Where we’ve been; why we’re here
Stepping into our Wayback Machine, Avnet Express and UBM Electronics, in early 2011, hit on a plan to celebrate electronics innovation across North America. To highlight it, we selected as a symbol and as our literal conveyance the then-new Chevrolet Volt an electric vehicle with gasoline range extension.
It was chock-full of electronics and is an engineering marvel. We bought one in the spring and set out on a year-long journey around North America, stopping at innovation centers like Chicago, Raleigh, Boston, Austin, Vancouver. Along the way EE Times editor Brian Fuller and his videographer-brother Kirk interviewed hundreds of engineers, entrepreneurs, teachers and engineering students to uncover what innovations were bubbling up from the invention cauldron.
The multimedia-laden project resulted in hundreds of stories, videos and photos that revealed and illuminated the faces and human spirit behind deeply technical inventions.
The Drive for Innovation also paid homage to the engineering behind the Volt, tearing apart a second Chevy Volt in early 2012 to analyze the electronics and presenting the findings on the site and in live events.
The award-winning Drive for Innovation site continues to celebrate and publish stories about innovation, determination, risk and reward well after the road trip ended after 12 months and 33,000 miles driven. Check out our content below and sign up for our monthly newsletter for a handy reminder in your hectic life of the great things being done in electronics today.
Inside the Volt
General Motors unveiled its ambitious electric vehicle, the Chevrolet Volt, in late 2010, and production models hit dealerships a few months later. It's powered by a 16 Kwh 360V battery that GM says will deliver about 40-50 miles range before the 149-HP gas engine kicks in to charge the battery. Click on "deep dive" to take a peek under the hood
Map
Read, hear and see the stories from hundreds of engineers, entrepreneurs and teachers about how they’re transforming engineering, technology, applications and education and in the process inventing the future. View Larger Map Back To The Way Back Machine
Photos From The Road
We found astonishing electronics designs everywhere we parked the Chevy Volt, whether it was a many-cores GHz processor built for just $2 million, or a small system that harnesses energy from a temperature differential. But the thousands of photos we took on the road tell a simple, beautiful story of the humanity behind the most complex inventions history has ever seen. Back
