By Bolaji Ojo
What’s at stake
Those who invested early in silicon carbide are seeing their efforts start to pay off. But competitors are popping up everywhere, putting more SiC-related M&A and partnership deals in place. The question is who, over time, can build the right ecosystem to advance SiC technologies, bring down costs and ensure a stable supply of raw materials and SiC wafers.
Read More »Silicon Carbide Gets Ready for Prime Time
What’s at stake?
Vehicle electrification helped push silicon carbide (SiC) out of labs and into systems, making SiC a commercially viable alternative to silicon-based power electronics. Some high-profile names have played key roles in that transition, but it may be too early for any company to claim victory in the evolving SiC technology race. Who’s best positioned to profit from the decades-long SiC development effort?
By Ron Wilson
What’s at stake
Silicon carbide isn’t just about drill bits and abrasives anymore. The material also goes into transistors that are increasingly vital to green energy and transportation. The SiC supply chain may determine whether you can actually take delivery on that electric car you’ve been thinking about, or the solar panels to help charge it.
Dear Ted,
Velodyne’s recent announcement introducing you as its new CEO didn’t surprise me. You’re the right executive arriving at the right time to correct the course of a vision-challenged company that has lost its way.
Velodyne went public in September 2020 through the dubious mechanism of a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) merger with blank-check company Graph Industrial. Since then, as the corporate board and its largest shareholder have relentlessly exchanged accusations, Velodyne has become best known for its dysfunction.
Read More »Open Letter to Ted Tewksbury, Velodyne’s New CEO
Drones are coming to the farm, hot above the heels of marauding wild boars.
With the explosive growth of feral hog populations that wreak havoc on crops and fields, farmers worldwide are suffering a significant uptick in crop loss.
Stepping to the front lines in this agricultural clash is Sara Nozkova, CEO and cofounder of Flox Robotics, a drone startup based in Sweden.
Read More »Farm Drones Going Hog Wild
By Bolaji Ojo
What’s at stake
NXP is growing, well above the semiconductor industry average, and is leveraging prior acquisitions and financial strength to establish itself as a major player in the market. Can the company maintain this growth profile in the face of hungry competitors and against the backdrop of its own history? It may take several years for NXP to prove it can withstand market and geopolitical pressures beyond its control.
By Bolaji Ojo
The electronics industry is at it again. Notorious for offering bewildering solutions to chronic and possibly unsolvable problems, OEM and semiconductor executives are convulsed with figuring out a fix for the supply shortages that have shuttered some automotive manufacturing plants and crimped sales as global economies struggle to recover from the pandemic.
Read More »JIC is a Poor Replacement for JIT
Dear Zuck,
You can hide behind a rebranding, but you can’t run from your most egregious accomplishment: You’ve delivered, in a most terrifying way, on that infamous slogan of yours, “Move fast and break things.” You’ve broken people, societies and dented American democracy. What you’ve built is nothing less than “a toxic propaganda guidebook for the ages,” according to New York Times columnist Kara Swisher.
Read More »Open Letter to Zuck: Prove to Us That ‘Ethics in Tech’ Is Not an Oxymoron
By Bolaji Ojo
What’s at Stake?
The challenge posed by Nvidia – via its planned acquisition of Arm – to Intel’s x86 architecture is real and potentially unstoppable, and should not be casually dismissed. With a huge market at stake, we expect Intel to fight back hard. But no matter what kind of headwinds Nvidia faces from Intel, Arm licensees and international regulators, the deal signals that a new day is dawning in the chip market – one that will have major ramifications for all the players, and for consumers too.
Draft of a funereal eulogy to be read in the event of Nvidia’s acquisition of Arm Ltd.
So, farewell, Arm Ltd., you were a fine company. You were a child of Cambridge, England, but you only made it to 32 years old.
Nothing lasts forever. But some things and ideas last a long time and become part of the landscape, part of what defines what else can happen. And some things don’t last so long or cease to endure, and can be moved around or taken off the table for commercial benefit.
Read More »Rest in Peace: Arm, 1990 – 2022
