I-Connect007 Editor’s Choice: Five Must-Reads for the Week
March 22, 2024 | Nolan Johnson, I-Connect007Estimated reading time: 3 minutes
This week’s news makes me think of the long-running U.S. television game, “Wheel of Fortune,” where you compete against two others to solve word puzzles. Contestants take turns spinning a wheel, which determines a dollar amount. Then, they choose a letter from the alphabet to be revealed in the puzzle, earning them that dollar amount for each letter revealed—that is, if they ultimately solve the puzzle. For years and years, many contestants have shouted, as they spin the wheel, “C’mon, big money!” The whole character of the show is down-home and personable.
And, as it turns out, this week’s news feed also contains a bunch of big money items, as well as some interesting industrial and technology puzzles to be solved. There’s even some down-home people news from the Dallas SMTA conference held this week. Don’t overlook the latest issue of PCB007 Magazine, either. The topic is sustainability, which is becoming an ecosystem of its own.
All that, and a plug for the latest episode of our podcast, “On The Line With…” This week’s edition features Cadence’s Taylor Hogan and Patrick Davis, discussing the developing role of AI in PCB design.
Have a great weekend, everyone; you’re now up to date on the news.
SMTA Dallas 2024 Photo Gallery
Published March 20
I-Connect007’s editorial field team was onsite at the SMTA Dallas event in Plano this week. Managing editor, Marcy LaRont shares this photo gallery from the event.
Sustainability Explored in the March Issue of PCB007 Magazine
Published March 20
Speaking of sustainability, this month’s issue of PCB007 Magazine–focusing on the hot button issue of sustainability–makes for great reading. The issue examines this topic through the lens of several individuals and organizations. As Dr. Kelly Scanlon of IPC points out, the concept of sustainability applies to many areas, including the economy, training, and education. Get your copy at the link above.
Enabling a New Paradigm for Flexible, Point of Need Design and Manufacturing
Published March 18
The headline on this news article from DARPA hides what is a very interesting read about the DoD “Rubble to Rockets” program. From the article: “The Department of Defense (DOD) needs the flexibility to manufacture critical structures at the time and point of need using locally available materials. Yet current manufacturing approaches for forward production operate under the assumption that pristine raw materials will be readily available; furthermore, any change in material input would require costly redesign. This means that structure designs are reliant on fixed inputs to produce fixed outputs, hindering the flexibility required for forward production where raw materials and resources are limited.”
The implications of this new paradigm are staggering; to colonize the Moon or Mars, on-site fabrication will require this kind of capability. A very interesting read and worth following.
Asia/Pacific PC Market Dropped 16.1% in 2023
Published March 18
I’m choosing this specific announcement, but there are two other IDC-sources news items, which support this report. From this report: “In 2023, the Asia/Pacific region decreased year-on-year (YoY) in all quarters as the overall demand for devices continued to decline across the consumer and commercial segments. Purchases were soft given that a good portion of demand was already fulfilled during the COVID-19 pandemic, and ongoing challenging economic conditions didn’t help either.”
IDC also released this report (link) detailing a 9% drop in PC workstation shipments (PC workstations are a contributor to the 16.1% drop in this report. But not all is doom and gloom; in another report (link), IDC reports that the wearables sector saw some up-and-down growth in 2023, but is poised for a strong rebound in 2024.
Put the three reports from this week together, and it’s continuing evidence that computing platforms are evolving into dramatically different form factors.
Intel, Biden Admin Announce up to $8.5 Billion in Direct Funding Under the CHIPS Act
Published March 20
CHIPS Act and other related money is being awarded. Intel sees an award of $8.5 billion, which will be invested into Intel’s U.S. facilities in Arizona, New Mexico, Ohio, and Oregon. Intel is not the only company to announce funding awards this week. Elsewhere in our news coverage this week, was news of an award to SAIC from the U.S. intelligence community.
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I-Connect007 Editor’s Choice: Five Must-Reads for the Week
04/12/2024 | Nolan Johnson, I-Connect007As we publish this week’s most-read news, the I-Connect007 team is wending its way home from an eventful and productive week at IPC APEX EXPO in Anaheim, California. We’ve posted a variety of dispatches from the show this week, released 73 realtimewith.com video interviews (and counting), and also gathered the content and updates you’ll be looking for in the upcoming issue of Show & Tell… IPC APEX EXPO 2024.
I-Connect007 Editor’s Choice: Five Must-Reads for the Week
03/01/2024 | Nolan Johnson, I-Connect007I just finished counting the percentage of times in which artificial intelligence/machine learning/data analytics topics appeared in the I-Connect007 news this week. What do you think the percentage is? AI has moved well beyond a technical term; heck, it has clearly also eclipsed catch-phrase status. It seems a foregone conclusion that AI applications will be inserting themselves into manufacturing just as they are appearing in our handheld devices. Speaking of handhelds, that market seems to be growing as well. This week’s five must-reads include smartphone market data, telecom infrastructure development, a new white paper on the influence of data analytics, a report on the European market, and the launch of a new podcast series on PCB 3.0, a new design methodology.
I-Connect007 Editor’s Choice: Five Must-Reads for the Week
02/16/2024 | Marcy LaRont, PCB007 MagazineIt’s been another busy week in the industry. We lost another old friend last week. The EIPC show happened, and Pete Starkey provided us with complete and compelling show coverage, from start to finish. Recently, we posed the question, “When is it time to introduce embedded components into your PCB design?” which was asked and answered by design aficionado Kris Moyers in the latest issue of Design007 Magazine. We are proud to be a part of the exciting Global Insights weekly newsletter, which Nolan Johnson and Brian Knier explored in their interview, and we rounded out the week with some big merger news. Here are my picks for the past week’s must-read news items.