said that globally, CDMA is growing rapidly and the ecosystem is strong. We're in the process of updating our numbers, but at the end of Q2 there were over 451 million CDMA subscribers worldwide, including 438 million CDMA2000 subscribers.

The EV-DO subscriber base grew from 65 million to 91 million over the past year, achieving a CAGR of 40 percent. Since the beginning of 2007, the number of commercial EV-DO Rev. A networks has also grown from three to 43, with another 35 being deployed.

CDMA continues to be the dominant technology in North America, while subscribership is growing fastest in Asian countries such as India and Indonesia. Additionally, the recently-restructured Chinese telecommunications sector has created a tremendous opportunity for CDMA with China Telecom.

Let's see what kind of services does Rev. A bring to Korea and globally. LaForge added: "LG Telecom launched its flat-rate "OZ" mobile broadband service, which is enabled by Rev. A and has been immensely popular, bringing in more than 100,000 subscribers per month since April 2008.

"The connectivity enabled by Rev. A is opening up a whole new level of wireless services to operators around the world, including user-generated content/social networking, broadcast TV/multicasting, mobile commerce, push-to-X, mobile advertising, mobile commerce, enterprise productivity applications and public safety initiatives."

So, how does the CDG foresee CDMA's growth in India?

Certainly, CDG sees an incredible opportunity for CDMA growth in India, especially when mobile broadband EV-DO services become widely available. Commenting on the new 3G spectrum policy, LaForge said it allows CDMA operators to gain access to 2x1.25MHz 3G spectrum in the 800MHz frequency band is a welcome first step towards that goal.

He added: "We welcome the DoT's announcement of the spectrum guidelines for 3G services and congratulate the DoT for opening up the IMT-2000 recognized bands of 450MHz and 1900MHz bands for 3G services, in addition to the 2100MHz band.

"Although no spectrum is currently available in the 450MHz and 1900MHz bands, we trust that they will soon be made available for bidding to maintain a level playing field with GSM operators.

"Just as the competitive forces of CDMA2000 1X stimulated the rapid growth of telephony penetration in India, we expect EV-DO will add the necessary impetus to take the growth of Internet penetration in the country to the next level.

"The CDG agrees with the recommended principles of using spectrum efficiently, ensuring technology and service neutrality, and establishing a level playing field through auctioning with a reserve price for allocation of 3G spectrum."

Part two follows in the next blog.