Embedded Executive Podcast

Bluetooth has been around for a quarter century. That’s a very, very long time in technology years. It’s evolved into one of the most omnipresent standards ever produced. That said, it continues to grow with new features and enhancements, which result in new use cases. I spoke to Shantanu Bhalerao, the Vice President of Bluetooth Products for Infineon Technologies on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast to understand how that works and what's still to come for Bluetooth.

Everything is connected, everything is smart, and AI controls everything. And it all comes back to the “smart Edge.” While these statements seem to be a bit over-arching, there’s a lot of truth to them. But building and then designing around that smart Edge can be quite tricky. Add TinyML to the equation, and it should become clearer (well, maybe). To better understand what that means exactly, I spoke to Amir Panush, the CEO of Ceva on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

The software-defined vehicle (SDV) requires lots of horsepower, and in many cases, extensive use of AI. Is the world ready for this application? More importantly, are the automakers ready? This is the avenue I went down with Frantz Saintellemy, the President and CEO of Leddar Tech. We discussed the ecosystem, the available products, the activities in different regions, and the prevailing perceptions in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

Many of the memory suppliers choose a niche to be an expert. It may be automotive, consumer, industrial, medical, etc. In the case of Apacer Technology, the company has chosen to do it all. In my discussion with Gibson Chen, the General Manager of Apacer, I challenged whether that’s the best approach, trying to serve just about any market. Listen to this week’s Embedded Executives podcast and decide for yourself if that’s the right strategy.

The latest wearable medical devices are designed to help consumers make better decisions regarding their care. Until recently, the space has been somewhat limited. Size and power were the two biggest constraints. Those constraints aren’t going away, but they are definitely being lessened thanks to some of the latest innovations on the semiconductor side. To hear more about these innovations, I spoke to Andrew Baker, the Co-Founder and CEO of Orca Semiconductor, a startup in the emerging connected health arena. Check out this week’s Embedded Executives podcast to learn more.

If the software-defined vehicle (SDV) comes off as planned, life for consumers becomes a whole lot easier. “If” is the key word in that sentence, and there’s tons of debate as to when that might actually happen. To understand what the SDV is—and it means different things to different people—I spoke to Suraj Gajendra, the Vice President of Automotive Products for Arm. As the IP provider for many of the Tier 1 silicon providers in the automotive space, the company has a big say in what it’ll actually look like and when it’ll happen. Hear what Suraj had to say on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

Is Wi-Fi even a thing anymore? What I mean by that is, at least from the users’ perspective, Wi-Fi just works, and that’s not much to think about. However, behind the scenes, a lot has to happen to make that “ubiquitousness” happen. To get a better understanding of what is happening back there, I spoke to Sivaram Trikutam, the Vice President of Wi-Fi Products for Infineon. We get into the latest standards, including Matter, on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

Can batteries last for 40 years? And what is the application that would require such a timeline? That’s the discussion I had with Sol Jacobs, the Vice President and General Manager of Tadiran Batteries. The topic arose after the company’s recent whitepaper crossed my desk. To understand whether this was fact or simply a click-bait headline, I decided to go right to the source. Hear what Sol had to say on the matter in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

Why would you put sensors and power components into the same business unit if you’re a component supplier? That’s what I asked Adam White, President, of Infineon’s Power and Sensors Division. After hearing his response, it made perfect sense—today’s sensors are quickly growing in number and power consumption. So it only makes sense to put those engineers in the same room. Adam explained it better than I could, citing lots of power numbers and energy requirements needed by various applications, and how they vary in different regions. Check out this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

Memory for automotive applications needs to be different from memory that’s intended for other applications. Why is that? I could not answer that question, so I turned to Michael Basca, the Vice President of Embedded Products and Systems within Micron’s Embedded Business Unit. As you might expect, Michael had no trouble answering the question. Hear what he had to say on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.