Embedded Executive: Michael Duhamel, Vice President, SECO USA

Are SOMs and COMs the same thing? Some people would say yes, but in reality, they are not. So, what’s the difference. To get a better understanding of the matter, I spoke to Matthew Burns, a Global Director at Samtec on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast. The second part of this discussion is which is appropriate for your application. Tune in to find out.

Have you ever heard of an isolator without a power supply? I hadn’t either, until now, sort of. That’s not exactly what Infineon is launching, but it’s close enough that I needed to have a conversation with Daniel Callen, Infineon’s Sr. Manager in the Power IC Group to understand exactly what the company is launching.

If your application is in solid-state relays, industrial automation (PLCs), or commercial HVAC controllers, this is a conversation you should hear. Check out this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

MEMS have been used in lots of sensors and even in microphones. But, until now, I hadn’t seen them used in speakers. xMEMS Labs is one vendor that’s doing just that, and the sound is incredible. When you hear how it works, it really makes a lot of sense. And if you listen to this podcast, you will hear exactly how it works. Check out my discussion with Mike Housholder, the Vice President of Business Development at xMEMS Labs in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

There’s a new sheriff in town when it comes to the Z-Wave Alliance, a newly formed standards development organization. The new Chairman of the Board of Directors at the Z-Wave Alliance is Avi Rosenthal, whose day job is the Managing Partner of bluesalve partners.

I know Z Wave has been around for quite some time, but the Alliance was previously a manufacturer-owned group, and now it’s independent. That “launch” comes on the heels of a second supplier being added to the mix. Previously, you had to go to Silicon Labs to get your transceivers. Now that the spec is truly open, other transceiver manufacturers will likely come on line, and Trident IoT is the first to join. To hear more about what this means and where the spec and the Alliance is headed, check out this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

COM Express has been around for at least a decade. While many people think of it as a standard architecture (it is), it can be customized in lots of different ways. To understand how a standard can be made custom while remaining standard, I spoke to Earle Foster, a Senior Vice President, Sealevel Systems in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast. It’s actually easier than you might think.

A few years ago, Microsoft acquired Express Logic, who’s key product was the ThreadX operating system. Fast forward to today, and Microsoft has released that operating system to the open-source community. Why did they do that? And what does that mean to the development community? I was really curious about these issues, so I spoke to Frédéric Desbiens, who manages the embedded, IoT, and Edge computing programs at the Eclipse Foundation on this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

We appear to be over the hump between hype and reality when it comes to GaN technology. Components and end products are readily available. But according to David Snook, the product line manager for  GaN products at Texas Instruments (TI), we are just scratching the surface of where GaN’s potential lies. Hear more in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

Timing devices within embedded systems are likely the most important components that you don’t know anything about. That’s a paraphrase from Piyush Sevalia, a Vice President at SiTime, and it’s certainly very true.

When you get into 5G applications, the effects are often working against you, like use in extreme temperatures, or in ruggedized applications. This makes the tolerances even more difficult to match. What to do? Your first step is to check out this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.

I feel like we have been two years away from fully autonomous vehicles for the last five years. It gets difficult to differentiate between what’s accurate and what’s fiction. To try to get at the truth, I spoke to Avijit Sinha, the newly appointed President of Wind River for this week’s Embedded Executive podcast. We get into the hardware, the software, and the standards. Note that Avijit was promoted just after we recorded this podcast!

Are you familiar with Raspberry Pi? Of course you are. But are you aware of all the things that you can do with it, or should do with it? 

First, if you think it’s a low-compute-power board, you are mistaken. Second, if you think you can’t go to production with a Pi, you’d be mistaken again. If you don’t believe me, listen to what Eben Upton, the Founder of Raspberry Pi had to say in this week’s Embedded Executives podcast.