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Nikkei Electronics

August 01 2005 Issue

Next 2 Weeks .  .  .  p. 8

Keyword .  .  .  p. 10

Holographic Data Storage

What’s New .  .  .  p. 28

• WILLCOM Develops a Miniature Wireless Communications Mobile
• Fuji Heavy Industries Develops a New Type of Electrical Storage Element Combing Both Capacitor and Lithium Ion Technologies
• HDTV Signal Output to Analog Interfaces to Be Effectively Prohibited in Next Generation Optical Disc Players
• HGST Develops HDD Featuring Up to 60% Power Consumption Reduction
• KDDI Displays a Fuel Cell for Mobile Phones with a 20Wh Capacity
• Tool to Measure OS or Other Software Behavior in Detail Appears
  
  

Leading Trends

Lithium Ion Batteries to Be Finally Implemented in Hybrid Cars                .  .  .  p. 43
Lithium ion secondary batteries are going to take the place of nickel-metal hydride secondary batteries as the favored power supply for hybrid vehicles.  Their inclusion in vehicles should begin in earnest from around 2006 to 2008.

Other than Long-Term Storage Use, the Optical Disc Will Largely Disappear.  .  .  p. 51
Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD will mark the end of the line for optical disks being used as a medium for content distribution.  From 2010, optical disks will be put to greatly different use.  Instead of being used to distribute content, they will be promoted for use as a medium for long-term storage of data across networks.

Cover Story

IBM’s Chances of Winning in the Semiconductor Market .  .  .  p. 77
IBM Corporation and Apple Computer, Inc. have drawn the curtains on their 15-year honeymoon period.  IBM, which has effectively withdrawn from the microprocessor market for personal computers, wants to rebuild its semiconductor business. 
The key will be to capture the market for embedded devices.

(Part 1)
New Opportunities in Embedded Devices—Sharing Technology to Form Partnerships .  .  .  p. 80
The parting of ways between IBM Corporation and Apple Computer, Inc. took business circles by surprise.  Underlying the move was the pressure placed on IBM to overhaul its semiconductor business. 
The company is aiming to expand its share of the market for embedded devices where it can draw on the strengths of its own process technology.  Making inroads into the household game console market is merely one point along the way in this endeavor.  Pulling out of the microprocessor market for personal computers was perhaps an inevitable course of action for the company to be able to make effective use of its limited development resources.

(Part 2)
Playing it Safe up to 2010 with Confidence in the Next New Strategy .  .  .  p. 87
The CMOS technologies IBM Corporation has put into practical application over the last decade—copper circuitry in 1997; silicon on insulator (SOI) technology in 1998; and strained silicon in 2001—have been consistently stunning. 
The electrical properties of CMOS circuits can no longer be enhanced by miniaturization alone, which means prominent technologies such as those IBM has introduced thus far will become ever more essential.  IBM’s technical releases to the major semiconductor associations have roughly quadrupled in 10 years and the company is further strengthening its resolve to delve into new technological research that can be quickly applied.  Just what does IBM have in mind next?

Interview

IBM Systems Group’s Vice President, Mark Papermaster: “From Game Consoles to Servers, Our Collective Power Is Our Strength”  .  .  .  p. 95

Tech Tale

The Engineers Who Created Cell (Final): “Chasing an Unfulfilled Dream”.  .  .  p. 98

Guest Paper

Magnetic Sensors Capable of Detecting Motion to Be Used in “Gesture Control” Mobile Phone .  .  .  p. 103
From mobile phones operated by pushing buttons to ones you shake—mobile phone operation is likely to undergo significant changes in the near future.  Aichi Steel Corporation has developed a sensor module that combines a geomagnetic sensor with an acceleration sensor. 
The module is compact so that it can be installed in mobile phones, and in February 2005 it was employed in Vodafone phones for moving cursors on menu screens and controlling game screens.  Based on the idea of pairing a magnetic sensor element called an MI (magneto-impedance) element with a cantilever unit, acceleration could be measured using the same principles as a geomagnetic sensor. 
Here, the person in charge of Aichi Steel’s development department gives an overview of the recent technology and the products, details of the module’s internal configuration and sensing principles, an overview of MI sensor method, and potential applications of geomagnetic and acceleration sensors in mobile phones, while offering comparisons with other types of sensors. 

NETs Buyers’ Guide

Mobile DRAM .  .  .  p. 112
As mobile phones, digital cameras, and other mobile devices become more functional, there is an increasing demand for types of memory that consume low levels of power and yet possess a certain capacity. 
Meeting these requirements is “mobile DRAM,” a type of synchronous DRAM that consumes low levels of power.  Other types of memory that are characterized by low power consumption include “Pseudo SRAM,” but this article will deal with mobile DRAM, which has performance advantages in terms of capacity and operating frequency.  Mobile device functions are evolving with remarkable speed, which means the requirements for mobile DRAM are also constantly changing. 
With this in mind, we outline the specifications of products currently being mass-produced as well as present trends concerning upcoming changes in performance for mobile DRAM.

NETs Seminar

Applying Optical Technologies to Measurement and Communications (2nd Half)  .  .  .  p. 117
The second part on photonic electric field sensors looks at specific application examples. 
We introduce development and measurement examples of: measurement systems for inner nodes of LSI; measurement systems for various printed circuit boards; and communication systems that use the human body, for example, as a transmission medium.

“Side Channel Analysis”: The Actual Threat (Part 2) .  .  .  p. 125
Side channel analysis methods can be classified into a number of groups according to the type of data being analyzed. 
This installment introduces specific techniques of the main methods, which include differential power analysis that uses statistical analysis to detect slight differences in electrical power.

Next 2 Weeks	8	For further information, please contact: Nikkei Electronics 2-1-1, Hirakawacho Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 102-8622, Japan Vox: +81-3-5210-8141, Fax: +81-3-5210-8510 http://ne.nikkeibp.co.jp/
Keyword:	10
News Ranking	12
What's New:	28
Selected Shorts:	37
Leading Trends:	43
Cover Story:	77
Interview:	95
Tech Tale:	98
Guest Paper:	103
NETs:	112
Calendar:	164
From the Readers:	168
From the Editors:	169