The Current

Embedded systems find themselves in many applications today, where low power and small size are requirements, along with the ability to perform complex tasks like vision or machine learning, are important. In this episode, Todd Speaks to Rick Dudley, Business Development Manager at Microchip about how engineers can make the choice to move from a microcontroller to a microprocessor for their applications. Also, learn how we can take advantage of their performance capabilities for these advanced tasks without sacrificing end product size or battery life.

The Embedded World conference presents the latest, future-oriented trends from each embedded discipline, where experts gather to discuss complex questions of system design. Future Electronics a hub for knowledge transfer and a key player in the dialogue among embedded systems developers, international specialists, and decision makers. In this episode, Todd speaks to Lazina Rahman, Future Electronics Technical Engineer and host of Techventures who is on location at the conference.

Many companies are finding their engineering staff overloaded with sustaining ongoing designs. In some cases, a company will have an exciting idea for an embedded hardware platform, but an engineering staff with an expertise geared towards software or mechanical design. What if you could leverage a partners to design, test and show off a application idea? Electronics distribution like Future Electronics' Montreal Design Center can offer a higher level of service to meet those needs. In this episode Todd speaks to Martin Bernier, Director of the System Design Center the about how companies can partner with Future for their full engineering designs.

Maximizing the power efficiency of our designs has become critical as more systems get their energy from battery arrays, and as we look to high power electronics to supplant traditional combustion based systems. In this episode, Todd speaks with Doug Bailey Power Integrations Vice President of Marketing and Applications about wide bandgap technologies and trying to demystify when they should be used in system designs.

Watch the full video for a recap of all Season 2 episodes of The Current so far!

Adding embedded vision into designs requires many decisions to be made in the overall architecture. With the rise of CMOS imaging sensors engineers have to an FPGA or a Processor is right to handle the complex application layer to turn our designs into viable products. In this episode, Todd Baker speaks to Future's own Abhishek Gadgi, Image Sensor Specialist Engineer about machine learning and AI in our applications, what types of vision sensors we should be using and what should constitute the "brains" of our system to maximize it's capabilities.

With the rollout of 5G Cellular technology, the capabilities of our wireless networks continues to expand. Designing these advanced communications networks requires enormous engineering capability including special requirements for our passives and electromechanical devices within the design to make it all function. In this episode, Todd Baker speaks with Brian Donavan and Jeff Katz from Panasonic about the key technologies on the periphery of 5G designs.

It is now an expectation for connected systems to be intelligent enough to understand the surrounding environment and make decisions on behalf of their users with minimal or no intervention. That has required a great deal of innovation in the environmental sensor space, along with increased accuracy and the ability in our embedded systems to fuse data from multiple sources to get our systems to react in real time. In this episode, Todd Baker discusses the topic with Dr. Richard Fix, Portfolio and Product Manager at Bosch Sensortec about their sensing solutions and how they can help accelerate the development of innovative IoT applications.

Wireless technology is now a standard in designs as a basic serial port. Many of our systems today use Radio Frequency (RF) technology broadly to communicate about the environment around them, to upgrade their capabilities through seamless software updates, and to receive instructions on their next task. In this episode of The Current, our host Todd Baker speaks to Bob Card - ASE Marketing Manager at onsemi. The two discuss communication of data as an end application of wireless technologies and what new possibilities are currently in the market to provide wireless technology with an expanded new path to the future, and to success for designers across the globe.

Designing a system from the ground up can be an enormous challenge. Embedded engineers are leveraging new platforms to quickly build proof of concept for a low cost. In today's episode, Todd Baker speaks to our very own Ed Baca. The two discuss these designs and if they are the right solutions for production. Also, they talk about when to buy an off-the-shelf System on Module (SoM) versus a full chip-down design.

With the world opening up again, Todd has been busy traveling so this week is a little exit from the norm, but he will return next week with new topics.

The economic environment has become more challenging, and sustainability is being emphasized. Customers can expect to see shortages of products on shelves and price increases of those products. In this episode, Todd Baker speaks to Marty Branam, Vice President of STMicro's Geographic Sales about the allocation challenges, how they affect electrical engineers and what are key suppliers in the industry doing to help mitigate frustrations and keep production lines moving?

Engineers are faced with many options to solve the challenges associated with designing an accurate current-measurement circuit for applications, and inductive current sensing has become the least obtrusive method of measuring power consumption. In this episode, Todd speaks to Paul Schmokel and Bruno Boury of Melexis about Future Electronics' current monitoring demo platform the Faraday Board.

LEDs have stormed the lighting market over the last 15 years and changed the very way we see. In this episode, Todd Baker speaks to Erik Swenson, Vice President of Nichia America. The two discuss the next phase of LED technology - Whether a mere continued push for the lowest cost is "good enough" or if there are new innovations and advances in technology that could open up entirely new applications for this technology.

Timing circuitry is the heartbeat of our embedded systems as electrical engineers. So many of our designs rely on it, yet it can often be overlooked as and not a major area for improvement or innovation. In this episode, Todd Baker speaks to David Meaney , ECS' VP of Technical Marketing about some extra considerations on timing device selection that offers improvements for our products in this all too often overlooked area of electronics.

Ultraviolet C or UVC has become synonymous with the cleansing practices- to eliminate germ and harmful viruses that surround us. But just how is this technology used and how safe it is? In this episode Todd Baker speaks to Patrick Durand, Worldwide Technical Director of Future Lighting Solutions about the best practices for UVC and how the technology is helping change the environment around us.

Over the last few years the number of women in the technology or engineering profession has risen. Yet, even with that increase there is still a significant gender gap in the overall number of professionals in Engineering. In this episode, Todd Baker speaks to three of the best and brightest women in engineering at Future Electronics, on how they navigate this profession and how they are helping to build towards a brighter future.

The global economy and the semiconductor industry in particular is seeing significant challenges with product availability, long lead times, and electronic products struggling to get to market. With all of the complexities of our industry this has become one that's weighing heavily on embedded design engineers, in this episode of The Current, Todd Baker speaks with Karim Yasmine- Corporate VP a Future Electronics about how the industry is changing.

Electrostatic Discharge (ESD) is not always the most compelling topic for engineers who are designing an embedded system, but it is ALWAYS critical. ESD protection ensures the reliability of our designs as engineers, in even unexpected conditions, and with a little foresight, it can be easy to prepare for. In this episode of The Current, Todd Baker speaks to Mark Hubbard-Field, Application Engineer at Littelfuse, about the details of ESD protection and what engineers should consider when trying to protect their products.

In this episode of The Current, Todd Baker speaks to Mark Calhoun, Future Electronics Connectivity Specialist, about tools that are available to embedded engineers to make cloud connectivity simpler than it can often be. Together, they walk through some of the system designs Future Connectivity Solutions has created to make embedded cloud design more efficient with faster time to market for customers.

Power circuitry design is often a consideration late in the design cycle of a product after all the application circuitry has been selected, and basic functions defined. The challenge for engineers has been how to get the best components that can maximize battery life, efficiency, and voltage regulation without taking up prime real estate on the board. In this episode of The Current, Todd Baker talks to Bob Card and Tim Kaske of onsemi about their solutions to get the best power, and small components to fit your design.

More than ever, embedded systems are performing critical functions vital to the users safety and environment, often while being vulnerable to attack through internet connectivity, IP theft, or malicious reprogramming. Embedded systems security is relevant to all industries - from transportation, aerospace and healthcare to household appliances. As embedded systems are becoming more intricate and interconnected with IoT, so is the potential for a breach in security. In this episode of The Current, Todd Baker talks with Kimberley Dinsmore of Renesas, exploring how to manage the time and cost associated with improved security in embedded designs.

In today's embedded system designs, temperature sensor requirements are more intense and acute than they have been in the past. Temperature sensor cost, accuracy, and size are key factors that make or break the viability of many applications. In this episode of The Current, Todd Baker is breaking down industry trends in temperature sensors with Joris Roels of Melexis, and discussing the next generation of thermal monitoring.

Machine Vision in embedded systems continues to be a field of growth that offers tremendous opportunity, amazing new possibilities for our products, and a level of complexity that can sometimes seem daunting to accomplish. Can this complex technology be implemented and controlled with reasonable cost, power consumption, and in less complex silicon? Gain additional insight and solution ideas by learning more about the Future Electronics newly released Northern Lights platform. In this episode Todd Baker talks with Bill Pratt about showcasing multiple Microchip solutions that target intelligent machine vision in motor control applications.

With the need for facial or object recognition in more applications today, integrating MIPI based camera sensors to assorted processors can be a challenge for design engineers. In this episode of The Current, Todd Baker speaks to our very own Intelligent Sensing Engineer, Don Gunn, who takes us through new solutions he has developed to make proof of concepts easier, and how engineers can build their own camera enabled embedded systems with NXP's i.MX or Renesas's RZ processors and onsemi's imaging sensors.

Time-of-Flight (ToF) sensors have endless variety of uses across many industries. In this episode of The Current, Todd Baker talks to John Kvam about how ST Micro's ToF sensors provide an all-in-one (emitter, receiver, and processor) system for an easy, cost effective, and small footprint integration. We'll explore applications ToF is rapidly growing into, and look in depth at a people counting application system that we can share with customers.

The world of IoT has grown at a rate that is beyond what most had imagined. The capabilities to integrate electronics directly into the environment has allowed consumer products to be taken to the next level. In this episode of The Current, Todd Baker speaks to Matt Johnson CEO and co-founder of Bare Electronics about the easy-to-use Bare Conductive printed conductive technology that can revolutionize where electronic circuits can be placed.