Amelia's Weekly Fish Fry

Reliability’s Road

“The road to success is paved with the hot asphalt of failure.” ― Craig D. Lounsbrough

In this week’s episode of Fish Fry, we take an in-depth look at the complex reliability issues present in today’s automotive designs.  Hany Elhak (Cadence Design Systems) and I chat about the role that mixed-signal chips play in the automotive ecosystem, the reality of defect analysis in the world of analog design today, and why transistor degradation it is even more important now than ever before. Also this week, we check out the details of three new automotive-based design contests rolled out by Ennomotive and Grupo Antolin.

Backward Balance Board

Sometimes we have to find a way around our design challenges. Sometimes finding the equilibrium between our design legacy and the futuristic stuff we want to do is harder than we we expected. In this week’s episode of Fish Fry, Nigel Forrester (Concurrent Technologies) joins us to discuss the ongoing security challenges in the world of embedded computing and how we can balance the past with the present and the future. Also this week, we check an amazing new discovery out of the University of Arizona that challenges some of our prevalent theories about how dying stars seed the universe.

When the Undecidable Becomes Decided

In general, we like light hearted stories on Fish Fry. We like “smart” forks that tell us when we should stop eating. We enjoy 3D printing robots that make pancakes with the faces of famous people. All of that is fine and dandy but sometimes, we have to talk about more serious stuff. Today we are talking about when safety and security is mandatory, when failure is life or death, and when finding bugs doesn’t just mean your job is on the line. In this week’s episode, Quentin Ochem (AdaCore) I are chat about what the SPARK language can do that C cannot and the software development and verification challenges inherent in safety-critical applications. Also this week, we check out the details of a new matchbox-sized radar system coming out of VTT Technical Research Center of Finland and KAUST (King Abdullah University of Science and Industry).

 

The Curious Case of the Critical Catalyst

Are we really using the edge to the best of our ability? Sure, VR and AR are cool, but are they the best case for engineering and business development at the edge? In this episode of Fish Fry, I sit down with Kevin Hannah (CEO - Kazuhm) and chat about why he thinks artificial intelligence should take center stage at the edge and why our ability to process the tsunami of information that is coming at us from 5G, IoT, and Big Data is going to depend how successfully artificial intelligence is deployed at the edge. Also this week, we check out the details of Hacker.io and Avnet’s new “Bring Intelligence to the Real World” design contest.

Avoiding IoT Purgatory

“Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore” - Dorothy, The Wizard of Oz

We’ve all been there. We’ve lost of our way and the road ahead is more than just a bit fuzzy. In this week’s episode of Fish Fry, I sit down with Lou Lutostanski (Avnet) and chat about why IoT projects are so challenging and what we can do if we find ourselves stuck in “IoT Purgatory.” Keeping with our IoT theme, we also investigate how Purdue University is looking to protect our smart implanted devices with electro-quasistatic human body communications and how a new kickstarter campaign called “Fromaggio” is taking the IoC (Internet of Cheese) to a whole new level.

The Art of (Rugged) Communication

In this week’s episode of Fish Fry, we are delving into the world of RFSoCs, radar, ruggedization, and reliability. Rodger Hosking (Pentek) joins us to discuss the details of the Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC and we take a closer look at the benefits and challenges of this unique single-chip adaptable radio platform. Also this week,  Justin Moll (Pixus Technologies) and I talk about how the various levels of ruggedization can pose specific thermal challenges in our designs and how the right enclosure can make all the difference.

Wheels Up!

In this week’s episode of Fish Fry, Scott Engle (Mercury Systems) and I investigate the coexistence of safety and security in world of avionics and why the key to security in aviation may be tied to the reclassification of security-related failures. Keeping with our aviation theme, we also take a closer look at how FORDISC (a windows-based interactive software program) may have just solved the mysterious disappearance of Amelia Earhart once and for all.

 

Faster Interconnect! Go! Go!

What do Moore’s Law, the Von Neuman Bottleneck, and alpha-band brain activity have in common?! This week’s episode of Amelia’s Weekly Fish Fry! Matthew Burns (Samtec) joins us to discuss how we can prepare for the next wave of high speed fabrics in embedded computing and why  these new faster fabrics will make our design lives harder not easier. Also this week, we take a closer look at new research that contends that human brain waves respond to changes in Earth-strength magnetic fields.

More than Just Silicon

In this week’s episode of Fish Fry, we investigate the challenges SoC Design with ClioSoft CEO Srinath Anantharaman. Srinath and I are chat about the hidden advantages of IP management, the challenges of global design teams, and how IP reuse can make all the difference in your bottom line. In this week’s Kickstarter corner, we also take a closer look at the details of a new mind-controlled drone called the UDrone!

 

 

Honey, I Shrunk the Semiconductor

In this week’s episode of Fish Fry, we are headed to the smallest of the small process geometries: 2nm! My guest Ruben Molina (Synopsys) and I are talking about how exactly we are going to get started with these tiny process nodes and how technical advisory boards are driving the charge toward standardization and process architecture specification. Also this week, we take a closer look at the world’s first mobile skin bioprinting system unveiled by the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine.

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Links for March 8, 2019

Industry Leaders Collaborate with Synopsys on Modeling Standards to Address Design Down to 2nm

Mobile Bedside Bioprinter Can Heal Wounds (Wake Forest School of Medicine)

Whitepaper: In Situ Bioprinting of Autologous Skin Cells Accelerates Wound Healing of Extensive Excisional Full-Thickness Wounds

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Fish Fry Executive Interviews

Anupam Bakshi, CEO – Agnisys

Dave Kleidermacher, CTO – Green Hills Software

Robert Blake, CEO – Achronix

Jack Harding, CEO – eSilicon

Michiel Ligthart, COO – Verific

Adnan Hamid, CEO – Breker Technologies

Simon Davidmann, CEO – Imperas

Ted Miracco, CEO – SmartFlow Compliance Solutions

Jessica Gomez – Rogue Valley Microdevices

Shishpal Rawat, Chairman – Accellera Systems Initiative

Kevin Bromber, CEO – myDevices

Daniel Hansson, CEO – Verifyter

Mark Papermaster, CTO – AMD

David Fried, CTO – Coventor

Dr. Steven LeBoeuf, President – Valencell

David Dutton, CEO – Silvaco

Bob Niemiec, CEO – TwistThink

Allan Martinson, COO – Starship Technologies

Zhihong Liu, Chairman and CEO – ProPlus Solutions

Taher Madraswala, CEO and President – Open-Silicon

Kapil Shankar, CEO and Director – AnDAPT

Dan Fox, CTO – Local Motors

Kim Rowe, Founder and CEO — RoweBots

Lawrence Cooke, Founder and CEO — NovaSolix

Gregg Recupero, CTO — Performance-IP

Alan Grau, CEO — Icon Labs

Carl Alberty, Vice President – Cirrus Logic

Maximilian Odendahl, CEO — Silexica

Finbarr Moynihan, General Manager — MediaTek

Sanjay Pillay, CEO — Austemper

Louis Parks, CEO – SecureRF

Harold Blomquist, CEO – Helix Semiconductor

Dale Dougherty and Sherry Huss, Co-Founders – Maker Faire

Mike Wisart, CEO – efabless

Chris Giovanniello, SVP and Co-Founder – Menlo Micro

Jake Janovetz, President – Opal Kelly

Jerry Gipper, Executive Director – VITA

Ethan Plotkin, CEO – GDCA

Xin Song, CEO - Bottos

Chris Dries, CEO – UnitedSiC 

Bob Smith, Executive Director - ESD Alliance 

Rick O'Connor, Executive Director - RISC V Foundation

Naveed Sherwani, CEO and Yunsup Lee, CTO/Founder- SiFIve

Doug Letcher, CEO and President – Metrics Technologies

Jun Pei, CEO – Cepton Technologies

Nikos Zervas, CEO of CAST