Author Archives: Brian
About Brian
Editorial Director for EE Times' EE Life engineering community. Baseball fan and road trip guy for the next several months.Been all around this world
May 16, 2012SAN DIEGO–Somewhere along a sun-smooched stretch of road here in May, we circled the Earth. Our journey to hunt down innovation stories across the country in a Chevy Volt officially crossed 24,901 miles, one measure of the earth's circumference. We're [...]
Posted in Homepage Carousel, On the Road | Tagged Avnet, Avnet Express, Brian Fuller, drive for innovation, EE Times, road trip | Leave a commentWhen one foot’s on the dock…
May 16, 2012CLEARWATER, Fla.–In most technology-adoption periods, there's a time when users are require to straddle two worlds, old and new, with one foot on the dock and one on the boat. Innovation tends to slip into any vaccuum and make that [...]
Posted in Homepage Carousel, On the Road, Videos | Tagged AAMP of America, Android, automotive electronics, electronics, engineering, in-car stereo, iPhone, ipod, iSimple, radio, Ron Freeman | Leave a commentChange of scenery
May 14, 2012What does Led Zeppelin have to do with Shockley Semiconductor? Very little, unless you read, as I did the other day, a piece about the legendary rock band and your mind wandered. Peter Cook wrote a piece about Led Zeppelin [...]
Posted in Homepage Carousel, On the Road | Tagged Bob Noyce, electronics, Eugene Kleiner, Gordon Moore, innovation, semiconductors, Traitorous Eight, William Shockley | Leave a comment‘It takes tenacity to become a female engineer’
May 11, 2012PHOENIX–That was Eliza Nelson's take when we spoke with her at "Girls Have 'IT' Day" here at Xavier College Preparatory. More design resources Nelson, an Avnet FAE, was invited to speak at the event to help inspire girls gathered here [...]
Posted in Homepage Carousel, On the Road, Videos | Tagged Avnet, Avnet Express, drive for innovation, electronics, Eliza Nelson, engineering, semiconductors, women in engineering | 4 CommentsRugged challenges
May 10, 2012HUNTSVILLE, Ala.–Sometimes you wonder why some people pursue the paths they do, why a good solid technology chases a crowded space, like a moth to flame, so brilliant one moment and vaporized the next. More design resources Take ruggedized computers [...]
Posted in Homepage Carousel, On the Road, Uncategorized, Videos | Tagged Bruce Imsand, computers, COTS, drive for innovation, electronics, engineering, MaxVision, mil-aero, ruggedized computing | Leave a commentMaking the grid smart
May 9, 2012RALEIGH, N.C.–Mike Sinclair stretches a faint smile and puts it plainly: "one of the issues you have with this new smart grid stuff is that it's not all quite ironed out." That's a good-news bad-news story: The bad news is [...]
Posted in Homepage Carousel, On the Road, Videos | Tagged ABB, alternative energy, drive for innovation, Green energy Corp., Mike Sinclair, Renewable energy, Siemens, smart grid, smart power | Leave a commentWhat B.S. filter do you use for your own ideas?
May 8, 2012You've no doubt heard the phrase your baby's ugly. You've probably used it to describe some piece of technology you've seen somewhere, or maybe had the courage to say so in a customer design meeting. But how do you come [...]
Posted in Homepage Carousel, On the Road | Tagged business, electronics, engineering, HBR, innovating, innovation, Philip Auerswald, Scott Anthony | 7 CommentsVolt teardown: Charge system slide presentation
May 7, 2012Here's a presentation compiled by Al Steier of Munro & Associates and John Scott-Thomas of TechInsights that walks you through what they found during their analysis of the Chevy Volt's charge/powertrain system:
Posted in Battery technology, Charge system, Chevy Teardown, Electric drive unit, Engine generator, Under the Hood | Tagged autoelectronics, charge system, Chevy Volt, EV, powertrain, technology | 2 CommentsVolt Teardown: Powertrain presentation at Design West (32:14)
May 7, 2012In the second of a three-part series of video excerpts from Design West, Munro & Associates' Al Steier and TechInsights' John Scott-Thomas analyze the Chevy Volt's powertrain and charge electronics (the session runs 32:14):
Posted in Chevy Teardown, Videos | Leave a commentInnovation is dead (a panel discussion)
May 4, 2012SAN JOSE, Calif. — You could be forgiven if your outlook for the long-term future of the North American electronics industry is dire. Mine once was. In fact, I went into this yearlong road trip hoping for good predictions but [...]
Posted in Homepage Carousel, On the Road, Uncategorized, Videos | Tagged Avnet Electronics Marketing, Dave Lentz, design west, James Truchard, Jeff Lawson, National Instruments, Shockwave Impact, Swemco, UBM Electronics | Leave a comment