NYBob
10 years ago
Russia Media: Malaysian Airlines Flight MH370 located in Afghanistan
Tuesday, 01 April 2014 13:46
April 1, 2014 -- (TRN) --
The Russian media outlet MK.ru is reporting today that Malaysia
Airlines flight MH-370 made a hard landing on a rural road
southeast of Kandahar, Afghanistan, near the Pakistan Border.
According to the report, the passengers and crew are alive.
While the Google translation from the original Russian language
is not precise, the MK story says that the Pilots of
Flight MH370 did not steal the plane; it was hijacked by unknown
persons.
This information came from a confidential source inside the
Russian security services.
Flight MH370 went missing on March 8 with 227 passengers and
12 crew on board.
The MK story claims that the passengers and crew have been
"captured" and that the airplane is on a rural road, southeast
of Kandahar, Afghanistan, with a broken wing from a hard landing.
The plane is said to be located very near the border of Pakistan.
The story even contains a map as follows:
The story goes on to report that all the passengers are alive;
that they've been divided into seven groups living
hand-to-mouth in mud huts nearby.
The story also says that "20 Asian Professionals were captured"
and bluntly accuses that the hijacking was done "presumably
by the Americans" on "someone's order."
Member of the Flight Safety Foundation Sergey Melnichenko,
pointed out that on "March 21 Thailand, India and Pakistan
said that the aircraft was not tracked by air defenses;
not that it did not fly over their countries, just that it
was not tracked.
This past Sunday, the head of the Intelligence Committee of
the U.S. Senate Diane Feinstein, responding to a question from
CNN on the probability of a terrorist component in the case of
the missing plane, said "At the moment nothing has been found".
The story goes on to point out that there are two areas in
Afghanistan controlled by the Taliban, with two air corridors
where MH370 could fly after disappearing from radar.
Rather than admit this, Malaysian authorities are merely relying
on the Afghan and Pakistan governments saying military radar
never tracked the plane.
The story goes on to say that trust may be misplaced
since the border area between Pakistan and Afghanistan
is semi-abandoned.
http://www.turnerradionetwork.com/news/394-pat
God Bless
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
Freescale makes a grab for wireless USB
Official standard could get beaten to the market
Peter Judge, Techworld, 04 January 2006
Two vendors are rushing out wireless USB products based on Freescale's flavour of ultra-wideband (UWB), the fast short-range wireless technology, in a bid to steal the market from the official Intel-backed version of ultra-wideband.
Both Gefen and Belken will deliver products this spring, that carry a conventional USB 2.0 link across UWB wireless, allowing users to connect cameras and other devices to their PC without cables. Both are being demonstrated at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week.
The products are described as "Cable-Free USB", because the USB Implementers' Forum has given its blessing to the Intel-backed WiMedia specification as the "official" future for USB without cables. WiMedia also succeeded in getting its specification rubber-stamped as a formal standard by the ECMA standards body.
Despite this, WiMedia still faces tough opposition. The Belkin and Gefen announcements underline Freescale is much closer to the market, and its proponents argue that Cable Free USB will be closer to today's USB than the "official" upgrade.
"The Freescale approach uses ultra-wideband to work with the existing USB specification," said a Freescale spokesperson. "It has an instant "out of the box" capability that allows anything that is certified USB to work without the cable and become a wireless solution."
"It is important to note that Certified Wireless USB will be USB in name only, for all practical purposes" said the Freescale spokesperson. "It is an entirely new specification requiring software updates and new hardware. Microsoft will need to support it in its next OS and it will require new drivers. The question becomes what will consumers and manufacturers embrace? An entirely new approach or one that leverages the nearly 1 billion certified USB devices in the market today?"
Both products use a USB dongle on the PC, which makes a wireless link to another device. In Belkin's case, this is a conventional USB hub which allows wired connections on to the client device; in Gefen's, it's a dongle that attaches to the client device direct. Both approaches use the ExtremeUSB extension technology from Icron.
While it looks like Freescale has got there first, WiMedia has a couple of options on the go. WiMedia member Staccato is working on Ripcord, a wireless link that will carry the new Wireless USB protocol, and Wisair released a reference design last month. Freescale claimed that this must still be considered an interim product until the Certified Wireless USB specification is finalised.
http://www.techworld.com/mobility/news/index.cfm?NewsID=5089&Page=1&pagePos=5&inkc=0
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
Freescale's Communications Processor Shipments Top 200 Million
Monday October 31, 9:00 am ET
No. 1 Supplier of Embedded Processors Continues to Reach New Milestones in Communications Processing
PR, 10/31/05
AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 31, 2005--Freescale Semiconductor (NYSE:FSL - News; NYSE:FSL.B - News), the leading supplier of embedded processors, has reached another milestone in its long history of providing processing intelligence for the world's networks. Freescale has shipped more than 200 million integrated communications processors, a semiconductor device category the company pioneered 16 years ago.
In June during the annual Freescale Technology Forum, Freescale marked the 10-year anniversary of the PowerQUICC(TM) processor family based on PowerPC® cores, the embedded industry's most widely used communications processor architecture. Earlier this year, a Gartner Dataquest report named Freescale the world's No. 1 supplier of embedded processors in 2004, surpassing Intel with 28.2 percent market share.
"The ongoing market success of Freescale's PowerQUICC architecture has helped propel our communications processor shipments past the 200 million mark," said Lynelle McKay, vice president and general manager of Freescale's Digital Systems Division. "The PowerQUICC family is the most popular communications processor architecture in the history of embedded processing. And the innovations never stop. We continue to invest heavily in our flagship PowerQUICC business, and our customers can expect to see architectural advancements for many years to come."
Engineered for scalability, versatility and compatibility across many development platforms, Freescale's PowerQUICC processor family is the solution of choice for more than 5,000 communications and networking system designs. A mainstay in infrastructure applications, PowerQUICC processors provide the communications intelligence for a large proportion of 2.5G and 3G wireless basestations, enterprise and SOHO routers, remote access servers, DSLAMs, central office switching equipment, voice over IP (VoIP) systems and media gateways.
While PowerQUICC architecture remains a de facto standard for networking and communications infrastructure, it is also an increasingly popular processing platform in the home networking and consumer electronics market. PowerQUICC processors are used in such applications as voice-enabled VPN routers, residential gateways, home media servers, IPTV set-top boxes and network storage.
Iomega Corporation, for example, recently announced that its new UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) compliant StorCenter Network Hard Drive contains a PowerQUICC II processor. Last week, Freescale also announced its collaboration with Jungo to deliver platform solutions for residential and business gateway products based on security-enabled PowerQUICC II processors and Jungo's OpenRG and OpenSMB software.
Beyond communications infrastructure and home networking, PowerQUICC processing intelligence has spread to many other rapidly growing application segments, such as printing and imaging, blade servers, defense and aerospace systems, enterprise and small-medium business (SMB) storage and industrial control.
Freescale's PowerQUICC architecture is backed by a comprehensive ecosystem of development tools from leading third-party vendors belonging to Freescale's Design Alliance Program. In addition to this extensive third-party support, Freescale offers a wide range of development solutions for PowerQUICC processors, such as cost-effective QUICCstart evaluation systems, application development system (ADS) boards and the CodeWarrior(TM) development products for Freescale processors based on PowerPC cores.
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/051031/315258.html?.v=1
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
Freescale Unveils World's First 3G Single Core Modem for Mobile Phones
PR, Monday October 31, 8:00 am ET
Mobile eXtreme Convergence platform cements Freescale's 3G wireless leadership with a two-year lead on competition
AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 31, 2005-- Freescale Semiconductor (NYSE:FSL - News; NYSE:FSL.B - News) has unveiled its revolutionary 3G single core modem processor, at the heart of the MXC300-30 platform, based on the Mobile eXtreme Convergence architecture. Freescale is the first to provide a single core modem for third generation wireless phones -- and is the only one to provide a comprehensive UMTS platform including combined baseband and applications processor, RF, power amplifier and power management.
"Freescale is pulling ahead in the race to deliver comprehensive 3G solutions that remove barriers and reduce the risk for handset manufacturers," says Franz Fink senior vice president and general manager of Freescale's wireless and mobile systems group. "The MXC300-30 platform illustrates our architectural approach to reducing handset design costs while increasing design freedom. Imagine slim and sleek 3G handsets like the 2.5G handsets of today, at the same affordable price."
This single platform can equip virtually any product -- an MP3 player, a handheld DVD player or a digital camera -- to become a fully functional smart mobile cellular device. Customer implementations have demonstrated that:
MXC's simple, clean architecture reduces development time, in turn decreasing complexity, reducing risk and speeding time to market.
MXC's shared memory approach and built-in hardware accelerators result in a 40 percent lower power consumption compared to traditional architectures, increasing battery life for power hungry 3G devices.
MXC's innovative packaging techniques put the architecture in the size of a postage stamp, literally freeing up more room to design and innovate.
MXC's integrated world-class power amplifier and power management technology helps reduce dropped calls and extend battery life.
MXC's scalable, flexible roadmap provides the right solution for ultra-low-cost, voice-only 3G phones all the way up to full featured multimedia 3G devices.
Freescale 3G solutions
Freescale delivers a full range of UMTS/W-CDMA and GSM/GPRS platforms and components with a proven software stack, the industry's first single core modem architecture and full portfolio of connectivity technologies. These open, scalable solutions help to reduce risk and cost, speed and ease time to market and create design freedom for handset manufacturers, network operators and third party partners and developers. The MXC275-30 platform for 2.75G EDGE and MXC300-30 platform for 3G WCDMA markets are both based on the Mobile eXtreme Convergence architecture. For more information visit: www.freescale.com/MXC
Freescale provides the flexibility to differentiate, cut costs and innovate -- it's freedom for 3G. www.freescale.com/3G
About Freescale Semiconductor
Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. (NYSE:FSL - News; NYSE:FSL.B - News) is a global leader in the design and manufacture of embedded semiconductors for the automotive, consumer, industrial, networking and wireless markets. Freescale became a publicly traded company in July 2004 after more than 50 years as part of Motorola, Inc. The company is based in Austin, Texas, and has design, research and development, manufacturing or sales operations in more than 30 countries. Freescale, a member of the S&P 500®, is one of the world's largest semiconductor companies with 2004 sales of $5.7 billion (USD). www.freescale.com
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/051031/315052.html?.v=1
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
Freescale Gets in Fighting Form, Helped by Former Parent Motorola
BARONS ONLINE, By MARK VEVERKA, MONDAY, OCTOBER 31, 2005
FREESCALE SEMICONDUCTOR WAS SPUN OFF from Motorola more than a year ago, but the Austin, Texas, chip maker still counts the former mothership as a big customer and has clearly been sharing in its recent successes.
Freescale (ticker: FSL) hit a 52-week high of 25.99 on July 28 before fears about a foundering auto industry began to spook investors. About one-third of the company's revenues come from silicon it supplies to Detroit, Tokyo and Munich. But even at about 23 on Friday, Freescale's shares are still up about 45% from a year ago.
"We entered the market quite undervalued, and I think that the market has given us credit for beating earnings estimates since going public," Freescale Chief Executive Michel Mayer told Barron's in a recent interview.
The nation's third-largest chip maker, behind Intel (INTC) and Texas Instruments (TXN), didn't miss a beat when it reported earnings a couple of weeks ago. Driven by intense cost-cutting and major organizational restructuring, profits nearly tripled for the third quarter to $164 million, or 38 cents a share.
Sales rose only about 1.4%, to $1.45 billion, reflecting the lackluster demand for automotive and networking-gear chips. Revenues from chips for handsets, however, rose 8.5%, reflecting brisk sales of Motorola's latest models, including the ultra-thin RAZR phone.
As is often the case with huge units within major conglomerates, the former Motorola (MOT) chip unit needed some serious belt-tightening, says Mayer, a French national and former IBM executive.
"One of the things I inherited was sub-par financial performance, [so] we've had to undergo significant manufacturing restructuring," Mayer says.
One of his primary goals has been to fatten gross margins to north of 45%, which is close to being accomplished. Third-quarter margins clocked in at 43%, which explains how Freescale managed to nearly triple profits despite relatively flat sales. "We have been very clear with Wall Street that at this part of our life, margin expansion is very important," Mayer says.
Of course, cost-cutting and manufacturing efficiency can only take you so far. And fond as Mayer is of Free-scale's former parent, he is anxious to grow the company's wireless business beyond Motorola. He also plans to expand business in automotive, especially in Japan, where Freescale has about 1,000 employees on the ground. Plus, Mayer hopes to make more inroads into consumer electronics and entertainment, which has been a key area of concentration for its competitor up the Interstate in Dallas: Texas Instruments.
The weakness in automotive and networking gear has driven Freescale shares down about 11% from their July high. But that isn't dampening UBS semiconductor analyst Tom Thornhill's enthusiasm for the shares. The analyst upgraded Freescale last week to Buy with a target of 28, calling the dip an opportunity.
Thornhill contends that the company will make up for softness in its transportation and networking businesses, which together account for more than 70% of revenues, with yet more margin expansion and higher mobile-wireless sales. He figures that Freescale is trading for 18 times calendar 2006 earnings (adjusted for options) of $1.23 cents a share, which is slightly lower than Texas Instruments' multiple of 19.
Of course, betting on Motorola having a strong holiday season with its latest phones isn't a slam dunk, but it isn't a long shot either.
Open-Source Protection
If the likes of Lloyd's of London can insure University of Southern California quarterback Matt Leinart from career-ending injury, it can certainly figure a way to protect corporations from liability related to running open-source software on their networks. That, at least, is the thinking of Matthew Hogg, an executive with Kiln of London, a Lloyd's underwriter.
Hogg and Daniel Egger, chief executive of Open Source Risk Management, a New York consulting firm, have teamed to launch a completely new insurance policy that covers risks associated with users of Linux and other open-source software.
"It puts open source on a level playing field with other types of software," Egger said in an interview. "We hope this product becomes a standard part of risk management."
Called "Open Source Compliance Insurance," the policies are expected to be written initially for about $5 million to $10 million. And while many corporate lawyers may not understand what it is, or why they might need it, they will soon. Most major companies use open-source software somewhere in their enterprises. It is basically free, and it is shared. It is a major threat to the proprietary and expensive closed-software products sold by Microsoft.
At some point in the enterprise, a company's proprietary software code meets the open-source code, which is where the potential risk lies. Companies are discovering that some code they would rather not share with the public is considered by non-profit governing bodies as "open." If deemed so, these companies stand to lose monetary value associated with the code.
When Cisco Systems bought consumer wireless-router company Linksys, it found out after the fact that Linksys unwittingly used open code it thought was proprietary. Cisco paid a premium for some of Linksys' code, but had to share the code eventually with the public and eat the premium it paid in the acquisition cost.
The first policies will be written for "early adopters" of this innovative policy. Says Hogg: "Big companies have been asking for this kind of coverage." All that remains is whether they will buy it.
http://online.barrons.com/public/main/
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
Freescale's Ultra-Wideband Wins Wall Street Journal Technology Innovation Awar
PR, Thursday October 27
AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 27, 2005--Freescale Semiconductor (NYSE:FSL - News; NYSE:FSL.B - News) has received a Technology Innovation Award from the Wall Street Journal for its commercial Ultra-Wideband (UWB) products. Named a winner under the "wireless" category, Freescale was recognized for its efforts to enable the first consumer products using UWB.
In an audio interview published by The Wall Street Journal, News Editor John Leger, who oversees the awards, said, "For the purposes of this contest, an innovation has to represent a break with conventional ideas or methods. It has to go beyond marginal improvements on what's already on the market. In other words, it has to be truly novel."
Freescale was named the winner in the "wireless category," beating runners-up Airgo Networks and BT. Judges named winners in each of 12 categories and a total of 20 runners-up. Out of 750 entries, the field was narrowed to 104 semifinalists. Then a panel of expert judges from industry, research organizations and academia scored each entry and picked the winners. Judges praised Freescale for helping bring to consumers a technology that could lead to ubiquitous consumer deployment.
"This award validates the tremendous work that our team has done to enable a new approach to wireless communications," said Martin Rofheart, director of the Ultra-Wideband Operation at Freescale. "It is also timely in that many UWB-enabled applications, such as cell phones, USB hubs and high definition televisions (HDTV), will be showcased at the Consumer Electronics Show in January. Indeed, UWB will play an important role as consumers become increasingly aware of technologies such as UWB that allow more wireless freedom."
About Freescale's UWB Solutions
Freescale's UWB solutions enable high rate transfer of video, audio and data streams wirelessly. At rates 100 times faster than Bluetooth® technology and with wire-like quality, UWB brings a new wireless option to consumer electronics and PC/peripheral manufacturers. Using UWB, for example, an MPEG2 movie or HDTV stream can be broadcast in real-time wirelessly. This allows consumers new freedom in the placement of home entertainment equipment, as the various components -- HDTV, digital video recorder, media server -- no longer need to be connected with wires.
Freescale, a pioneer in UWB and the first company to offer commercial UWB products, is currently shipping its UWB solutions to original equipment manufacturer (OEM) customers worldwide for a variety of consumer electronics and computing products. Freescale's XS110 chipset received Federal Communications Commission certification in 2004 and currently delivers 110 megabits per second and achieves a range of up to 20 meters. The world's first consumer product using UWB was announced in June, a high definition television from Haier Corporation, which uses Freescale's UWB solution.
About Freescale Semiconductor
Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. (NYSE:FSL - News; NYSE:FSL.B - News) is a global leader in the design and manufacture of embedded semiconductors for the automotive, consumer, industrial, networking and wireless markets. Freescale became a publicly traded company in July 2004 after more than 50 years as part of Motorola, Inc. The company is based in Austin, Texas, and has design, research and development, manufacturing or sales operations in more than 30 countries. Freescale, a member of the S&P 500®, is one of the world's largest semiconductor companies with 2004 sales of $5.7 billion (USD). www.freescale.com
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/051027/275653.html?.v=1
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
Freescale Expands QUICCstart Evaluation System Support for Flagship PowerQUICC Communications Processors
PR, Wednesday October 26
Embedded system developers accelerate "out-of-the-box" productivity with Freescale's easy-to-use processor evaluation board and software tools
AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 26, 2005-- System developers are under constant pressure to choose the optimal embedded processors for their next system designs. To help developers streamline the process of evaluating communications processor choices, Freescale Semiconductor (NYSE:FSL - News; NYSE:FSL.B - News) has expanded its line of QUICCstart evaluation systems to support a broader range of popular PowerQUICC(TM) processors based on PowerPC® technology.
Freescale now offers a QUICCstart evaluation system for the high-performance MPC8541E PowerQUICC III processor with integrated security. The MPC8541E evaluation board can be configured to support the MPC8555E, MPC8560 and MPC8540 PowerQUICC III processors. A new QUICCstart evaluation system also is available for the PowerQUICC II Pro processor family. The evaluation board is based on the MPC8343E processor with integrated security, enabling developers to evaluate performance, features and functionality of the PowerQUICC II Pro family.
Freescale's latest QUICCstart evaluation systems support a variety of communications interfaces, including 10/100/1000 Ethernet and PCI. The PowerQUICC II Pro family evaluation system also supports all flavors of USB (USB Host 2.0, Device 2.0, and On-The-Go). As an added convenience, the QUICCstart systems include a CodeWarrior(TM) USB TAP that enables developers to control the evaluation board and set break points quickly and easily.
"QUICCstart is the ideal evaluation solution for developers because it provides a head start in the development cycle with a smooth transition to a production environment, while providing relief to the development budget compared with higher-cost application development systems," said Jeff Timbs, director of marketing for Freescale's Digital Systems Division. "Combining ease of use with versatility, QUICCstart systems enable designers to take on a multitude of networking and telecom equipment applications based on PowerQUICC processors."
QUICCstart evaluation systems support the full range of Freescale communications processors, from cost-effective PowerQUICC I devices to high-performance PowerQUICC III system-on-chip processors. The evaluation systems provide a turnkey platform for evaluating the performance and functionality of PowerQUICC processors for use in a wide range of embedded applications. Hardware engineers can use the systems to prototype board designs that closely parallel their final applications. Software developers also can use the systems for developing and testing application code.
"Embedded Planet launched its first platform based on PowerQUICC processors in 1997 and has continued to build an extensive product portfolio around the PowerQUICC architecture," said Matt Hoover, vice president of sales and marketing at Embedded Planet. "With the increasing performance and functionality of the PowerQUICC architecture, it is critical that developers have a simple and cost-effective development environment early in the processor lifecycle, and QUICCstart evaluation systems provide a perfect solution."
About the QUICCstart evaluation systems
Each QUICCstart system comes complete with an evaluation board developed for Freescale by Embedded Planet, associated power supply and cables, CodeWarrior(TM) Development Studio, a Freescale open-source operating system based on the Linux® kernel, and CD-ROM-based documentation, including system design and reference information. The evaluation systems have been packaged for "out-of-the-box" productivity. Within 30 minutes of unpacking the kit and connecting the board to a host laptop or desktop system, developers can be up and running in evaluating their PowerQUICC processor-based designs.
"Freescale's PowerQUICC architecture is popular among embedded systems developers because it offers exceptional scalability, compatibility and a host of development tools," said Ranjit Deshpande, CTO of Kenati Technologies. "Using the QUICCstart evaluation system, Kenati was able to deploy and qualify a full-fledged VPN gateway solution in less than four weeks. Due to the availability of development tools, such as QUICCstart boards and Kenati software platforms, device manufacturers are able to roll out products with a vastly reduced software development cycle."
Using the QUICCstart board, a software developer can write code on a PC host, download it to the evaluation board, then examine chip performance, develop and debug algorithms, and work quickly toward an end application. Firmware, hardware and production test engineers can adapt the QUICCstart system to their own requirements to reduce development time. Production test engineers can use the board and debugging tools to design and prototype complex production algorithms before custom hardware is prototyped.
Pricing and availability
QUICCstart evaluation systems for the MPC8541E PowerQUICC III processor and the PowerQUICC II Pro family are available this quarter from Freescale and through Freescale distributors; suggested retail prices range from $795 to $995. The CodeWarrior Development Studio that comes with each system is an evaluation version that is time limited to 30 days from installation. A fully licensed version of CodeWarrior software can be obtained separately from Freescale and Freescale distributors. For more details about QUICCstart and other Freescale development tools, visit www.freescale.com/devtooldirect.
About Freescale Semiconductor
Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. (NYSE:FSL - News; NYSE:FSL.B - News) is a global leader in the design and manufacture of embedded semiconductors for the automotive, consumer, industrial, networking and wireless markets. Freescale became a publicly traded company in July 2004 after more than 50 years as part of Motorola, Inc. The company is based in Austin, Texas, and has design, research and development, manufacturing or sales operations in more than 30 countries. Freescale, a member of the S&P 500®, is one of the world's largest semiconductor companies, with 2004 sales of $5.7 billion (USD).
www.freescale.com
Freescale(TM) and the Freescale logo are trademarks of Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. All other product or service names are the property of their respective owners. The "PowerPC" name is a trademark of IBM Corp. and used under license. © Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. 2005.
http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/051026/265197.html?.v=1
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
Freescale exec says centralizing design activity paying dividends
<Dylan McGrath, EETimes, 10/21/05>
SAN FRANCISCO — Changes in Freescale Semiconductor Inc.'s approach to chip design, including standardizing on methodologies and appointing a renowned design manager, are contributing to improvements in the company's bottom line, according to Sumit Sadana, senior vice president of strategy and business development.
Sadana told EE Times Friday (Oct. 20) that, since joining Freescale in December 2004, he has implemented several changes to centralize design activity within the company in support of Freescale's overall goal of reducing cost structure and improving efficiency.
In addition, Sadana credited the addition of Chekib Akrout, the former IBM vice president who headed the design effort on the Cell processor, with adding experience, leadership and star power to Freescale's design efforts. Akrout quietly joined Freescale several months ago as vice president of design systems.
Freescale, which had been Motorola Semiconductor prior to being spun out by the parent company last year, had traditionally maintained a very de-centralized design function, Sadana said, with design teams that were segregated mainly by product division. Each, he said, operated completely autonomously from the others, selecting their own EDA tools (and suppliers), methodologies and practices. This situation resulted in a mismatch of tools and technologies, and left the company with little leverage for negotiating volume license agreements with EDA vendors.
Sadana has created a centralized design technology organization, responsible for design teams across Freescale's divisions. This organization is in the process of creating a common methodology, including standardizing on a set of EDA tools.
"It's still a work in progress," Sadana said. "But we've been at it for many months."
Though he would not reveal the vendors involved, Sadana said Freescale is close to signing some very significant deals with a much smaller set of EDA providers than the company had been using previously and that, over time, Freescale's EDA tool vendor base would decrease. These pending deals, he said, are more "partnerships" that include the sharing of Freescale and legacy Motorola internal tools and intellectual property.
Sadana said the design centralization effort, though still evolving, has already paid dividends. As proof, he pointed to the company's recent announcement that its first dozen 90-nanometer products have all been "right-the-first-time," producing fully functional samples in customers applications after only one pass.
Like many companies, Sadana said, Freescale is also putting greater focus on design-for-manufacture (DFM) and design-for-test (DFT) in order to increase yields, reduce test times and "not build un-testable chips." In support of these efforts, Freescale is including more built-in self-test (BIST) structures in designs and is moving to standardize on one tester platform company-wide, Sadana said.
On Thursday, Freescale reported a third quarter net income of $164 million on sales of $1.45 billion. Sadana touted the company's third quarter improvements in gross margin (to 43.3 percent) and operating income (to 10.6 percent) as indications that Freescale is succeeding at its goal to strengthen its operating model.
Also Thursday, Freescale announced the acquisition of modem processing multimode IC provider CommASIC, which Freescale has converted into its San Diego Design Center. Sadana said Freescale would "almost certainly" be announcing other acquisitions in the near future and that the company would "not be shy" about making acquisitions to acquire technology and talent.
http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=172303317
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
CommASIC gives Freescale OFDM-based technology for wireless-LAN, WiFi, WiMax & Digital Video Broadcast (DVB).
Freescale acquires fabless company CommASIC
<EETimes, 10/20/05>
MANHASSET, N.Y. — Freescale Semiconductor has acquired CommASIC, a San Diego-based fabless semiconductor company, to strengthen its offerings in wireless broadband technologies.
Freescale (Austin, Texas) did not disclose terms of the transaction.
Privately-held with 30 employees, CommASIC provides modem processing multimode technologies, including orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM)-based solutions, such as Wi-Fi-certified 802.11 a/b/g. These solutions enable low-cost wireless broadband capability in various mobile and consumer devices.
"This acquisition gives Freescale a base architecture and system expertise that can be leveraged across any OFDM-based technology such as wireless-LAN, WiMax and Digital Video Broadcast (DVB)," said Sumit Sadana, Freescale's senior vice president, Strategy and Business Development, in a statement.
CommASIC’s team will staff Freescale's newly formed San Diego Design Center, which will work in concert with other Freescale design centers to advance the company's connectivity roadmap.
http://www.eet.com/news/latest/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=172302845&printable=true
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
Cost Controls Boost Freescale's Net
<By Staff Reporter, WALL STREET JOURNAL, 10/21/05>
Freescale Semiconductor Inc.'s net income in the third quarter nearly tripled as cost controls helped offset sluggish sales.
The Austin, Texas, chip maker reported net of $164 million, or 38 cents a share, up from $57 million, or 15 cents a share, in the year-earlier period. The latest quarter included a $26 million pretax gain and a $10 million write-down of receivables stemming from Troy, Mich., auto-parts supplier Delphi Corp. filing for bankruptcy protection.
Sales rose 1.4% to $1.45 billion from $1.43 billion as demand for the company's automotive and networking-gear chips stalled. Revenue from the company's mobile-phone-chip division rose 8.5%.
Freescale, the nation's third-largest chip maker behind Intel Corp. and Texas Instruments Inc., makes a wide range of chips for cars, cellphones, Internet networking gear, and home appliances. It was spun off by Motorola Inc. in 2004 and is the primary chip supplier to the Schaumburg, Ill., maker of telecommunications equipment.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB112986076109775332.html?mod=yahoo_hs&ru=yahoo
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
Freescale acquires CommASIC
<PR, 10/20/05>
Company brings ultra-low power embedded Wi-Fi to Freescale's connectivity offerings
AUSTIN, Texas — October 20, 2005 — Freescale Semiconductor (NYSE:FSL, FSL.B) has acquired CommASIC, a fabless semiconductor company based in San Diego. CommASIC provides modem processing multimode technologies, including orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM)-based solutions, such as Wi-Fi-certified 802.11 a/b/g. These solutions enable low-cost wireless broadband capability in a wide variety of mobile and consumer devices that require maximum energy efficiency for long battery life, without sacrificing style, weight or performance.
"This acquisition gives Freescale a base architecture and system expertise that can be leveraged across any OFDM-based technology such as wireless-LAN, WiMax and Digital Video Broadcast (DVB)," said Sumit Sadana, Freescale's senior vice president, strategy and business development. "CommASIC's flexible, programmable, ultra-low power baseband architecture will complement Freescale's portfolio of offerings for networking, industrial, wireless and consumer markets."
According to the 2005 ABI Research Wi-Fi forecast, an estimated 350 million devices will have embedded Wi-Fi by 2010. Freescale plans to offer integrated Wi-Fi technology for original equipment manufacturers to leverage in next-generation products such as cellular and VoIP handsets, personal multimedia players, computer peripherals and other consumer devices.
Founded in 2001, CommASIC is a privately-held company, headquartered in San Diego, California. It has 30 employees. This team will staff Freescale's newly formed San Diego Design Center, which will work in concert with other Freescale design centers to advance the company's connectivity roadmap.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
About Freescale Semiconductor
Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. (NYSE:FSL, FSL.B) is a global leader in the design and manufacture of embedded semiconductors for the automotive, consumer, industrial, networking and wireless markets. Freescale became a publicly traded company in July 2004 after more than 50 years as part of Motorola, Inc. The company is based in Austin, Texas, and has design, research and development, manufacturing or sales operations in more than 30 countries. Freescale, a member of the S&P 500®, is one of the world's largest semiconductor companies with 2004 sales of $5.7 billion (USD).
www.freescale.com.
http://www.freescale.com/webapp/sps/site/display.jsp?nodeId=093623&filePath=/media_center/news_r....
SeriousMoney
19 years ago
Freescale 3Q Profit Nearly Triples - Freescale Semi Almost Triples 3Q Profit on Strength in Wireless, Mobile Products
<AP, 10/20/05>
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) -- Freescale Semiconductor Inc. on Thursday said its profit nearly tripled in the third quarter on improved sales in its wireless and mobile segment.
Shares of Freescale slipped 59 cents to close at $21.81 on the New York Stock Exchange, but gained 99 cents, or 4.5 percent, to $22.80 in after-hours activity.
Quarterly income was $164 million, or 38 cents per share, up from $57 million, or 15 cents, the year before. Setting aside a $26 million pretax gain from selling a unit and a $10 million write-down of receivables, earnings amounted to 35 cents per share.
The chip maker's adjusted income easily surpassed the average estimate of 28 cents per share from analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial.
Net sales totaled $1.45 billion, a slight 1 percent gain from $1.43 billion a year earlier and just ahead of analysts' consensus target of $1.44 billion.
By segment, sales of Freescale's transportation and standard products fell 2 percent to $637 million, and networking and computing systems declined less than a percent to $360 million. However, sales of wireless and mobile products advanced 8 percent to $438 million.
"Our team turned in a good performance during the quarter," Michel Mayer, chairman and chief executive, said in a statement. "We have a lot of work left to do, but our third-quarter results clearly indicate that we are on the right track to transform Freescale."
Looking forward, the company forecast fourth-quarter revenue of $1.43 billion to $1.53 billion, and said gross margins are expected to increase slightly from the prior period.
Analysts project quarterly income of 32 cents per share and revenue of $1.48 billion.
http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/051020/earns_freescale.html?.v=1