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Discusses the importance of reusable intellectual property (IP) for the computer industry of the United States. Estimated growth of commercial IP from 1998 to 2001; Benefits of reusable IP to application specific integrated circuits (ASIC) business; Licensing strategy developed by Motorola Corp. for its IP.

The article analyzes different reasons why people in the U.S. are taking to learning the Mandarin language. Chris Chene, senior director of marketing at Sharp Microelectronics decided to learn Mandarin because he believes that there is design as well as production going on in China today. Other Westerners who have taken on Mandarin agree that the first contact can be daunting. Mark LaPedus, editor of Silicon Strategies, had personal reasons for sticking with it. LaPedus took a route not readily available in the States: Mandarin immersion classes, which are offered in Taiwan to foreigners who want to learn the language and can work intensively on it.

The article focuses on the intellectual-property (IP) law or the patent process. Protecting one's own or an employer's IP is crucial in today's global marketplace, IP and patent experts say, and engineers would do well to consider the possibility sooner rather than later. In the U.S., unlike in many other countries, precedence is decided by the date of invention, not by the filing date to the patent office. If an application covers pioneering work, it makes sense for the claims to be broad. But the broader the claims, the longer it will take the patent office to evaluate them and the more likely it is they will conflict with a previously granted patent or some prior art. INSET: History lives at the PTO.

Focuses on the Bush administration's establishment of a commission to supervise human expedition to Mars in 2020. Emphasis on robotic orbital and lunar flights; Importance of electronics in the renewed manned-space-flight program; Transmission for electromagnetic communications; U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration's application of incremental strategy to test manned vehicles for Mars.

Interviews eSilicon Corp.'s chairman, president and chief executive officer Jack Harding. Performance of the company as a general contractor for chip companies in the United States. Views on the case of public policy on education; Ideas on improving the expected value of an investment portfolio for a venture investor; Future business plans.

Provides information about the list of the most notable startups in the electronic industry in the U.S. for year 2005 compiled by "EETimes." Creation of a network-on-a-chip interconnect design; Technological advancements for electronic dispersion compensation; Development plans on well-backed startups targeting semiconductor memory.

Reports on the revival of third-party logic-cell libraries and memory intellectual property in the United States. Announcements made by Prolific Inc. and Artisan Components Inc.

Reports that a patent granted to PalmChip Corp. covers the techniques used to implement on-chip computer processing unit (CPU) bus structures in nearly all modern system-on-chip designs in the U.S. On-chip interconnect structure for linking CPUs, memories and peripheral devices; Use of unidirectional buses with centralized memory controllers; Implications of the patent.

Reports on the efforts of University of California's Kodak Berkeley Research to improve the Reed-Solomon approach to error correction. Views from researchers; Domain of forward error correction; Systems approach. INSET: Reed-Solomon..

Focuses on the problems faced by digital television (DTV) broadcasting in United States. Acceptance of DTV in United States; Factors that block the growth of DTV in the country; Other issues about DTV broadcasting.

Focuses on the increase in number of Christian private schools in the U.S. Background on the history of Protestant, evangelical schools in the U.S.; Decline in enrolment affecting Catholic private schools; Comparison of the quality of teaching in Christian schools and public schools.

The article reports on the triple-play high-definition (HD) service of U.S. cable and telephone operators. The new very-high-speed-digital-subscriber-line (VDSL) technology will provide voice, data, and video service to telephone, cable, and wireless customers. The author discusses traffic shaping and a fast and thorough packet inspection as possible solutions to networking problems like running out of bandwidth and security. He cites that new generation silicon chips will require a faster speed and a capacity to perform deep packet inspection.

The article discusses the testing of audio integrated circuits in the U.S. System-on-Chip (Soc) platforms designers are now assessing the new challenge and joining experienced audio-integrated circuits designers who have lived with it. The manufacturing test for these chips will depend on their architecture and will need as science. Design for test will take on a new importance for audio functions as user's expectations for high fidelity increase.

This article reports that the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA) has created a blue-ribbon committee to address the loss of research capability in the U.S. Called the Committee on American Competitiveness, the SIA group consists of a half-dozen leading U.S. chip industry executives who will lobby for the need to boost overall competitiveness in the U.S. Observers agree that economic pressures and shortsighted public policy have converged to create a shortfall between the basic research being conducted in the U.S. and the needs of U.S. industry.

This article reports that the cell phone handset can be the point of convergence for personal communications, photography, video and gaming. Each of those functions has its own computationally intensive algorithms. And given the current power of embedded CPUs for the handset business, each requires a certain amount of hardware acceleration to provide adequate performance. It's that the handset manufacturers and the service providers all need for people to buy new handsets. But especially in the U.S., less so in Europe and Asia-the service providers aren't willing to invest in the network infrastructure that would enable a new generation of network capabilities in the handsets.

Reports that Intel Corp. and Texas Instruments Inc. have introduced 65-nanometers processors in the U.S. Clock speed of 65-nanometers processor; Techniques used by semiconductor companies to enhance the performance of a 65-nanometer process; Applicability of the processor in handheld devices, such as cellular phones.

Comments on the popularity of the concept of verification intellectual property (IP) among electronics design automation companies in the United States. Use of the concept to create revenue-producing products without having to commit full-time engineering resources to customers; Need for an expertise in the functions of the design IP.

Reports on updates relating to the semiconductor industry in the United States as of February 2005. Richard Tobias, vice president of application specific integrated circuit and foundry business unit at Toshiba America Electronic Components' discussion of the critical issue of design-for-yield in a DesignCon panel in February 2005; Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. Ltd.'s offering of a set of 90-nm libraries.

Reports on specific applications for Internet protocol (IP). Factors attributed to the shift in applications of IP; Comments of Derek Meyer, vice president of marketing at ARC International, on the evolution in IP; Significance of the trend to design-outsouring firms.

Reports on the Department of Homeland Security's test of electronic-passport interoperability exposed technology flaws at National Biometric Security Project facilities in West Virginia. Vulnerabilities of electronic passport; Comparison of the difference between electronic passports based on the ISO 14443 Type B contactless interface with those using the Type A interface; Demonstration of the capabilities of electronic passport.

Highlights embedded central processing unit (CPU) announcements at the 2004 Embedded Processor Forum in San Jose, California. ARC International PLC's ARC700 core processor; ARM Ltd.'s ARM-11-36-derived CPU; Tensilica Inc.'s LX processor.

Inapac Technology Inc., a fabless DRAM company in San Jose, California, is preparing to introduce custom, fully tested DRAM dice in system-in-package (SiP) configurations. Startup to assist customers with SiP development; Possible work on a custom DRAM design specifically for SiP integration.

Focuses on logic devices in Phoenix, Arizona. Scaling trends for soft-error rate of logic devices; Concern for mission-critical systems with respect to soft errors in logic devices; Use of error correction coding.

Focuses on a debate between electronics companies in the U.S. over the reliability of static random-access-memory-based field programmable gate arrays (SRAM-based FPGA). Actel Corp.'s release of a report indicating that normal neutron flux can alter the configuration of the devices; Results of test on the consistency of the behavior of SRAM-based FPGA.

Reports on the changes on static random access memory (SRAM) embedded in cell-based chip designs in the U.S. Factors forcing vendors of SRAM intellectual property to update their technology; New options brought to system-on-chip designers; Realignment of the Internet protocol business.

Reports that Fujitsu Ltd. announced structured-ASIC devices at electronicaUSA with the Embedded Systems Conference in San Francisco, California. ARM926ES CPU; Difference of the chip from the LSI Logic approach; PHYblocks; CMOS process of Fujitsu.

Discusses the recast of the business model of Xignal Technologies AG, a provider of analog amd mixed signal silicon intellectual property in the U.S. Strategy to account for the hollowed-out design teams of potential customers; Offer of full design support to semiconductor suppliers; Shift of customer expenses from front-end fees to back-loaded royalties.

Comments on the confidence of the integrated circuit industry on its adoption of the 90-nanometer technology. Ability of the interconnect stack to handle the designs; Implementation of metal gates and immersion lithography in the same process node; Challenge of carrier mobility for transistors to go faster. INSET: What process is this anyway?.

Reports on the 51st International Solid-State Circuits Conference in San Francisco, California. Participation of leaders from the global semiconductor industry; Communication of devices through the Internet; Evidence of the continual Moore's law scaling of chips.

Focuses on the success of a Jet Propulsion Laboratory team in the diagnosis of the embedded system of the U.S. Mars rover Spirit before its landing on the Martian surface. Correction of design errors in the field; Identification of shortcomings in the code in the launch load of the software; Discovery of a system log in which the problem was documented.

Reports on the controversy surrounding iSuppli Corp. principal analyst Len Jelinek's prediction about "the end of the wild cycles of boom and bust in semiconductor capacity investment" in the U.S. Jelinek's belief that circumstances in the chips industry have changed to dampen the cycle; Growing financial conservatism in the industry.

Reports on the impact of the popularity of cellular telephone handsets with built-in cameras on the market for low-end and midrange digital still cameras in the U.S. Manufacture of camera telephones by Japanese service providers to increase network revenue; Increase in demands for higher-resolution cameras in telephone handsets; Use of camera resolution by handset makers to win market share.

Reports on the acquisition of a computer-enabled electronic pipe organ to replace the damaged pipe organ at the Trinity Episcopal Church in Broadway, New York city caused by the ruins and debris from the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack at the World Trade Center. Physical description and specifications of the pipe organ; Integration of a tone-generation software into the system; Speaker system; Sound generation; Other features and specifications.

Reports on developments related to the field of electronic engineering in the U.S., as of June 1, 2003. Issues of interest to the electronic engineer; Implications of the issues on the electronic engineering industry.

Reports that Tensilica Corp. has claimed broad protection on the automatic generation of central processing unit hardware and compatible software development tools from an architectural description, based on two patents it received from the U.S. Patent Office. Likelihood of a debate between Tensilica and archrival ARC International PLC about the breadth of the patents.

Introduces the Systems on a chip (SoC) design for network processing in California. Composition of the design; Functions of the system; Practical advantages of the design.

Focuses on the Design Automation Conference for the electronic design automation and integrated circuits industry held in June 2002 in the U.S. Economic concerns of both industries; Disappointment brought by the 0.13-micron process technology node; Financial troubles of Numerical Technologies, which develops products to enable subwavelength technology; Concerns of companies over bottlenecks in design flows.

Reports on issues in the debate over computer systems implemented on programmable chips in the U.S. as of March 4, 2002. Definition of computer systems; Approach of Actel Corp. in embedding field programmable gate arrays in application specific integrated circuits; Criterion for picking configurability in programable chips.

Reports on the launch of Open Library Application Programmer Interfaces (API) by the Silicon Integration Initiative during the first annual OLA Conference in San Jose, California in February 2002. View of several vendors of electronic design automation tools on API; Information on the OLA conference; Application specific integrated circuit makers that will adopt OLA as a standard; Correlation of library information from disparate tools connected to the API; Advantage of OLA.

The article focuses on use of technology JenRus Freelance, an advertising agency located in Kansas, citing that owner Jenny Russell uses high-speed telecommunication services to run her business which has helped the agency in overcoming challenges like remote location of places.

Features the application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) cores from NEC Electronics Inc. Applications of the building blocks; Outlook on the high definition television (HDTV) silicon market; Comments from John Kelley, general manager of IBM Microelectronics Inc.

Reports on the online electric-utility company, Utility.com Inc., to be launched by CellNet Data Systems in San Carlos, California. Business model of Utility.com Inc.; Details on how the company will operate.

Suggests that, despite some problems, the digital cellular telephone network in the United States is not as unreliable as some say. Reasons for initial disappointment; The IS-54 standard currently being used for the digital service in the United States; Comments on IS-54's ability to offer caller ID, call waiting and other features.

Focuses on the coalition that was launched by NTT Data Communications Systems Corp. and Harmonix Corp. at the 1995 Design Automation Conference. Promotion of reconfigurable-computing architectures based on reprogrammable logic; The Plastic Architecture Consortium; More.

Reports on IBM Microelectronics and NEC Corp's launching of directly competing but different product lines. Aim at the cream of the gate-array market; Similar application specific integrated circuits (ASIC) offerings; Profound differences beneath similarities; Dependence of gate performances on metal loading; Both company's emphasis on design methodology.

Reports on the startup company created by Donald Sollars for the production of digital signal processing (DSP) cores. Career information on Sollars; Importance of DSP cores to application-specific integration circuit (ASIC) business.

Reports on the expected display of central processing units (CPU) and 1-Gbit dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chips at the 1995 International Solid-State Circuits Conference in San Francisco, California. Intel Corp.'s P6 processor and Hal Sparc CPU; Introduction of 32-Mbit flash chips by several companies using various architectural approaches.

Reports on the status of multimedia in the United States, according to the papers delivered in the Microprocessor Forum in California on October 1994. Multimedia's venture into embedded-systems design; Adding features of multimedia processing to available processors; Strategies of Advanced RISC Ltd. and Quantum Effect Designs.