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Турклуб "Глобус": змагання, перемоги і донати Інформація КП вт, 03/24/2026 - 12:00

India’s electronics and semiconductor sector is currently experiencing a significant turning point in its trajectory. This transformation is primarily fuelled by key government initiatives such as the Production Linked Incentive (PLI), Electronic Manufacturing Clusters Scheme (EMCS), and Design Linked Incentive (DLI) schemes. In addition, the sector is benefiting from the realignment of global supply chains towards India and the anticipated growth in domestic demand. As a result of these factors, industry projections indicate that the sector is on track to reach a market value of US$500 billion by the year 2030. This rapid evolution signifies India’s transition from being a consumption-driven market to emerging as a prominent global centre for innovation, manufacturing excellence, and intellectual property (IP) development.

At the core of this momentum are events such as Electronica India and Productronica India, which are organised by Messe Muenchen India. These platforms have transformed beyond mere trade shows and have become pivotal drivers of industry advancement. By bringing together policymakers, international investors, pioneers, suppliers, and producers in a single setting, these events facilitate more than just conversations. They lead to tangible results such as establishing new collaborations, transferring technology, integrating supply chains, and translating policies into market opportunities that enhance India’s electronics value chain.

In a highly insightful discussion, the President of IMEA (India, Middle East, Africa) at Messe München, along with the CEO of Messe München India, sheds light on India’s remarkable journey from a consumption-oriented market to a prominent global electronics manufacturing hub. Recognising the imperative need to keep pace with the swiftly evolving industry landscape, electronica India and productronica India are making a strategic shift to a biannual schedule commencing from April 2026 in Greater Noida. These cutting-edge platforms, revered as “decision-grade” marketplaces, are strategically designed to streamline the supply chain operations, showcasing over 400 exhibitors and fostering collaborative partnerships, technological advancements, and bolstering domestic production capabilities.

In a recent conversation with Bhupinder Singh, President of India, Middle East, and Africa at Messe München, as well as the Chief Executive Officer of Messe München India, we discussed…

ELETimes: India’s electronics landscape has evidently undergone a significant transformation. In your opinion, which pivotal shift do you believe is driving the market trends presently?

Bhupinder Singh:  The crucial transition happening in the current landscape, shifting from intent to execution at a large scale. With capacity increasing, compliance becoming stricter, and decision-making processes becoming more efficient, the market must enhance its capability to assess technologies, validate partners, and smoothly progress from planning to implementation without delays caused by evaluating multiple vendors. In such a dynamic setting, business platforms should not only bring stakeholders together but also facilitate productive outcomes.

ELETimes: What sets electronica India and productronica India apart as marketplaces in 2026?
Bhupinder Singh: Our role is to simplify a complex supply chain by reducing friction. Given the deeply interconnected nature of electronics manufacturing, Electronica India and Productronica India bring the entire value chain into a single, focused environment—enabling companies to evaluate solutions end-to-end, align cross-functional stakeholders, and make more confident decisions. Ultimately, this is not just a showcase, but a purpose-built, decision-grade marketplace.

ELETimes: What level of scale and participation can the industry anticipate from the April 2026 editions?

Bhupinder Singh: Scale matters—but what truly drives outcomes is decision density. The April 2026 edition is built around high-intent engagement, bringing together 400+ exhibitors representing over 1,000 companies from 20+ countries, connecting with an expected 30,000+ trade attendees. Through live demonstrations, operational equipment, supplier interactions, and structured meetings, participants can evaluate solutions in a focused setting. With multiple options available in one place, teams can benchmark more efficiently, compare with greater accuracy, and accelerate decision-making. In effect, the event condenses months of fragmented vendor assessments into a few days of meaningful, high-value evaluation—because attendees don’t come to browse; they come to make decisions.

ELETimes: What prompted the shift to hosting two editions each year at this point?
Bhupinder Singh: The pace of the industry has fundamentally shifted. Product cycles are shorter, supplier qualification is more stringent, and project timelines leave far less room for delay. A single annual—or even biennial—touchpoint no longer reflects how companies make decisions, build, and scale today.

This transition also aligns with the momentum driven by India’s PLI and ECMS schemes, which are accelerating investments across electronics components, products, and systems manufacturing, while enabling faster capacity expansion across regions.

Taking all of this into account, from 2026 we are moving to a biannual format: Greater Noida in April and Bengaluru in September—two key markets, two distinct buying cycles, and two strategic opportunities each year to evaluate solutions, strengthen partnerships, and fast-track implementation.

ELETimes: What new opportunities does a biannual format create for exhibitors?

Bhupinder Singh: It creates three distinct advantages: speed, precision and responsiveness.
First, pipeline velocity improves—exhibitors can engage buyers more frequently, which directly supports conversion.
Second, regional precision—North and South are both high-opportunity, but they operate differently in procurement cycles and ecosystem density.
Third, market responsiveness—brands can launch updates, gather feedback and recalibrate strategy with far less lag. In electronics, speed is not a nice-to-have. It’s a competitive advantage.

And for visitors, it means access. If you’re sourcing, building, or scaling in India, you don’t have to wait for a single annual sourcing window. You can qualify suppliers, shortlist faster and keep projects moving with a six-month rhythm.

ELETimes: The April edition is being hosted in Uttar Pradesh—what new value or advantage does this bring to the event?

Bhupinder Singh: Hosting changes the quality of engagement. With Uttar Pradesh as host, the presence of relevant government departments and institutional stakeholders becomes structural—not optional. For international and domestic participants, a host state context brings sharper visibility on facilitation and readiness—so expansion conversations move from exploratory to executable

ELETimes: The event will be inaugurated by Hon’ble Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Shri Yogi Adityanath—what message does this send to the broader industry?

Bhupinder Singh: It reflects a clear strategic commitment. Electronics sits at the core of national competitiveness and industrial growth, and the strength of state ecosystems increasingly determines the pace of progress. An inauguration led by the Chief Minister underscores electronics as a priority growth engine. For the market, this sends a strong signal—it boosts confidence and enhances the overall business environment surrounding the marketplace.

ELETimes: Uttar Pradesh has also unveiled targeted initiatives at Electronica India and Productronica India 2026. What makes these events the right platform for such announcements?
Bhupinder Singh: The aim is to elevate engagement beyond generic networking and create structured access. These initiatives are designed to raise the signal-to-noise ratio and make engagement more purposeful:

• UP Electronics Leadership Summit: A closed-door gathering of 100+ CEOs to accelerate top-level partnership and investment conversations
• CM-Meet: An invite-only leadership roundtable to align on priorities and collaboration themes
• 1: 1 meeting with international companies: To foster and accelerate alliances, JVs and market-entry conversations.
• Startup Showcase: 20+ startups to connect innovation with adoption and manufacturing capability

ELETimes: How international is the 2026 edition—practically speaking?

Bhupinder Singh: You’ll see a genuinely global footprint—strong participation across Asia, Europe and the US—bringing better benchmarking and more partnership options. As we progress toward the event, we are building toward the planned scale of 400+ exhibitors from 20+ countries.

For visitors and exhibitors alike, this matters because international presence improves benchmarking, expands partnership options, and raises the standard of technical and commercial discussions.

ELETimes: What does “end-to-end ecosystem” actually translate to on the show floor?
Bhupinder Singh: It translates to a complete, decision-ready view of electronics manufacturing—where stakeholders can assess both upstream and downstream implications and qualify partners with confidence. That includes components and modules, SMT and assembly, automation, test and inspection, embedded hardware and connectivity, EMS capabilities, and the factory disciplines that protect yield and reliability—cleanroom readiness, ESD control, safety systems and process consistency. The point isn’t variety. The point is readiness because electronics outcomes are not driven by one technology choice—they are driven by how choices perform together across the production flow.

ELETimes: You also announced a significant milestone for India’s PCB ecosystem—BPCA 2026 in collaboration with ELCINA. What shift does this represent?

Bhupinder Singh: We’ve formally launched the next phase of BPCA 2026—Bharat’s dedicated platform for Printed Circuit Boards and Assemblies—in partnership with ELCINA (Electronic Industries Association of India). As part of this transition, the India PCB Tech Conference will be rebranded as the Bharat PCB Tech Conference, creating a stronger national platform aligned with global standards and manufacturing readiness. With BPCA joining Electronica India and Productronica India 2026, we are shaping a more focused, future-ready PCB ecosystem under one roof.

ELETimes: Where does the Bharat Electronics Yatra fit into the larger strategy?

Bhupinder Singh: The Yatra is about building market readiness before the event and expanding engagement beyond the venue. It takes the conversation directly to the clusters and decision-makers, captures on-ground perspectives, and drives awareness across the broader production chain. The outcome is better participation quality: a more informed audience, sharper buyer intent and a show floor aligned to real needs. It’s a pipeline builder, pulling the ecosystem in—focused on relevance and ensuring this trade forum remains connected to the market between editions.

ELETimes: Final message—what makes the April 2026 editions of electronica India 2026 and productronica India 2026 essential fixtures on every serious industry calendar?
Bhupinder Singh: Because India is no longer “next”—it is now. Capacity is expanding, standards are sharpening, and scale is accelerating faster than most markets can track. In such a cycle, advantage belongs to those who evaluate rigorously and secure the right partners early. electronica India and productronica India are designed as decision-grade marketplaces—where technologies are benchmarked live, and partnerships move swiftly from discussion to commitment. And in April 2026, Greater Noida is where market leaders go not just to get ahead—but to stay ahead.

The post India’s Electronics Powerplay: Why 2026 Will Lead the Way for the Industry appeared first on ELE Times.

OXIDE Corp of Yamanashi, Japan (which specializes in optical crystals and frequency-conversion technology) and Finland-based laser developer and manufacturer Vexlum (which was spun off from Tampere University of Technology’s Optoelectronics Research Centre in 2017) have officially entered into a strategic partnership agreement. The collaboration focuses on the development and manufacturing of high-power laser systems designed to overcome primary scaling bottlenecks in the quantum computing and semiconductor industries...

For decades, the semiconductor industry has relied on the relentless pursuit of Moore’s Law—the doubling of transistors on an IC every two years—to deliver ever-increasing performance and functionality. This traditional approach, primarily focused on scaling individual transistors and integrating more components onto a single, monolithic 2D die, has driven innovation across countless industries.

However, as we approach the physical limits of silicon, and the economic realities of advanced process nodes become increasingly prohibitive, the conventional path of monolithic scaling is facing significant roadblocks. Companies are encountering diminishing returns in terms of performance gains, escalating design and manufacturing costs, and challenges in integrating diverse functionalities onto a single chip without compromising yield or power efficiency.

In response to these growing pressures, a fundamental shift is occurring in chip design: the move toward 3D ICs and heterogeneous integration. This paradigm offers a compelling alternative, allowing companies to overcome the limitations of traditional 2D scaling by integrating multiple specialized chiplets—each potentially manufactured on different process technologies and optimized for specific tasks—into a single, advanced package.

Beyond raw performance, the shift to 3D IC offers benefits in design flexibility, manufacturing economics, and form factor by mixing dies manufactured on different process nodes. This modularity enables the use of cutting-edge processes only where absolutely necessary for performance, while leveraging more mature, cost-effective nodes for other functions. This approach also facilitates the creation of smaller, more integrated systems, crucial for devices where space is at a premium.

The unique challenges of advanced packaging

The shift to 3D IC advanced packaging isn’t without its complexities. Heterogeneous integration introduces a new set of design challenges that traditional monolithic approaches simply didn’t encounter. Existing design tools and methodologies are insufficient for the scale and complexity of heterogeneous integration.

With 3D IC design now featuring hundreds of thousands to millions of connections, it’s impractical to use manual methods like spreadsheets to manage the intricate connectivity and interactions between 3D layers.

3D IC designers also face the daunting task of managing a myriad of diverse IP and data formats. Source data for connectivity is supplied in a multitude of formats, including CSV files, LEF/DEF, GDS, Verilog RTL, and plain text files.

Integrating multi-vendor chiplets exacerbates the need for standardized, machine-readable design-models to ensure operability across different EDA tool design workflows. Furthermore, 3D IC designs typically include multiple dies from different foundries and processes, increasing the risk of failure and making them harder to identify and fix.

Because data is often dynamic, with updates received throughout the design process, incorporating new versions of design IP threatens to obliterate existing data, especially when IC and package designers work concurrently. So, designers must be able to accept input from various stakeholders—often designing their content concurrently—to create a design that is both electrically and physically correct.

Ensuring the integrity and functionality of these complex systems demands comprehensive system-level verification, not individual component checks. To truly harness the immense power of heterogeneous integration and confidently navigate these multifaceted challenges, a robust, systematic, and proven framework is not just beneficial—it’s foundational. Otherwise, without a clear roadmap, design teams risk costly iterations, delayed time-to-market, and sub-optimal product performance.

System technology co-optimization: The key to efficient 3D IC design

System technology co-optimization (STCO) is exactly that foundational framework: an advanced, holistic methodology that elevates optimization beyond the considerations of a single die. Instead of narrowly tuning devices at the wafer or chip level—a practice known as device technology co-optimization (DTCO)—STCO allows for the optimization of power, performance, area, cost, and reliability across various components as a unified whole, including silicon, packages, interposers, PCBs, and even mechanical components.

Thus, STCO provides the system-centric framework needed for organizations to stay ahead of the curve in 3D IC design, maximizing value, minimizing risk, and unlocking new levels of competitive differentiation.

STCO breaks down silos that historically separated silicon, package, and board design, and it leverages system-level analysis to guide critical decisions—such as chiplet partitioning, placement, interconnect planning, and assembly verification—early in the design flow. This integrated approach not only reveals downstream issues much sooner but also enables “shift-left” validation and optimization, preventing costly respins and delays.

The strategic benefits of STCO are profound for organizations embracing 3D IC design. Companies can realize shorter design cycles with fewer iterations and handoffs, thanks to continuous verification and ongoing feedback between domains.

Cross-functional teams—from system architects to packaging, DFT, and manufacturing engineers—can observe interdependencies and work together to resolve them proactively. This leads to faster time-to-market, improved first-pass yield, and the ability to confidently deliver innovative, heterogeneous products that meet aggressive performance requirements.

Mastering heterogeneous integration: Your expert guide

This is precisely where the Heterogeneous Integration eBook series becomes a handy guide. This eBook series doesn’t just describe the challenges, it provides a comprehensive, actionable methodology to overcome them.

This robust 10-step methodology for heterogeneous integration, formulated by author of this article, guides designers through the entire process: from the initial creation of the 3D digital twin and system-level planning to detailed design optimization, rigorous verification, and final sign-off. By following this methodology, designers are ensured a streamlined and predictable path to robust advanced package development.

Designers gain expert insights into building a complete digital model, optimizing physical layouts, ensuring robust verification, and preparing designs for successful manufacturing. The series is structured into four eBooks, each focusing on a critical stage of the heterogeneous integration journey—from initial 3D Digital Twin Creation and Assembly Floorplanning, through Scenario Completion, and finally to the crucial Signoff phase—empowering design teams with the knowledge and best practices to confidently lead the next wave of chip innovation.

If you’re ready to move beyond outdated methodologies and truly unlock the power of 3D IC and heterogeneous integration, now is the time to act. The Heterogeneous Integration eBook Series offers not just theory, but a proven framework to help conquer the formidable challenges of advanced packaging.

Don’t let complexity stand in the way—arm yourself with strategies for system-level optimization, cross-domain collaboration, and predictable first-pass success.

Keith Felton is marketing manager for Xpedition IC packaging solutions at Siemens EDA. Working extensively in IC package design since the late 1980s, Keith drove the launch of the industry’s first dedicated system-in-package design solution in the early 2000s and led the team that launched Siemens OSAT Alliance program.

Special Section: Chiplets Design

• What the special section on chiplets design has to offer
• Chiplet innovation isn’t waiting for perfect standards
• Scoping out the chiplet-based design flow

The post Demystifying 3D ICs: A practical framework for heterogeneous integration appeared first on EDN.

Renesas Electronics Corporation, a premier supplier of advanced semiconductor solutions, unveiled the industry’s first bidirectional switch using depletion-mode (d-mode) GaN technology, capable of blocking both positive and negative currents in a single device with integrated DC blocking. Targeting single-stage solar microinverters, AI data centres, and onboard electric-vehicle chargers, the high-voltage TP65B110HRU dramatically simplifies power-converter designs. It replaces conventional back-to-back FET switches with a single low-loss, fast-switching, easy-to-drive device.

Single-Stage Topology Boosts Efficiency, Reduces Components

Today’s high-power conversion designs use unidirectional silicon or silicon carbide (SiC) switches, which block current in only one direction when in the off state. As a result, power conversion must be divided into stages with multiple switched bridge circuits. For example, a typical solar microinverter uses a four-switch full bridge to convert from DC to DC for the first stage, followed by a second stage to produce the final AC output to the grid. Even as the electronics industry moves toward more efficient single-stage converters, engineers must work around inherent switching limitations. Many of today’s single-stage designs use conventional unidirectional switches back-to-back, resulting in a fourfold increase in switch count and reduced efficiency.

Bidirectional GaN changes this landscape entirely. By integrating bidirectional blocking functionality on a single GaN product, power conversion can be achieved in a single stage using fewer switching devices. A typical solar microinverter, for example, will require only two high-voltage Renesas SuperGaN® bidirectional devices, eliminating the intermediary DC-link capacitors and cutting the switch count by half. In addition, GaN products switch fast, with low stored charge, enabling higher switching frequencies and higher power density. In a real-world single-stage solar microinverter implementation, the new GaN architecture demonstrated higher than 97.5 per cent power efficiency with the elimination of back-to-back connections and slow silicon switches.

Combining Robust Performance and Reliability with Silicon-Compatible Drivers

Renesas’ field-proven 650V SuperGaN devices are based on a proprietary normally-off technology that is simple to drive and highly robust. The TP65B110HRU combines a high-voltage bidirectional d-mode GaN chip co-packaged with two low-voltage silicon MOSFETs with high threshold voltage (3V), high gate margin (±20V), and built-in body diodes for efficient reverse conduction. Compared with enhancement-mode (e-mode) bidirectional GaN devices, the Renesas bidirectional GaN switch offers compatibility with standard gate drivers that require no negative gate bias. This translates to a simpler, lower-cost gate loop design and fast, stable switching in both soft and hard switching operation without a performance penalty. Power conversion topologies that require hard switching, such as the Vienna-style rectifier, can benefit from its high dv/dt capability of >100 V/ns, with minimum ringing and short delays during on/off transitions. The Renesas GaN device enables true bidirectional switching with high robustness, high performance and ease of use.

“Extending our SuperGaN technology to the bidirectional GaN platform marks a major shift in power conversion design norms,” said Rohan Samsi, Vice President, GaN Business Division at Renesas. “Customers can now achieve higher efficiency with fewer switching components, smaller PCB area and lower system cost. At the same time, they can accelerate design by leveraging Renesas’ system-level integration with gate drivers, controllers and power management ICs.”

Key features of the TP65B110HRU:

• ±650V continuous peak AC and DC rating, ±800V transient rating
• 2kV Human Body Model ESD protection rating (HBM and CDM)
• 110 mΩ typical RSS,ON @ 25⁰C
• 3V typical Vgs(th)
• No negative drive required
• ±20V maximum Vgs
• >100 V/ns dv/dt immunity
• 1.8V, VSS,FW freewheeling diode voltage-drop
• TOLT top-side cooled package with industry standard pin-out

The post Renesas Launches First Bidirectional 650V-Class GaN Switch For Multiple Uses appeared first on ELE Times.

k-Space Associates Inc of Dexter, MI, USA — which produces thin-film metrology instrumentation and software — says that Dylan James Scientific (DJS) will serve as its new sales representative for Europe...

In booth #1935 at the IEEE Applied Power Electronics Conference (APEC 2026) in San Antonio, TX, USA (22–26 March), Efficient Power Conversion Corp (EPC) of El Segundo, CA, USA — which makes enhancement-mode gallium nitride on silicon (eGaN) power field-effect transistors (FETs) and integrated circuits for power management applications — has introduced the EPC91121 motor drive inverter evaluation board, built around the Gen-7 EPC2366 40V eGaN power transistor...

SemiQ Inc of Lake Forest, CA, USA — which designs, develops and manufactures silicon carbide (SiC) power semiconductors and 150mm SiC epitaxial wafers for high-voltage applications — has launched the QSiC Dual3, a family of 1200V half-bridge MOSFET modules for motor drives in data-center cooling systems, grid converters in energy storage systems, and industrial drivers...

Renesas Electronics Corp of Tokyo, Japan has expanded its suite of AC/DC and power adapter solutions with a new gallium nitride (GaN)-based half-wave LLC (HWLLC) platform that supports 500W-or-higher operation across IoT, industrial and infrastructure systems...

КПІшники — переможці Чемпіонату Києва з шахів серед студентських команд 2026! kpi пн, 03/23/2026 - 17:45

When a bathroom scale gives you multiple different weight-measurement results from consecutive usage attempts, is it cheating if you pick the lowest outcome of the lot?

Two years ago (with publication following a few months later), I took apart my wife’s fancy bathroom scale, which measured not only weight but also body mass index and fat percentage:

but whose LCD had gone AWOL and had subsequently been replaced by a simpler successor. Speaking of simple, this time we’ll look at the insides of my first digital bathroom scale, which replaced a traditional mechanical forebear. It’s Innotech’s model ID-767, the black-colored variant to be exact, which I’d bought on sale for $14.99 from Amazon in spring 2018.

Simpler vs. better

Stock images to start:

No, I didn’t keep mine next to the bed:

Hey loser, don’t you want to be a weight “losser” too?

Consistent inconsistency

About those “error-free readings within 0.2 lb” and “accurately weighs up to 400 lb” claims…

There was much to like about the Innotech model 767. It was svelte and light, with long battery life. It responded quickly when I stepped on it. And I liked its looks, too. Accuracy, on the other hand, was not its strong suite. I very well might have had a bad unit. But if I stepped on it, read the display, then stepped off and repeated the procedure, my second result would be consistently inconsistent, varying from the first by several pounds (albeit always down). And I never knew which reading to believe. The saying “you get what you pay for” perhaps applies?

And then it decided to take a spontaneous swan dive off the counter (where I’d placed it while cleaning the bathroom one day) to the tile floor below, resulting in my not liking its looks as much as before:

You’ll have to trust me when I tell you that its measurement inconsistency predated the dent!

So, I decided to retire it; more accurately, replace it (meh):

and turn it into a teardown candidate.

Incriminating reflections

Here are some overview shots to start. I have no idea who that is reflected in the first one…and speaking of weight, I’d also appreciate no snide comments about that poor person’s bulbous soft waistline, please:

The short URL printed on this sticker, as-usual accompanied by a 0.75″ (19.1 mm) diameter U.S. penny for size comparison purposes, is presumably intended to redirect here but no longer works, at least when I tried it:

This switch, when repeatedly pressed, toggles between the “3 weight units” featured in one of the earlier-seen stock photos: pounds, kilograms and rarely-seen stones:

A widely available AAA triple-battery power source (my kitchen scale, conversely, takes CR2032 coin cells, I was reminded the other night when I replaced one of the pair) is a nice touch:

Time to dive inside. Underneath each of the rubber “feet” is, to the “4 weighing sensors” highlight in one of the stock images, a strain gauge load cell. I discussed them in detail back in July 2024 so I’ll spare you the repetitive prose; check out my earlier teardown for all the details.

It’s delightfully wiggly ( and yes, admittedly, I’m easily amused):

But underneath…nope, no screw heads:

So, I redirected my attention to the scale’s sides, a decision which ended up leading to success:

Voilà:

Minimalist construction

Boring part first; here’s the inside of the lower half of the scale:

Next, the good stuff:

The first things you probably noticed were the four load cells in the corners (or maybe you saw the display-plus-PCB, in which case, please stand by; your patience is appreciated). Here they are in clockwise order, starting with the one in the upper left (upper right when the scale is in its normal usage orientation):

Here’s the first one again, being removed:

and now flipped upside down (the strain gauge structure is presumably underneath the glue):

Now for the stuff in the center (see, your patience was quickly rewarded!), the PCB, with this side showing nothing notable save for the weight-unit toggle switch:

and the next-door LCD:

Remove a few screws, and they’re free!

Now flip both 180°:

Dominating the landscape on this side of the PCB is…a blob, unfortunately obscuring the identity of the control chip. Generally speaking, considering the price tag therefore the bill-of-materials cost constraints, this design is impressively sparse in response:

The backside of the display backlight strives to redirect the aggregate glow toward the front:

where it’s further diffused by another peel-away-able layer:

Here’s the LCD itself:

As you may have already noticed, a red/black two-wire pair within the broader wiring harness powers the backlight. What about power (not to mention control) between the PCB and the LCD? That’s handled by an elastomeric strip with multiple embedded conductors, pressing against the PCB’s counterparts, an approach which we’ve seen plenty of times before:

Weighing in

For grins, in closing, I decided to put it back together and see if it still worked. Success!

Booting:

And ready and waiting to deliver additional impermanent results:

That’s all I’ve got for you today! As always, please share your thoughts in the comments.

—Brian Dipert is the Principal at Sierra Media and a former technical editor at EDN Magazine, where he still regularly contributes as a freelancer.

Related Content

• Dissecting a feature-enhanced digital bathroom scale
• Shipping Scale Converted from Bathroom Scale
• What good is 17.24 bits of flicker-free res?

The post A scale that tells inconsistent-weight tales appeared first on EDN.

В ім'я України, її народу та мови Інформація КП пн, 03/23/2026 - 13:00

Silicon photonics-based chip-to-chip optical connectivity firm Ayar Labs of San Jose, CA, USA — which is pioneering co-packaged optics (CPO) for AI scale-up — and Wiwynn Corp of Taipei, Taiwan, a cloud IT infrastructure provider for data centers, have announced a strategic partnership to deliver optically connected, rack-scale AI systems that support next-generation hyperscale AI workloads...

At the Optical Fiber Communication Conference and Exhibition (OFC 2026) in Los Angeles (15–19 March), photonic application-specific integrated circuit (PASIC) chip designer and manufacturer OpenLight of Goleta, Santa Barbara, CA, USA (which launched as an independent company in June 2022, introducing the first open silicon photonics platform with heterogeneously integrated III-V lasers, modulators, amplifiers and detectors) showcased multiple technology breakthroughs, including demonstrating its latest advances in high speed photonic integrated circuits (PICs) with integrated lasers, electro-absorption (EA) modulators, and amplifiers. The demonstrations showed next generation optical architectures designed to meet the performance, efficiency and scalability demands of AI, cloud and hyperscale data-center networks...

Photonic application-specific integrated circuit (PASIC) chip designer and manufacturer OpenLight of Goleta, Santa Barbara, CA, USA (which launched as an independent company in June 2022, introducing the first open silicon photonics platform with heterogeneously integrated III-V lasers, modulators, amplifiers and detectors) has announced continued progress in its ecosystem partnership with Suzhou TFC Optical Communication Co Ltd (a provider of optical sub-assembly integrated solutions and advanced optoelectronic package manufacturing services), building on the collaboration first announced in 2025 to fast track the back-end process for silicon photonics production and optical communication systems...

We’ve come to expect the U.S.-based global positioning system (GPS) to be available and ubiquitous for the countless military, commercial, and consumer applications dependent on it. Its diverse uses represent a huge leap from its original military-centric objective for determining an object’s precise location (positioning), chart its path to a destination (navigation), and manage its movement along that path (guidance)—usually summarized as PNG.

Applications that were not even conceived, let alone doable, are now enabled by tiny GPS ICs and systems that provide amazingly accurate and precise results—you can make your own list here.

If you want some insight into the people who made GPS happen despite severe technical and bureaucratic obstacles, check out Pinpoint: How GPS Is Changing Technology, Culture, and Our Minds by Greg Milner. Though somewhat dated now in its discussion of social implications, this fascinating book from 2016 tells the story of GPS from its conceptual origins as a bomb guidance system to its presence in almost everything we do.

Despite the sense that GPS is everywhere, the reality is that it was never the situation. Underwater, tunnels, indoor sites, and similar RF-blocked locations simply can’t receive enough of the relatively weak satellite signals to provide a viable result.

Now, we’re seeing many more situations where GPS signals are also being “denied” due to deliberate interference or spoofed via false signals by players with various motives. Some of the consequences are modest (lost dogs can’t be found), but others have more serious implications.

One possible solution is to increase the power of the transmitted signals, but that’s technically difficult and won’t happen for years even if and when it does—and doing so will still not help in many of these cases.

Alternatives to GPS

There’s a significant amount of research and product development toward devising ways to provide PNG using non-GPS, non-RF techniques driven by sensors for which jamming or signal access is not an issue. All of them require a considerable amount of computation to make sense of the sensed signals and transform data into results; none of them provide the performance of a GPS-based system—at least not yet. Much of the R&D work is being done by startups and innovators, in addition to traditional sensor vendors.

Among the non-GPS possibilities are:

• Inertial sensing

This is not new, of course, and has been used for decades, beginning with gyroscopes and accelerometers. Both sensors are now reduced to small, low-power MEMS devices that are orders of magnitude smaller, lighter, and lower-power than their electromechanical predecessors of just a few decades ago and even compared to the laser and fiber-optic versions that leverage the Sagnac effect and interferometry. Still, their accuracy is not as good as a high-end GPS system, but it’s improving.

For example, ANELLO Photonics has developed a silicon photonics optical gyroscope—dubbed SiPhOG—that uses an on-chip waveguide manufacturing process, integrated with a patented silicon photonic integrated circuit (Figure 1). Together, they claim these offer fiber-optic gyro performance with a standard silicon manufacturing process.

Figure 1 This silicon photonics optical gyroscope uses an on-chip waveguide manufacturing process that is integrated with a patented silicon photonic IC. Source: ANELLO Photonics

• Magnetic sensors

The Earth’s magnetic field is pervasive, ubiquitous, and unjammable. It’s also uneven, with highly localized variations due to differences in the Earth’s outer-crust and under-crust layers as well as deeper causes (literally) from flows of conducting material within the Earth (Figure 2).

Figure 2 This geomagnetic map of part of the Northern hemisphere is a starting point for more detailed, higher-resolution images and variations, and changes that must be captured for effective magnetic navigation. Source: Geomag

Using supersensitive quantum-based magnetic sensors based on optically pumped, cesium-based, split-beam scalar magnetometers, which have an absolute accuracy between one and three nanoteslas, it’s possible to read that field with high precision. The Earth’s core field has values ranging from 25 to 65 microtesla (that’s 0.25 to 0.65 gauss) at the surface while magnetic anomaly field of interest typically varies by just hundreds of nanotesla.

The readings are then matched to pre-existing maps of Earth’s field. This scheme has the disadvantage of not being very accurate compared to GPS, partially because the Earth’s magnetic field is not static and matching maps need constant updating.

Despite these challenges, companies such as SandboxAQ have developed a navigation technology (AQNav) that leverages proprietary large quantitative models (LQMs) and powerful quantum sensors to make use of the Earth’s crustal magnetic field. By combining high-sensitivity magnetometers with AI algorithms to identify unique magnetic patterns and locate position in real time, it’s possible to determine position in that field. The sensing is entirely passive, so users remain undetected.

• Visual matching

This uses a simple concept of matching what a camera sees to the verified landmarks on a map. Visual terrain-following has been used for decades in cruise missiles which follow a precise terrain-image pattern. Orders-of-magnitude improvements in imaging quality and the associated algorithms needed to process and match the observed image to the map now make this technology even more precise.

One vendor pursuing this approach is Vermeer Corp. Their system uses between one and four electro-optical/infrared camera feeds simultaneously to map real-time video to a locally stored 2.5D or 3D map database to generate an accurate location signal.

• Celestial navigation

This classic approach to navigation now uses modern, automated versions of the transit, celestial charts and precise clocks, aided by computerized calculations. This is a case of “back to the future” but in a new form and implementation.

• E-LORAN

LOng-RAnge Navigation was a hyperbolic radio navigation system developed by the United States during World War II. The third iteration, LORAN-C, was initiated in the late 1960s, but the stations and system were decommissioned in the 1990s due to the availability and performance of GPS.

It uses the differences in timing of received signals from multiple high-power transmitters in the 100-kHz band (yes, that’s kilohertz) to developed positioning information.

Enhanced LORAN is a standard which builds on the now obsolete LORAN system by putting more information into the modulation of the carrier as well as adding a data channel. Like LORAN, E-LORAN offers some benefits such as near-impossibility of jamming and spoofing, but it also requires many high-power transmitters and many of these need to be in inhospitable or remote locations which are difficult to support (Figure 3).

Figure 3 Like its predecessor LORAN, the enhanced LORAN system will require an extensive physical infrastructure located around the world. Source: UrsaNav

While E-LORAN proponents are eternally hopeful, the project has had difficulty getting traction and support due to technical challenges (primarily at the transmitter side), very high up-front infrastructure costs, and best-case accuracy of about 50 to 100 meters (although there are proposed ways to improve that number).

The realities of dealing with a GPS-unavailable world

Many of these alternatives are being enabled by advances in quantum-based sensors. Some may even require supercooled arrangements with all the obvious downsides of that requirement. Each of them offers the virtue of not being jammable or denied.

At the same time, none offers the amazing accuracy and simplicity of GPS for the user. No single technology offers anything close to GPS. A viable alternative, even with reduced accuracy, will require advances in sensors and gigabytes of support data such as maps. Any GPS alternative will also require tight fusion and merging of unrelated sensor technologies and outputs, huge datasets, and extensive use of AI and machine learning to create useful results.

It will be fascinating to see which one of these, if any, takes a dominant role in non-GPS settings, or will it be a balanced fusion? Perhaps some unexpected physical phenomenon will come from behind, as has happened so often in the past. As they say, “predictions are very hard to make, especially about the future.”

Related Content

• When your sensors mislead you
• Sensors Without Wires, But Not “Wireless”
• Navigating without GPS requires advanced sensors, intensive analog
• Sophisticated Sensors, Extreme Conditioning, Advanced Algorithms Yield Amazing Geolocation Results

The post GPS-free systems to spur highly advanced sensors, fusion appeared first on EDN.

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