Southern Africa
The telecoms cable manufacturing businesses and assets of Reunert and Altron merged on 1 February 2007 following the approval of the proposed merger by the Competition Tribunal. The merged entity, known as CBi-electric Aberdare ATC Telecom Cables, will operate from the existing Reunert facility in Brits, North West Province. The new company will be capable of producing the entire spectrum of copper and optical fibre telecoms cables, said Reunert. The assets located at the Aberdare facility in Port Elizabeth will be moved to Brits over time. The current managing director of CBi-electric: Telecom Cables, Koos Vorster, will head up the new operation. Ruenert says that the operation will be jointly controlled by itself and Altron, through their respective subsidiaries and their empowerment partners.
Motorola has signed an agreement with Neotel, South Africa's second national operator, for RF planning of its wireless networks in South Africa, which will in future include WiMAX and CDMA. Neotel officially launched its first services to the wholesale telecoms market on 31 August last year.
Tellumat has announced that it has received an order for X-band transponders from the Airports Authority of India (AAI). The XBT-2000P will be installed at remote island airfields to assist in positioning and identifying the landing zone using an aircraft's X-band weather or surveillance radar, said Tellumat. The original magnetron-based XBT-2000 was designed and produced by Tellumat in the early 1990s for military special forces, later enhancements included a chip-and-wire solid state transmitter.
Spectrum Visual Networks (SVN), a leading South African digital media solutions provider, co-exhibited with German engineering company Kinoton, its digital signage software supplier, at London Screen Expo Europe 2007 in January. This is a premier event for Europe's digital media and digital signage industry. Kinoton and SVN have worked together in deploying the world-leading 360° display unit, a patented advertising medium, with Kinoton providing the hardware and SVN supplying its digital signage software, Móbila, to the network.
The Southern Africa Amateur Radio Satellite Association will be holding its annual space communications conference in Gauteng on 23 June 2007 and has issued its first call for papers. Papers should be of a technical or operational nature and cover any of: satellite communication, weak signal communication, orbital mechanics, related software applications, and exploration of space such as SETI. The theme: 'Space: new Frontiers' relates to SA's latest satellite that is planned for launch in June. It will carry amateur radio equipment designed and built by radio amateurs and incorporated into the satellite by the University of Stellenbosch. Deadline for synopsis submissions is 17 March 2007. E-mail in Word to [email protected].
Overseas
Business
ARM Holdings reported a comprehensive loss for its fourth quarter and its full year, which it said was entirely due to the effect of foreign currency adjustments. Warren East, chief executive officer for ARM, said the foreign currency adjustment was not related to trading profit and loss but was an accounting rule that the balance sheet had to reflect a revaluation of assets. Revenues in Q4 2006 were £68,0m, up 8,1%. The income before income tax in Q4 2006 was £9,4m compared to £15,8m in Q4 2005.
Companies
NXP Semiconductors has announced that it will acquire Silicon Laboratories' AeroFONE single-chip phone and power amplifier product lines for $285m in cash. NXP said it will integrate Silicon Labs' RF CMOS technology into its platform for one-chip RF transceiver solutions.
Spectrum Control has announced that Spectrum Microwave, its wholly-owned subsidiary, has acquired EMF Systems, a designer and manufacturer of custom oscillator-based products, including phase-locked oscillators and synthesizers. The total purchase price was approximately $2,3m.
Vectron International has completed the acquisition of BiODE, a designer and manufacturer of fluid viscosity sensors and viscometer readers. The BiODE organisation will be integrated into Vectron's Sensors and Advanced Packaging (SAP) business unit.
QinetiQ Group of the UK has signed a definitive merger agreement to acquire Analex, a US specialist in providing IT, aerospace engineering and security and intelligence support services for defence, intelligence and space programs, for approximately $173m.
Wurth Elektronik eiSos Group has announced the acquisition of Midcom, a manufacturer of a broad range of transformers for analog, digital, power and LAN applications. The new company will be named Wurth Electronics Midcom.
National Semiconductor is acquiring Xignal Technologies, a German-based developer of high-speed data converters. Xignal is a developer of continuous-time sigma-delta ADCs, a technology that enables high-resolution ADCs at megahertz speeds with reduced power levels compared to traditional pipeline solutions.
Royal Philips Electronics has completed its acquisition of Partners in Lighting International (PLI). PLI is a European market leader in home luminaires. Together with PLI, Philips hopes to establish a strong presence in the emerging market for solid-state lighting solutions in the home, that will enable consumers to create different lighting atmospheres with energy-efficient LEDs.
Erni Elektroapparate has changed its name to Erni Electronics, which it says affirms its global presence and product portfolio for the international market. Company founder Ernst Rudolf Erni entered Erni Elektroapparate into the commercial registry over 50 years ago, when it began manufacturing electrical devices. In 1967 the company entered the interconnect market with the first backplane connector - which today remains its core competency. Erni has a staff of 500 and a turnover of around 130 million Euros for the 2006 fiscal year.
Power Analog Microelectronics (PAM), a developer of Class-D digital audio amplifiers and high-power LED display driver semiconductors, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) have agreed to jointly develop a bipolar-CMOS-DMOS (BCD) technology based on a 0,25 μm high-voltage process specifically tailored to high-performance power analog ICs used in audio and video displays and devices.
Maxim has concluded an IC-manufacturing agreement with Japan's Seiko Epson where Seiko will manufacture Maxim's leading-edge, mixed-signal semiconductor products designed for power-management and battery-management applications.
The European Commission's Joint Research Centre has selected mobile messaging operator Clickatell to run its EMM (European Media Monitoring) SMS alert service. The realtime service informs Commission spokespersons and nominated EC VIPs, of important breaking news detected by the EMM.
Osram and Royal Philips Electronics have signed a patent cross-licence agreement covering optoelectronic semiconductors. The agreement involves the mutual licensing of patents for all inorganic and organic LED technologies. Osram said the agreement relates to patents held by Philips, including its US subsidiary Philips Lumileds Lighting Company, and by Osram, including its subsidiary Osram Opto Semiconductor.
Industry
The global semiconductor market hit a new record in 2006 with a sales volume of $247,7 bn, up 8,9% from 2005, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA). December sales declined 3,6% to $21,7 bn. Compared to the previous year's total, the monthly total represented an increase of 9%. Quarterly sales in the fourth quarter also rose 9% to $65,2 bn year-over-year. The three-month moving average declined 1,9%. With healthy economic conditions expected to continue in major markets, SIA is forecasting that the semiconductor market will grow 10% to $273,8 bn in 2007.
Nokia shipped more mobile handset units in 2006 than its next two closest competitors combined, according to market analyst iSuppli. Sony Ericsson, however, was the biggest mover, posting highest quarter-over-quarter growth of all mobile-phone makers, with shipments rising 61,5% to 26 million units, up from 16,1 million units during Q4 of 2005. In 2006 Nokia shipped 348 million units while Motorola and Samsung Electronics together shipped 335,3 million units.
Honouring the most beneficial products to the semiconductor industry, the International Engineering Consortium (IEC) announced at DesignCon 2007 that Altium Designer 6 won the prestigious IEC DesignVision 2007 Award for its uniqueness, innovation and benefits to the electronics industry.
Technology
Broadcom has introduced a new chip that combines Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and FM, or frequency modulation. The BCM4325 uses Broadcom's InConcert algorithms to solve interference problems between Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, which both operate in the 2,4 GHz frequency range. This single chip features IEEE 802.11a/b/g integration and supports Bluetooth 2.0. Meanwhile, Texas Instruments has introduced two devices designed to integrate Wireless LAN, Bluetooth and FM technologies into handsets. The WiLink 6.0 integrates mobile WLAN, Bluetooth and FM, with support for IEEE draft 802.11n, while the BlueLink 7.0 device integrates Bluetooth and FM. The FM functionality in both devices delivers FM transmit and receive capabilities, turning the handset into a personal area broadcast device, said TI.
Leveraging its expertise in Structured ASICs, ChipX has introduced embedded array products built with structured ASIC libraries, also known as a 'structured ASIC fabric'. Most options available to ASIC designers are either based on a fully customised product (Standard Cell), or on the fully configurable structured ASIC as pioneered by ChipX. Embedded arrays add a new option to the products that its customers can use to bring their ASIC to market. With ChipX' patented X-Cell configurable logic technology, designers can make logic changes, corrections, or additions to the device using a standard automated tool flow.
Nemoptic has announced a 'low cost' prototyping kit to evaluate and develop e-paper applications with its BiNem LCD technology. The BiNem Display HVGA prototyping kit allows system integrators to inexpensively test the performance of Nemoptics's bistable nematic LCD technology and to develop applications using an e-paper display. Images and text, once written, can be displayed indefinitely without consuming any additional power. The 12,2 cm, mid-to-high resolution (120 dpi) B&W display is mounted directly on a driving electronics board. The dot-matrix display is said to offer the highest contrast ratio on the market (greater than 10:1) excellent readability in reflective mode at all angles, as well as fast-refreshing speed.
A team of University of California-Santa Barbara (UCSB) researchers have created a new type of blue-violet laser diode that they say could replace the c-plane violet laser diodes used for competing next-generation DVD formats. The researchers have achieved lasing operation in nonpolar gallium nitride (GaN) semiconductors and demonstrated the world's first nonpolar blue-violet laser diodes. They require low operating power and have long lifetimes, according to the group. The diodes have threshold current densities as low as 7,5 kA/cm², clear far-field pattern and a lasing wavelength of 405 nm (pulsed). The blue-violet laser's shorter wavelength will improve high density optical data storage.
D-Wave Systems has demonstrated the world's first commercial quantum computer, a supercooled, superconducting niobium chip housing an array of 16 qubits. According to the company, the quantum computer, called 'Orion,' solves the most difficult problems - called 'nondeterministic polynomial problems' - in just a few cycles, compared to the thousands of cycles needed by conventional computers.
Seagate's DAVE is a new pocket-sized hard drive device that provides 10-20 GB of cable-free wireless storage for mobile phones, PCs, and other wireless-enabled devices using Bluetooth or WiFi connections. DAVE (digital audio video experience) is about the size of a centimetre-thick credit card (61 x 89 x 12 mm) and weighs 70 grams. Products based on the DAVE storage platform will allow consumers to access and store all of their mobile media on one device.
Researchers at the University of Southern California have designed a phosphorescent dye molecule that emits near-infrared light and have used it to make long-lasting organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). The diodes could be used to make a cheap and flexible near-infrared (NIR) display that would be unreadable to the naked eye but could be read with night-vision goggles, they said. Such a display could be integrated into a soldier's uniform or a device that could be stashed in a pocket, allowing soldiers to read communications at night without being spotted by an enemy.
Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers have discovered a carbon nanotube-based system that functions like an atom-scale switch. Described as an electrical gate at the molecular level: in one position, the molecular gate is open, allowing current through; in another position, the gate is closed, blocking the current. In a silicon chip, the gate is a silicon oxide barrier within the structure of the chip. In the researcher's model, the gate is a short molecule - encapsulated inside the carbon nanotube - that is about one nanometer in size, or three orders of magnitude smaller than a silicon chip.
Kurita Water Industries demonstrated a solid-state methanol fuel for direct methanol fuel cells (DMFC) at the Fuel Cell Expo 2007. Solid-state methanol makes use of clathrate compound technology in which a guest compound (methanol) is trapped in a solid state host compound. The company believes solid-state methanol to be a safer alternative to liquid methanol for use in fuel cells. In the demonstration, white dry granular solid bodies simply placed on an anode plate induced power generation.
LCOS (liquid crystal on silicon) micro-display manufacturer SpatiaLight and Foreal Spectrum have entered into a memorandum of understanding for the development and marketing of a 1920 x 1080p LED-based LCOS light engine for rear projection televisions and front projectors. Solid-state LED sources will remove the 'lamp lifetime' issue that manufacturers have with standard high-pressure mercury arc lamps and more significantly, will allow for thin form factor LCOS rear-projection TVs.
A prototype device from Telecom Italia and Polymer Vision called the Cellular-Book has a display that rolls up. Presented at the 3GSM World Congress, the rollable display technology enables mobile devices to incorporate a display larger than the handset itself and offers a readability similar to printed paper. While smaller than a typical cellphone, the device's display extends up to 12,7 cm and may simply be stored away after use by rolling it in. The display includes 16 levels of grey scale and is readable in bright sunlight. Future developments will include colour and moving image capabilities.
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