Walking into Computex 2014 at Nangang Exhibition Hall 1F, a constant crowd of attendees surround an eye-catching stage, featuring a massive leader board and a half dozen five-foot tall liquid nitrogen tanks. White clouds of nitrogen billow across the stage, timers count down on the overhead TV screens, and the audience buzzes in anticipation and excitement. This is G.SKILL International Enterprise Co., Ltd. hosting two spectacular and awe-inspiring global overclocking events during Computex week - the 1st Annual OC World Cup and the 3rd Annual OC World Record Stage.G.SKILL is a high-end PC memory module expert and manufacturer, focused on the high-end extreme-performance market segment of the PC industry, and has dominated the overclocking scene in recent years. G.SKILL memory is the most used memory brand in overclocking communities and has held a long-standing world record for the highest memory frequency at 4404MHz. During Computex 2014, the OC World Cup event brought together 6 international overclockers, not only to compete for a single US$10,000 grand cash prize, but also to strengthen the international overclocking community. Meanwhile, the OC World Record Stage brought together five major motherboard manufacturers (ASUS, ASRock, EVGA, GIGABYTE, and MSI) to show off the latest technology at the extreme performance-end of the PC industry by breaking various benchmarking world records, which stands at six new world records this year.Today, we sat down with Johnson Huang, CEO of G.SKILL, to learn more about G.SKILL products and market position, as well as valuable insights into the future of the computing industry, and most importantly, what drives them to fearlessly pursue high performance overclocking. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_E2zHLJQIM)G.SKILL Computex 2014 overclocking eventsUnderstanding the DRAM overclocking market segmentOverclocking (aka OC'ing) is the art of tweaking computer components to run at a specification higher than originally rated by the manufacturer. The DRAM module is one of the computer components that can increase computer performance when overclocked, which is highly sought after by computer enthusiasts and PC gamers, where each fraction of gained performance translates into victory and dominance over opponents.A decade ago, overclocking involved tweaking dozens of timing values and voltages in BIOS, making it a tedious, time-consuming process with little overall success. Today, overclocking DRAM has become a much simpler process, whereas overclocking CPUs and graphics cards remain the same, mainly due to the fact that overclocked memory kits have a guaranteed overclockable frequency when it leaves the factory. All users have to do is simply enable XMP (eXtreme Memory Profile) from within the motherboard BIOS and save – everything else is automatic.This is where G.SKILL excels – providing high performance memory kits that have high availability, high reliability, and high ease of use, while expanding the usage of XMP on the global market. Through close cooperation with major motherboard and CPU manufacturers, G.SKILL continues to raise the standard for memory compatibility on a wide variety of motherboards and processors, which result in memory kits that allows consumers to overclock up to 3000MHz (compared to the JEDEC standard of 1600MHz) by simply enabling XMP. At the time of writing, G.SKILL's own TridentX series is the only brand with 3000MHz memory kits that is XMP validated by Intel.It is a very rewarding market segment, as it leaves very little risk to the users, as well as providing a simple upgrade solution to the PC industry.G.SKILL extreme overclocking memoryContributions of extreme overclockingExtreme overclocking utilizes unconventional methods, such as liquid nitrogen for extreme low-temperature cooling below -196°C, to obtain and extract the highest performance out of a piece of hardware. By doing so, G.SKILL engineers are able to come up with groundbreaking methods to integrate higher performance into new PC memory products, making high performance systems possible for PC enthusiasts and gamers. During this process, it is vital to work closely with motherboard and CPU manufacturers to ensure new products provide an optimized performance experience out-of-the-box.In a computer system, performance comes from a combination of the processor, motherboard, and memory. When any one of these components outpaces the other two in performance, it drives the whole industry forward to innovate for improved products. G.SKILL intends to constantly integrate new innovations into new products, and consequently, to spur the PC industry to a whole new level. The result not only impacts PC enthusiasts and gamers, but also other growing sectors, such as the 2D and 3D graphic content creation industry, which require high system performance to render the ever-expanding resolution of pictures and videos with a multitude of effects.Liquid nitrogen used for extreme low-temperature cooling below -196°CBringing high performance to notebooks and small form factor PCsHigh performance systems used to be exclusive to the desktop market segment. But as newer technology allows more efficient use of silicon real estate, high efficiency and performance CPUs and graphics cards made their way into notebooks and small form factor PCs, while the DRAM being used in these systems remain at standard speeds of 1600MHz.Through close cooperation with notebook manufacturers, G.SKILL developed high-performance and high-capacity Ripjaws-series SO-DIMM memory kits for gaming laptops and high performance small form factor PCs at 1866MHz and 2133MHz. Thus far, G.SKILL is the only memory manufacturer to release 2133MHz memory kits at 1.35V and 32GB (8GBx4), available on July 1st. When installed in compatible gaming laptops, the memory kit automatically operates at its high frequency setting, no user adjustments necessary, providing gamers a one-stop solution to optimally tuned laptops.Gaming product linesG.SKILL's target market segment is and has always focused toward high end systems, PC enthusiasts and gamers. Their newest products reflect their continual dedication to bring the best and newest technology for high end performance systems – Phoenix Blade Series PCIe SSD and Carnage Series 7.1 Gaming Headsets. The Phoenix Blade Series PCIe SSD combines extreme speeds of up to 1900MB/s on PCIe 2.0 x8 lanes with a colossal capacity of 480GB and 960GB. When compared to a SATA3 SSD, this increases transfer speed by 300% and capacity by 400%. As PC games and datasets become larger, the Phoenix Blade Series aims to eliminate load time and limited capacity issues. As SSDs become the prevalent storage solution over traditional platter-based drives, G.SKILL is researching advanced methods to apply overclocking innovations to further maximize the performance of SSDs.The Carnage Series 7.1 Gaming Headsets aim to immerse gamers in their gaming environments and allow gamers to have an edge over their competitors with 360° directional and positional audio via 10 discrete drivers or Dolby Headphone technology, as well as clear communications with teammates with patented ENC (Environmental Noise Cancellation) technology in the headset microphone. G.SKILL's non-stop innovation seeks to bring system performance to the front lines of technology, while providing gamers a wide variety of product choices for the highest quality immersive gaming experience.Burning passion of G.SKILLSo why does G.SKILL devote so many resources into a small niche segment like extreme overclocking? This is a burning question in many people's minds.Mr. Johnson Huang gave us an apt analogy: Formula One cars test the highest extreme limits of vehicle technology, and then the innovations are integrated into high performance cars like Ferrari and the McLaren. G.SKILL does the same, by testing the extreme limits of memory through overclocking, then integrating the innovations into high end systems and drive the high performance systems market segment to new heights.G.SKILL, as a global brand, firmly and passionately believes that the only way to establish breakthroughs in performance standards is by fearlessly investing into extreme overclocking as part of R&D at all costs. Only then, will new technology be continually created and assimilated into the high-end PC industry as the main criteria of future computing performance. That, ladies and gentlemen, is G.SKILL's undying dedication and ambition.

Digital products are rapidly penetrating into the modern lifestyle, bringing various forms of convenience, but in a sense also increasing the distance between people because even when people are together, they are often respectively sliding their fingers on the mobile phones' touchscreens with their heads lowered. Behind our highly-efficient lifestyles, is there a hidden crisis of alienation between people? Elo Touch Solutions (Elo Touch Solutions Taiwan, hereinafter referred to as Elo) OEM Business Division Vice President Niklas Fallgren remarked during Computex that with touch-controlled products becoming more user-friendly, digital technologies will help tighten relationships between people and strengthen interaction between people as well. Very soon, we will see how touch-controlled products transform the face of traditional industries.According to Fallgren, Elo has been developing touch solutions for over 40 years. Before smartphones became widespread, touch technologies were already being applied in areas such as industrial automation and transportation logistics. With the rise of touch-controlled consumer products, high-end commercial touch-screen products are accelerating their penetration into traditional service industries, and consumers are experiencing the benefits of upgraded services in the banking, medical, healthcare, hotel and retail industries.Many people believe that the rise of the Internet will result in the decline of traditional industries. For example, online stores are backed up by rich online resources and it is extremely convenient for consumers to communicate with customer service personnel online. On the other hand, brick-and-mortar sales channels are restricted by the slow passing of information in traditional marketing models, and seem to be no match for the speed and convenience of online price comparisons. Furthermore, professional sales personnel are hard to find and even harder to keep. They require a great deal of training, which takes a long time. The quality of services is difficult to control, exposing these brick-and-mortar stores to threats from online stores. Fallgren, on the other hand, thinks that traditional industries should turn more active and use digital technologies to their advantage. Sales personnel should be given tablet computers that are connected to the Internet, giving them the ability to quickly obtain online information. That will bring the online shopping experience to brick-and-mortar channels, allowing further interaction and enhancing service quality.Fallgren picked up a tablet computer and threw it onto the ground! He noted that this is not only at gadget for entertainment, but also a mobile POS device with a comprehensive set of features. This seemingly clunky tablet computer includes features required by the general retail industry, such as the ability to scan product barcodes as well as process credit card transactions. By upgrading the equipment in retail stores, truly smart shopping experiences can be achieved.Fallgren stressed that touch-control is an extraordinary technology. In terms of the industrial application of touch-control products, most people may think of the built-in entertainment equipment and control systems in cars, or the various types of automation equipment at production lines. However, Elo's touch solutions also span across the banking, healthcare, hotel, and retail industries, making it even faster and even more convenient for patients to register at hospitals. X-ray images as well as image files from various other types of tests can be seamlessly transferred between different departments via touch-controlled devices and cloud databases.In order to meet the needs of our enterprise customers, Elo's zero-bezel touch solutions include surface acoustic wave, five-wire resistive, as well as the newly introduced PCAP touch screens, supporting Apple's Mac, Google's Android, Open Linux, as well as Microsoft's Windows operating systems, which is why this solution is already being widely used in POI systems for public navigational guide equipment, bank ATMs, gaming and gambling equipment, POS management systems, voting machines, medical equipment, as well as automation equipment in various industries. Its clients include Abbot Laboratories in the medical industry, Hong Kong Harbor City in the retail industry and MGM Macau in the casino industry.According to Fallgren, in medical devices alone, the incorporation of touch technologies is growing at an annual rate of 18%. It is anticipated that other touch-controlled equipment, such as interactive digital billboards and retail self-service machines, will also be widespreading. Touch-enabled life is not only a part of the plots in Iron Man movies; smart interactive technologies in touch-controlled systems are already surrounding us in our everyday lives.Elo Touch Solutions OEM Business Division Vice President Niklas Fallgren

According to a recent IDC research note, the transition toward mobile and cloud-based computing is unstoppable, with tablet volumes expected to pass total PC volume in the fourth quarter of 2014 and on an annual basis in 2016. Even smaller tablets are facing stiff market competition from large-size smartphones (phablets).While some semiconductor firms are using Moore's law to design increasingly more powerful, 64-bit, multiple-core processors to power mobile devices, others IC design houses are focusing on how to better tap the functionality and potential of mobile devices by connecting them to an increasing array of peripheral devices - such as TVs, keyboards, mice, and storage devices. One such company is Analogix and at Computex 2014, Digitimes stopped by to speak with Matt Ready, sales VP at Analogix, and discuss the importance of connectivity with mobile devices.Q: Analogix has a brand called SlimPort. Can you give us a primer on the difference between SlimPort and DisplayPort?A: DisplayPort is an industry standard display interface developed by VESA that is used to connect computing devices to a display. It was developed to replace interfaces such as VGA and DVI, with the key being DisplayPort is royalty-free and the interface can also be used to carry audio and high-speed data (USB).On the mobile side, VESA developed a lighter version called MyDP (Mobility DisplayPort) that provides connectivity between mobile devices and external displays and HDTVs. SlimPort is the Analogix brand that complies with MyDP. So basically, SlimPort-based devices can connect to any DisplayPort device and there are adapters to connect to any HDMI or VGA device as well. And there are more than 800 million DisplayPort devices in the market, so it's quite a big market.Q: Where and why is SlimPort being implemented?A: SlimPort was first implemented in the Google Nexus 4 back in 2012 and has continued to be used in a number of high-end tablets and smartphones from Fujitsu, Asustek, LG, and ZTE, as well as finding its way into Chromebooks from brands like Hewlett-Packard (HP), among others. The key is that the technology enables more features and can reduce costs. For example, users want to have the ability to take mobile audio and video and get it up on a big screen. Previously, the ability to get the video off of a tablet/smartphone was typically done by running it through a micro-HDMI port. Using SlimPort allowed the OEMs to drop the micro-HDMI port and simply run everything through the five-pin micro-USB port that is needed for charging. SlimPort simply takes control of the connector when a SlimPort dongle is plugged in, and while the devices are connected, SlimPort enables the display to also charge the mobile device. In 2013, support for Full HD was added but we really expect the technology to take off this year with SlimPort Pro.Q: Why's that?A: While SlimPort was great for connecting mobile devices to a display, the issue was that it was unidirectional. When you plug a SlimPort accessory into the micro-USB connector, it takes over the bus and allows the audio and video to come off of the mobile device, but you no longer have the USB functionality, which is the data functionality. This year, Analogix introduced SlimPort Pro, which is bidirectional. So now you can have audio and video, while also supporting data simultaneously. All are moving across the PHY in the micro-USB connector, and that data connection is moving both ways. This means a mobile device can be plugged into a hub where multiple USB ports can connect to a mouse, keyboard and monitor. And the content that is viewed can be controlled externally through the mouse and keyboard. So basically, a mobile device like a smartphone can become a PC in your pocket.A number of other improvements are included with SlimPort Pro as well. Bandwidth increased from 5.5Gb/sec to 6.75Gb/sec so you are seeing support for Ultra HD (4K) video. We are also working with partners like Qualcomm for improving the charging performance in the PHY. SlimPort delivered up to 9W of charging but with Qualcomm Quick Charge 2.0 users can receive up to 18W, enabling a much quicker recharge for the mobile device.Q: So how does SlimPort Pro work? Are the chips the same in all devices? Are they in the market?A: There is a transmitter chip (SlimPort Pro Tx) in the mobile device and a receiver chip (SlimPort Pro Rx) that will go into accessory devices like hubs, dongles and docking stations. We saw first silicon in the first quarter of this year and you are now seeing demos at Computex 2014. We should be the first out there with mass production with that push coming in the second half of the year. The first products for both tablets and smartphones should be coming to market late this year.Q: How has the reception been at Computex?A: If you look at Analogix, we have a number of revenue streams, including licensing DisplayPort IP. We also have a family of converter chips used in ultrabooks, motherboards and on dongles and we have PC related products such as timing controllers. But this year at Computex the main interest in the market has been for SlimPort Pro.First of all, application processors all have Ultra HD capable engines so customers are looking to moving to the Ultra HD support we have in SlimPort Pro. But with a bidirectional PHY, we are also enabling simultaneous audio, video and data connectivity. This is really capturing the imagination of players in the market, from mobile device vendors, to in-car entertainment suppliers, to IoT (Internet of Things) players.The reason is that people are seeing SlimPort Pro as having the potential to unlock the power of mobile devices such as smartphones. If you look at the development of the smartphone market through today, the increased functionality of the devices has killed off the digital camera market and it has killed off the GPS device and MP3 device markets. All of that functionality has become standard across all smartphones. Now if you embed a SlimPort Pro Tx into a high-end smartphone, you can exploit the increased performance that is being supplied by the wave of new quad-core and 8-core processors hitting the market. You now have a PC in a pocket.The ability to simply put your mobile device into a cradle and have all types of functionality, such as enabling keyboard, mouse, and external storage support, as well as audio and display support allows for a number of potential solutions that can seriously challenge the consumer notebook market over time. With SlimPort Pro we believe that mobile devices will get there sooner rather than later.Matt Ready, sales VP at AnalogixPhoto: Company

Gigabyte Technology continues to develop products and innovations for the graphics card market and is focusing on enhancing its graphics cards to help them become professional products.Gigabyte remains optimistic about the graphics card industry and is gradually moving into the enterprise sector. Digitimes recently interviewed Eddie Lin, associate vice president of Gigabyte's Graphics Card Business Unit about the efforts Gigabyte has put into the graphics card market as well as the company's strategy for the future.Q: What products or technologies is Gigabyte focusing on for the VGA sector at Computex 2014?A: Graphics cards are definitely the main focus of the VGA department and we are also showcasing our new improved air and liquid cooling modules to show our technological leadership in the market.For the liquid cooling product line, we are showcasing our new WaterForce cooling module, designed for the top-end segment.As for air cooling, we have improved the WindForce cooling module with an even higher heat dissipation rate.We will also display our latest keyboards and mice at our booth including those under the Aorus brand.Q: How is the graphics card market currently? How is Gigabyte performing in the market?A: Graphics cards have already advanced to become more like boutique and professional products. At the very beginning, consumers purchased graphics cards to output images from their computers, but graphics cards now are used mainly for game play.As demand for high-resolution games continues to rise, graphics card performance also needs to dramatically improve to handle the surging demand. Graphics cards need to handle about four times the workload to advance from Full HD to Ultra HD resolutions.Therefore, in the short term, the graphics card industry will remain how it is now and consumers will continue to purchase graphics cards to play games.Gigabyte's role in the industry is to grow even more professional over our technology and to develop innovations that satisfy consumer demand. Gigabyte's graphics cards have grown more professional and elegant and are turning more toward higher-end markets.We have also improved our box art to enhance the professional impression of our graphics card products and have treated brand nurturing as a priority for future growth.Q: Can you give us more detail on the company's WaterForce cooling system? Compared to other liquid cooling systems available on the market, what are the advantages that the system has?A: We have seen our competitors release high-end graphics cards equipped with liquid cooling modules, but Gigabyte does not believe that is how liquid cooling should be adopted.When gamers equip 2-3 high-end graphics cards into their desktops to run SLI, the lack of internal space can greatly affect the heat dissipation of their machines. Gigabyte's WaterForce cooling system is developed to resolve such an issue and is only used in multi-graphics card scenarios.Our WaterForce system does not require chassis modifications, unlike most liquid cooling systems available in the market, which need a specially designed chassis. Users only need an empty 5.25-inch drive bay in their chassis to install the WaterForce.The WaterForce also features a control panel, with which users can manually change cooling fan and water pump speeds for each graphics card. Users can also click a button to equalize all the graphics cards' temperatures.WaterForce will be selling with three Nvidia high-end graphics cards, making its end price surpass US$3,000. Through the bundling, users will be able to install the system into their desktops right away, and will not need to be concern about their warranty.As for whether we will use the system for AMD graphics cards, it will depend on how AMD graphics cards performance, as we only like to adopt the system with the highest performing graphics cards on the market.Q: What kind of solution is the WindForce cooling system? What can consumers expect from the system?A: Liquid cooling has always been considered to have better performance than air cooling in terms of heat dissipation; however, our latest WindForce 600W cooling module is already able to achieve a performance almost the same as a liquid cooling module.The cooling module is able to dissipate heat generated from 600W of power consumption and has already been adopted onto our Nvidia Titan Black-based graphics cards.With the cooling module's 600W heat dissipation rate, the graphics cards are able to operate at a constant low temperature even during heavy loads to allow stable output.The module features many of Gigabyte's technologies such as our differing height fin design for the heat sink, Triangle Cool as well as a special fan designed to increase air flow. We have already acquired the patent for our Triangle Cool technology and are in the middle of acquiring others.Q: How about PC peripheral products? What new features has Gigabyte integrated in them?A: Gigabyte has been in the PC peripheral business for 6-7 years and we have designed many innovations for related products.For Aorus, we are showcasing the new Aorus Thunder K7 keyboard and M7 mouse. The keyboard features a detachable number pad, which can be attached on either the left or right side of the keyboard.The M7 is equipped with several thumb buttons, which are specially designed so users will not miss-click other buttons.We will also showcase latest Gigabyte branded accessories at the show.Eddie Lin, Associate VP of Gigabyte VGA businessPhoto: Joe Tsai, Digitimes, June 2014

Until recently, Vitesse Semiconductor saw its core market as being the carrier Ethernet market, particularly what it calls the IP edge, which is anything from base stations to picocells to backhaul microwave/milliwave small cells, as well as routers and switches in the aggregation network. However, the company has noticed that there is demand for its chips and reference designs in the industrial segment, as that market is migrating from proprietary protocols toward Ethernet, and Vitesse has been able to provide timing and low power solutions that fit market needs.Digitimes spoke with Vitesse CTO Martin Nuss just before Computex to discuss the industrial space, which he describes as the part of the IoT (Internet of Things) market where revenue can be found today.Q: How has your work in the telecom business brought you into the industrial market?A: We noticed that there was demand for our chips and devices in the industrial segment because we provide standardized Ethernet solutions. What I mean is that there are a ton of protocols on the industrial side of the market. There is the EtherCAT (Ethernet for Control Automation Technology) fieldbus system. There is Profinet for industrial automation. There are a number of proprietary or semi-proprietary busses out there. The interesting thing is that many of them are still using Ethernet at the physical layer, but then they say Ethernet doesn't do x or y, such as providing ring protection or delivering a solution that is more deterministic - and Ethernet doesn't have that. So they put some proprietary features in there to make it more deterministic in the delivery of packets.But on the carrier side of the telecom industry, we've already worked out a lot of these technologies and implemented them into our Ethernet solutions. We have ring protection and we know how to do timing, which is a key aspect of deterministic Ethernet. We have resolved the reliable delivery of packets in the carrier space over the last year or two, so now customers on the industrial side are realizing they no longer have to only deal with proprietary solutions. They can take advantage of the ecosystem and chip designs that were developed on the telecom side. So, you are seeing increased scale and more new players developing more standardized solutions rather than essentially having 10 little companies delivering solutions at 10x the price.Q: What are some of the key applications in the industrial space that you are targeting?A: Some key areas are transportation, energy and factory automation. For example, if you look at a typical factory automation application these days, pretty much everything is wired by Ethernet, but as I said previously, sometimes there is proprietary stuff placed on top. They used to have proprietary protocols on top to get resiliency. If one thing fails, some other things come up but that is all being done by standard Ethernet today.Q: You also spoke about determinism in Ethernet being a key requirement in the industrial space. Can you speak more about that?A: What I am describing is a system that is predictable and consistent; one that is in sync. And the key is timing. Take a look at high-speed manufacturing lines, such as a high-speed printing press. There are hundreds of motors that need to be synchronized very tightly. This goes for any high speed manufacturing line in general. You have to synchronize events within nanosecond or sub-nanosecond accuracy. If one of them is out of sync, the whole system becomes a disaster.The key to having deterministic Ethernet is the Precision Time Protocol (PTP) or IEEE 1588 timing. For 1588 timing, you send out time stamped packets and there is a grand master clock that puts a time stamp into a 1588 packet (which is an Ethernet packet) and it gets transported through the network. At the slave, the time is determined through a two way handshake protocol between the master and the slave.Previously, problems in a typical packet network were introduced at the hub. You ended up getting packet delay variations or maybe asymmetry. The 1588 protocol, however, relies on symmetry between upstream and downstream and much of this has been worked out in the telecom world, where two new clock classes – the bounded clock and the transparent clock – were implemented in 1588 aware routers and switches to keep errors to a minimum. The first application that actually did that in Ethernet was wireless mobile backhaul. Timing over networks is very time sensitive and while there are no specifications in the ITU for this, base stations have to be synchronized to within a half hundred nanosecond accuracy for LTE, TD-LTE, LTE TDD and LTE Advanced. In the smart energy area, the IEEE has defined a power profile that is fairly similar and which leads to no more than 50ns timing errors. And now we are seeing timing becoming more important in factory automation.It is kind of ironic that 1588 is increasingly being worked into Ethernet. Vitesse comes out of the telecom side which first developed under synchronized SONET/SDH networks where everything was on the same clock but then the whole market moved to Ethernet where everything is packet based and queued. Now the Ethernet world is going back to where they want to have every network element accurately timed down to a nanosecond. The rest of the deterministic equation, where you need to know what time it is so you can determine whether you have to send a packet out within x amount of microseconds, whatever the requirement is, and get it all lined up, is done through timing.Q: Vitesse also speaks about power efficiency; this seems strange when speaking about factory automation. What is your message there?A: Well, lower power means lower costs. But what we are also talking about is being in sync with customer needs and providing the right solution. For example, our main competitors in this segment are companies like Broadcom and Marvell. With their product offerings, solutions scale up evenly, so you can go with a solution that has lower bandwidth, a lower port count and a lower feature portfolio. If you need more features such as service delivery, 1588 timing, security, quality of service (QoS), you need to buy into an architecture that is much higher in capacity and much higher in power consumption. Our strategy is to focus on lower- to medium-range capacity; for example below 100Gbit, but supplied with the full feature set, typically beyond what the competitors offer in terms of feature sets. That is why we end up being much more power efficient without making any compromises on feature sets.And this works for us because in the industrial space you don't need to be applying an 80-100Gbit solution to a 10Gbit problem. For example, industrial applications like printing presses, robotics and high-speed manufacturing feature solutions typically have 3-5 ports of Gb Ethernet. So you are talking about a requirement of less than 10Gbit Ethernet capacity. The industry is a little overpowered from the capacity/feature perspective. Customers don't want to pay for a 48 port switch at 15 watts when they can get a 6-8 port from Vitesse at much lower cost and much lower power with a better feature set and at a tenth of the power.Q: You mentioned how Vitesse is helping firms in the industrial space scale. Can you speak a bit about how that is affecting Taiwan ODMs?A: If you look at the enterprise turnkey model, a lot of low-end enterprise switches from the big vendors are being manufactured by Taiwan ODMs, with those solutions basically being Broadcom and Vitesse reference designs running slightly modified software to fit into the Hewlett-Parker (HP) or some other vendor's ecosystem. This business model makes sense on the industrial side as well, where ODMs partner with Vitesse on the design. They then get their hardware certified to run in rugged conditions while having the ability to slightly modify the API layer to tailor the solution to the end customer.Vitesse CTO Martin NussPhoto: Company

Although not best known for its notebooks, Gigabyte Technology has been operating in the notebook business for quite a while and entered the gaming notebook business two years ago.As one of the top-tier motherboard players, Gigabyte is known for its technological leadership in areas such as cooling and overclocking. These advantages have given the company competitiveness in the gaming notebook industry and helped the company earn recognition from consumers.For 2014, Gigabyte created Aorus, an independent gaming brand and will sell its top-tier products designed specifically for gamers under the brand. The company will continue to release Gigabyte branded notebooks and tablets, but they will be mainly focused on general purpose usage.For Computex 2014, Gigabyte is hosting a booth at Taipei World Trade Center (TWTC) Exhibition Hall 1 to showcase its new products. To learn about Gigabyte's latest gaming notebook strategy and the reasons behind the creation of Aorus, Digitimes recently sat down with Vincent Liu, director of Gigabyte's sales division to talk about the gaming notebook industry.Q: What are Gigabyte's plans for Computex 2014?A: Gigabyte is showcasing its latest gaming notebook products including several top-end models under the company's newly created Aorus brand as well as regular high-end models such as the P34- and P35-series, which are branded under Gigabyte.Gigabyte has three notebooks under Aorus: the X7, X3 and X3 Plus. These devices are our latest innovations and designed specifically for gamers. We have equipped them with top-end hardware and compared to our competitors, they also feature competitive price/performance ratios.Q: What are Gigabyte's strategies for the notebook industry? Will the company be developing anything new for the traditional notebook industry?A: For our notebook business, we currently have two brands: the newly created Aorus and Gigabyte. The gaming notebook market is now the main focus of our notebook division (G-Style) and we have grown professionally over the past two years in regards to the manufacture of gaming notebooks.Compared to the gaming notebook models we released two years ago, our new gaming products are thinner and lighter with new in-house developed cooling designs.Traditional notebook shipments have been dropping for several quarters and Gigabyte, as a latecomer, is at a disadvantage competing against other first-tier players in the market because the competition has already turned to economies of scale instead of innovation. For Gigabyte, which started with strong R&D capabilities, the gaming notebook market, which requires high technological involvement, is a more suitable direction to expand into.Gigabyte-branded notebooks are currently being promoted mainly for general purposes include gaming, enterprise-usage as well as traditional applications. For traditional mainstream models, we are offering them mainly to satisfy client demand and will not push them aggressively.Gigabyte's high-end notebooks are all manufactured at our plaints in Taiwan, while design and development of all our notebooks is conducted at our Taiwan headquarters. Through the strategy, we hope to maintain quality and stability, and fulfill our social responsibility to Taiwan.Q: What does Gigabyte think about the gaming notebook industry and its future?A: We are optimistic about the gaming notebook industry's future and are seeing the industry advance and evolve rapidly.Gigabyte is a latecomer to the gaming notebook industry and is facing fierce competition, but our business strategy of delivering the best out of the hardware we use has earned recognition from many consumers and gamers.Gigabyte's goal is to give users the best performance in each price segment, and we have developed many technologies and done product differentiation to accomplish this target.Compared to our competitors, the scale of Gigabyte's gaming notebook business is actually rather small, but after two years of operation, our technologies have started to be recognized by consumers. For now, we are not looking to experience an immediate and large shipment growth, but are instead focusing on earning consumers' trust.Building products that consumers can trust has always been the motto of Gigabyte, and is the business direction we will continue to follow. Despite the fierce competition, we will continue to offer reliable products to consumers.Q: Why is Gigabyte releasing a new brand name for its gaming notebooks? What benefits does Gigabyte expect to see from the new brand?A: Aorus is an independent brand and we will not market the brand as part of Gigabyte; therefore, you will not see Gigabyte's logo on Aorus-branded products. We created Aorus for professional gamers and in addition to notebooks, we also brand our best keyboards, mice and earphones under the brand.Aorus-branded notebook industrial designs also look different to models branded under Gigabyte. Aorus-brand notebook designs look powerful and futuristic, which we are confident will attract gamers. In fact, we have received good feedback from our channel retail partners as well as consumers about our product designs.We have equipped the best hardware in the Aorus X7 notebook such as Intel's fourth-generation Core i7 processor and dual-Nvidia graphics cards with SLI support. To keep its thin and light characteristics, we have designed a cooling module, which features five heat pipes, four air vents, three controllable fan settings and two fans to efficiently dissipate heat generated by the two GPUs.We are releasing our new Aorus X3 during Computex 2014 also featuring top-end hardware.We expect these gaming notebooks to help us advance further in the market as well as keep us ahead of our competitors.Q: Does the company have any new plans for tablets? What does Gigabyte think about the tablet industry?A: Gigabyte has a business unit that handles ARM/Android-based tablets and may showcase some products at the show.As for Wintel-based tablets, Gigabyte has no plans to release related devices. As I said previously, competition over economies of scale is not really something that Gigabyte is good at, and the Wintel tablet industry is currently in such a situation.Therefore, the market will not become a focus for Gigabyte. We will keep all our attention on developing the gaming notebook business.However, we are still shipping existing Wintel-based tablets launched a few years ago, to some enterprise customers and the procurement market as we still see good demand from these segments.Q: What are Gigabyte's long-term plans?A: Gigabyte's notebook business operations will be driven by our brand strategy. Aorus, as an independent brand, will continue to represent our top-end product line, and in addition to notebooks, Gigabyte will continue to add more products under the brand as long as those devices meet the qualifications of Aorus: top-end products designed specifically for enthusiast gamers.As for the Gigabyte brand, we wish to maintain its trusted image and will continue to strengthen related products with quality and stability, but still maintain a high price-performance ratio.Vincent Liu, Gigabyte director of sales divisionPhoto: Joseph Tsai, Digitimes, June 2014

As part of Toshiba, OCZ Storage Solutions is able to leverage Toshiba's NAND and combine it with its proprietary controllers, firmware and software. Toshiba's financial strength has also put OCZ in a better position to compete in the rapidly growing SSD market.Alex Mei, CMO at OCZ Storage Solutions recently spoke about the company's plans during Computex Taipei 2014 and its outlook for the year ahead.Q: What are the hot products OCZ will be showcasing at Computex 2014?A: We are excited to return to Computex as this is always a good show for us in terms of meeting with our partners, customers and media. This year we are showcasing our complete line of client and enterprise solid state solutions including our recently launched RevoDrive 350 PCIe SSD as well as our enterprise class Intrepid SATA series. We are also unveiling our latest addition to the award winning Vector SATA SSD family, the Vector 180 which leverages our proprietary Barefoot 3 controller with the latest generation Toshiba NAND and adds new enterprise features including partial PFAIL protection. We are seeing the lines blur between high end workstation drives and hyperscale/datacenter server SSDs and this product is designed to bridge that gap.Q: Recently OCZ launched a new PCIe SSD (RevoDrive 350), what is the main significant advantage using PCIe interface? What is the difference compared to other SSD using SATA Express standard?A: The RevoDrive 350 is designed for customers requiring high performance and is able to achieve three times the performance of SATA-based SSDs, delivering RAID like performance in a single easy to deploy single card solution. The RevoDrive 350 is based on our proven performance architecture and features 19nm Toshiba NAND to complete our portfolio transition to in-house flash, offering a high-performance yet cost-efficient SSD for bandwidth-intensive applications. This exciting new drive provides customers with workstation-grade design capabilities and maximum performance for professional content creation, multimedia, and extreme gaming. RevoDrive 350 is able to reach up up to 1.8GB/s sequential speeds and up to 140,000 4K random write IOPS thanks to the PCIe Gen. 2 x8 interface and multiple LSI SF-2282 processors to offer more bandwidth than the previous generation. Enabling both performance and functionality for applications ranging from scientific computing to extreme gaming systems, this workstation-class storage product also leverages our unique and proprietary Virtualized Controller Architecture (VCA) 2.0 to deliver highly efficient performance aggregation while reducing the burden on host resources, effectively accelerating application performance and taking full advantage of today's multithreaded processors and software. RevoDrive 350 also supports up to 50GB of host writes per day for 3 years to provide leading endurance for media professionals over less robust consumer SSDs.Q: How did OCZ and the storage market as a whole perform over the past year?A: The entire market for SSDs continues to grow and it is great to see the technology being utilized in everything from OEM laptops to enterprise cloud computing applications. There are so many demand drivers for SSDs that we are seeing adoption only accelerate as the need to store and manage data continues to grow. Last year was a transition period for OCZ and while we had the controller, firmware and application software technology already in-house it was becoming increasingly difficult to compete without the direct access to NAND. Today as part of the Toshiba Group we now have all the necessary technology pieces and are once again able to focus on delivering leading-edge products for our client and enterprise customers.Q: After the Toshiba-OCZ combination, what advantages bring to OCZ?A: Now that we are a Toshiba Group Company, one of the most exciting things about OCZ Storage Solutions is that we have been infused with even greater resources to develop next generation products. Toshiba acquired all of the company's R&D and engineering assets and not only kept them completely intact, but enabled these teams to refocus their efforts on developing our own next generation in-house controller, firmware, and enterprise software. These teams will continue to create products that are specifically designed for our target audience. As part of Toshiba we also have earlier and greater access to next generation NAND which allows OCZ optimize our next generation controllers and firmware to take advantage of the complete range of features, and opens the door to further enhance performance and endurance in future client and enterprise drives. This early access can also potentially accelerate the design cycle making it possible to release innovative products with even better time to market.Q: What are the fastest growing SSD interfaces in the enterprise segment? Is PCIe gaining traction?A: SATA continues to be the lion's share of the market but we have seen a continued ramp on PCIe SSDs both in the workstation and enterprise markets. With our current controller technology we are already at the point where we are saturating the SATA III bus so PCIe is a natural transition for customers looking for more bandwidth. We are already well along the design of our next generation controllers that are both native SATA and PCIe and I think that in the future we will see many PCIe SSDs in form factors beyond edge cards as customers seek the ideal combination of performance, density, reliability and ease of deployment.Q: Where does Taiwan fit into OCZ's operations?A: Taiwan has always been our APAC operations headquarters and continues to be home for our sales and marketing functions in the region. Our manufacturing operation in Taiwan has been absorbed by a Toshiba manufacturing partner and will continue to produce our drives. This organization has a wealth of expertise in the manufacture of storage products for Toshiba and is infusing additional resources into the operation. As we ramp both our client and enterprise businesses there is a major push to continually improve quality throughout the organization and our local team in Taiwan continues to play a key role in this regard.Q: Can you tell us more about your enterprise SSD strategy?A: The enterprise market continues to be a key growth area for us and where we are investing a lot of our resources on the R&D side. We have been refining our solution offering to build products that our customers are specifically asking for, in some cases this includes adding new enterprise features, something that we are able to do because we have our own controllers and firmware. We are also continuing to push are total solutions approach, like our newest ZD-XL SQL Accelerator 1.5 which is a tightly integrated hardware/software plug-and-play acceleration solution optimized for Microsoft SQL Server applications. This solution leverages OCZ's industry-proven PCIe SSD hardware and application-tuned software to deliver low latency flash that resolves potential SQL Server bottleneck issues enabling the flash to be deployed as a local flash volume, a flash cache for HDD volumes, or as a combination of both. The solution includes a combination of fast flash performance, a unique cache mechanism that makes advanced and statistically-optimized decisions on what data to cache, and a dynamic cache warm-up scheduler that enables workloads to be placed on flash cache in advance of demanding and critical jobs. Solutions like this make it easier to deploy and leverage the benefits of SSD technology and we are continuing to make investments in this arena, making it easier for enterprise customers to address their enterprise storage challenges no matter what the application may be.Q: Can you share your views about the outlook for SSD? What is your business outlook for 2014? Which are the most exciting challenges ahead of OCZ short-term, mid-term as well as long-term?A: While there is no doubt there will continue to be consolidation in the SSD market I expect that the NAND Fabs will continue to become the key players in this space. I believe we will continue to see a surge in adoption in both the PC and Data Center space with the most growth in the mainstream PC segment as drives only become more affordable. OCZ is back with a renewed focus and our most exciting short term challenges are mostly behind us as we have transitioned our portfolio to Toshiba NAND, and we were able to retain almost our entire team through the transition to let us hit the ground running. Mid-term and long term our challenges are on building back our business with all of our valued customers and partners across all regions, as well as accelerating our product development to leverage cutting edge TLC and 3D NAND technologies. OCZ has always pushed the performance envelope and we are committed to continue to support both the client and enterprise markets with quality SSD products. This is both a very exciting time for the maturing SSD market as well as our own organization, and with Toshiba's support we now have even more resources in which to bring to market innovative solutions that address our customer's requirements head on.OCZ Storage Solutions launched a new PCIe SSD RevoDrive 350Photo: Company

With more data center services and cloud solutions have been created on the way, experts are concerned that electricity consumption inside the massive data centers that power the internet and different enterprise server applications. In fact, a survey report of data centers today highlighted it consumes about 2% of the world's electricity production, and increased 7% in 2013 compared to 2012. Data center owners and operators have faced increasing electricity bills and taxes while increasing hardware density and, at the same time, maintain or improve the user experience.In recent years, several server solution providers have worked to create a new 64-bit ARM-based single chip solution driven by lowed power consumption and reduced total cost of ownership (TCO) not unlike the one in current Smartphone. Applied Micro Circuits Corporation, a NASDAQ-listed fabless semiconductor company producing computing and connectivity IC chips, has built brand new flagship server chips X-Gene product lines and the ecosystem. It has made it clear they intend to watch the market developed formany years and witnessed not only how data center demands has developed, but also how companies compete amid increased competition in current hyperscale challenges.X-Gene chips promise to significantly reduce the power consumed by the modern server, and that's certainly an attractive prospect for Facebook and other cloud service companies that now run their web services atop tens of thousands of servers.To understand how the server industry is developing in the ARM-based 64-bit sector, Digitimes invites Dr. Paramesh Gopi, the CEO of Applied Micro Circuits Corporation, to learn how the company is reacting to such developments and what kind of strategies are helping the company maintain a competitive edge and his outlook for the company.Q: What are the major products or solutions in 2014?A: Our major launch this year is X-Gene, which is the product of our core competencies of 1) brawny 64-bit server processor design, 2) high-speed mixed-signal I/O heritage, 3) broad, fast memory IP, and 4) our ability to integrate all of the above on a single piece of silicon. We also have a family of Connectivity products named X-Weave, that are ideally suited to address the growing need for high-speed, high-reliability communication within and between data centers.Q: From solution point of view, what would be the future trends of data center industry? Why and how things going for the direction?A: First, we see continued growth of the cloud. There will be multiple drivers of this growth: new software applications, more streaming video, more mobile services, more connected devices, i.e., the internet of things, and more enterprise services migrating to cloud. Some of the drivers may emerge more quickly or more strongly than others, but given demand coming from multiple directions, we see demand for cloud services only going up.Second, we see a trend toward driving down server infrastructure costs. We have observed this trend for some time, and we expect it to continue. Innovative new thinking and highly disruptive technologies such as X-Gene will enable this. Specifically, we expect to see higher densities, lower total cost of ownership, and an overall decline in the growth rate on energy consumption by data centers with the adoption of new technologies, like X-Gene.We see software-driven equipment malleability (i.e., software-based reallocation of computing, networking, and storage resources), lower cost open hardware following the massive adoption of open software, and a growing market for ODMs as demand from the cloud continues to drive the white box opportunity, which is particularly relevant in Taiwan.Q: What are the new products or solutions you are going to demonstrate in COMPUTEX TAIPEI 2014 this year? Can you share your views about the business outlook for 2014?A: We are very excited and proud to be demonstrating the great strides we've made in terms of our progress relating to production silicon and the ecosystem development this year at COMPUTEX TAIPEI 2014. We will be showcasing the following:The ARMv8 software ecosystem has come a long way over the last several years and now enjoys the full commitment of leading providers Microsoft, Red Hat, Canonical, Oracle and Citrix, along with open source stalwarts OpenStack, OpenJDK, KVM and others.Applied Micro is proud to be participating with Canonical on their Ubuntu OpenStack Interoperability Lab. OIL makes it easier for ecosystem partners like Applied Micro to assure the compatibility of our category-defining X-Gene Server of a Chip with the world's leading open cloud platform.Applied Micro and Canonical will also show Ubuntu 14.04LTS running on a 14U rack composed of 1U X-Gene Servers, using Juju, MAAS and charms to orchestrate applications, databases and services. This demonstration will provide proof that Applied Micro's X-Gene, the first (and in all likelihood the only) ARMv8 Server on a Chip product to launch in 2014, will be supported by the dominant open source cloud software framework - on an equal footing with x86-64 and POWER architectures.We have also invited several of our ODM partners to showcase their new and developing products based on X-Gene.Q: Besides COMPUTEX, is there any marketing or product promotion plans in this year?A: Certainly. One that I would highlight in the near-term is the International Supercomputing Conference, or ISC, later this month. Many people might not assume that an ARM-based server processor would be an obvious fit for the high performance market, but the interest and success we're seeing from the high performance community is a testament to the performance of our custom cores and the integrated high-performance analog and mixed signal I/O that X-Gene brings to the market. We are very excited about the breadth of applications for which X-Gene is uniquely suited.It's also quite reasonable to assume that there will be a campaign, perhaps in conjunction with customers and/or ecosystem partners to highlight availability of production units when the timing is appropriate later this year.Q: Is there a successful story sharing to us about your customers to use your products or solutions?A: We have nearly one hundred formal evaluation and use agreements signed by customers, potential customers, ecosystem partners, and the like. Since we have been sampling silicon for over a year now, there has been a tremendous amount of interest and effort in working on and evaluating X-Gene. I can tell you, in no uncertain terms, people are amazed by 1) the total cost of ownership, or TCO savings, 2) the high performance / low-power profile, 3) the range of applications X-Gene addresses, 4) the ease and speed of which software can be ported to X-Gene, and 5) our ability to deliver on what we promised.Q: Any message for Global IT Industry?A: The world has changed. The advent of Open Source, or LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) has set in motion an irreversible trend. No longer is there a need or justification for architectural monopolies and duopolies. In X-Gene we have created not just a viable alternative, but we have, in many ways created a superior product from a TCO and systems perspective.Dr. Paramesh Gopi, CEO of Applied Micro Circuits Corporation

With the IT market shifting from PCs to mobile devices, there has been an increased appetite for support for Wi-Fi and wireless technologies such as Bluetooth and near field communication (NFC). Mobile users are not only looking at emails and texting though; mobile devices are increasingly being used as a viewing device for HD content, which has placed an increased strain on bandwidth. Moreover, the market is seeing more and more new solutions that are being enabled by low-power wireless, such as wearables.Leading up to Computex, Digitimes spoke with Rahul Patel, vice president for Broadcom's Mobile and Wireless Group, to gain more insight into how Wi-Fi and low power Bluetooth NFC are coming to the forefront in the market.Q: Can you give us an update on Broadcom's rollout of 802.11ac over the last year?A: Last year at Computex we said Broadcom's 5th generation Wi-Fi (802.11ac) would be quickly adopted. Since then 802.11ac adoption has skyrocketed. It can now be found in all types of products ranging from routers, PCs and TVs while also being in mobile phones in a big way. Broadcom is looking at unit volume shipments totaling in the hundreds of millions of units. There is a fast adoption of 11ac across multiple market segments and that kind of highlights one of the biggest challenges in the Wi-Fi market.Q: What do you mean?A: If you look at the number of products that utilize Wi-Fi, you are seeing a lot more devices coming into the home that depend on personal home networks. Wi-Fi is being extended to things like televisions, music players and IoT (Internet of Things) devices. And when it comes to the individual user, it used to be that everyone had maybe one device but with the proliferation of tablets, smartphones and other mobile devices we are now seeing 2-3 devices per person. So for a family of four you are looking at more than 10 devices that need Wi-Fi support. We see this as being a problem because the network has to scale and provide appropriate bandwidth for the multiple devices and at multiple distances. To address these challenges in an interesting way, what we did was come up with a new platform earlier this year that we call 5G Wi-Fi XStream.Wi-Fi XStream is a six stream 802.11ac MIMO platform for home networks that can run up to 50% faster than MU-MIMO routers and gateways. What Wi-Fi XStream does is create an environment where all the high priority traffic on 5GHz in 802.11ac will move to one channel of the 5GHz frequency band while lesser priority traffic will simultaneously be moved to other 5GHz channels. The lowest priority traffic that does not have 5GHZ support can be shifted to the 2.4GHz band. So now all of a sudden you have the ability to support Wi-Fi data rates up to 3.2Gbit - or greater than 2Gbit per second of TCP/IP - without having legacy clients (or devices that are shipping today) needing to support multi-user MIMO (MU-MIMO). Broadcom is trying to address the problem of the home network by addressing the situation based on the clients that are there today by provisioning this new platform Wi-Fi XStream.So, for example, if you have two MacBooks talking to your 802.11ac 3x3 router, your bandwidth is going to get split down the middle between the two clients. And if you have more clients, such as phones, smartwatches and TVs, the bandwidth is going to get split even more. With 5G Wi-Fi XStream, the high priority client, say the one that is receiving streamed video will get the one channel and will get maximum bandwidth, while the lesser priority traffic will move to other channels in the 5GHz band.Broadcom is solving three big problems here. One is the quality of service (QoS) problem which is effectively taken care of by making sure 802.11ac devices in the home are not sharing with slower Wi-Fi devices, so users are getting a better quality of service and better video experience in the home. We are also addressing the bandwidth problem by making a lot more bandwidth available on the network, up to 3.2Gbit per second. There is no other router in the market today that can provide this much Wi-Fi capacity. And the third thing we address is the problem of range. The clients that need the furthest range will have the ability to choose between one of two channels which would be less congested and would be supporting the furthest reach versus a client that is stuck with one channel operation that is shared between multiple clients. These three issues are becoming a bigger and bigger problem for previous generation routers because there are so many more clients needing support in the home.Q: What is the expected rollout for 5G Wi-Fi XStream routers?A: Broadcom will enter into production in the second quarter and customers all over the world engaging on the platform with shipments in the second half of the year, or shortly thereafter. So we expect Taiwan customers to be launching a number of products during Computex.Q: What kind of adoption rates do you expect?A: Products will be slated for the premium category of the market initially but given that the growing appetite for Wi-Fi in the home and the desire for the market for increased performance in this segment, I expect demand to be much better than we saw for premium routers last year.Q: you spoke about increased Internet of Things devices. I know that that Broadcom has what you call WICED (pronounced as wicked; Wireless Internet Connectivity for Embedded Devices) for adding wireless connectivity to embedded devices. Can you update us on that platform?A: WICED is a fully integrated software/hardware design kit that can be used to quickly design and integrate wireless into a system for production and shipments. We have WICED Wi-Fi and we also have WICED Smart, which uses a BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy) module along with Broadcom software SDK.WICED is shipping to many ODM partners in Taiwan. We are seeing tremendous adoption because we make it easy for our partners; we don't require a lot of stringent paperwork to use WICED. It's simply available on Broadcom's website or through our channel partners' websites and we have seen thousands of SDKs and HDKs downloaded and purchased by customers.Q: What are customers doing with WICED?A: We have seen WICED-based designs ranging from garage door openers to music players. Things you see in your day-to-day life can utilize WICED, from hearing aids to lighting solutions. We also recently announced our Bluetooth SoC (BCM20737) for WICED Smart implementations, which will address the need for advanced security to ensure customer privacy. For example, this SoC can deliver on-chip advanced security to prevent hacking of sensitive information in areas such as medical data for IoT in wearable devices. We also added some new software features like support for iBeacon technology for better device detection and identity.So if you look at wearables, such as the Samsung Gear Fit and Samsung Galaxy Gear Fit, these products have Broadcom BLE functionality in them as well. This means you can monitor your heart rate, your pulse rate, the number of the steps you take - basically monitor your health - and quickly transfer the data to the cloud so that the right people can look at the data and make some assessments about your health. Those are some of the big benefits we foresee.BLE is also going to be used for proximity detection. If you are walking in a building and you want directions, BLE is going to help guide you in the right direction because of the radio technology. And these are all going to be low power devices, so they can also be used in applications that are tied to security. In your home, in your door drops, in your cameras - all of these areas offer potential usage scenarios for these devices.Q: Can you talk a little about the wireless charging?A: Let's take for example the protocol of A4WP Resonance. Under this protocol, a device would have to signal a certain control to the battery or the power unit (PMU) where the source of the charge is going to come from. For example, is it going to charge the battery by using wireless charging or will the charge come from plugging the device in the wall? BLE is the wireless connectivity that is going to drive the protocol to control the source of the charging so the battery gets the appropriate charge. You need to wirelessly control the source and communicate back to the charger where the source is going to be from. BLE gives you the ability to wirelessly talk to the transmitter pad or A4WPn and give information concerning whether the device needs to be charged, is fully charged, or how much charging it needs. All that information is communicated through BLE.So if you are wearing a device, you can put your hand on the table and maybe underneath the table there will be a wireless charging pad and your device would be charged automatically. Or at night when you get into bed, you simply put your IoT device on the nightstand where a charging pad is and in the morning it is fully charged. Charging will not compromise the user experience. You don't need to remember to charge or worry that you forgot to charge.Q: What kinds of engagement are you seeing?A: in terms of applications, we are seeing engagement from companies like Samsung, but we are also seeing interest from Taiwan ODMs. Taiwan firms have a big advantage because they know how to manufacture, they know how to design and they are very familiar with Bluetooth. They have been designing with Bluetooth for over a decade, so we expect to see a huge uptick in IoT and wearables from Taiwan ODMs and from China players as well.The key to success will be that companies understand that wearables need to deliver a lot from a productivity point of view. Devices will need to provide solutions that can give you things like the status of your health, or have the ability to guide you indoors if you are lost, or have the ability to receive text messages or have some form of text communicated directly on your wristwatch, maybe even a device that helps you fill out forms.Rahul Patel, VP and general manager, wireless connectivity combo, Mobile and Wireless GroupPhoto: Company

Silicon Image is a semiconductor IP company whose expertise is connecting boxes to displays. The company develops semiconductor IP based on industry standards it has helped develop. For example, it is one of the inventors of HDMI, DVI technology (in association with the Digital Display Working Group) and also the inventor and promoter of the MHL (Mobile High-Definition Link) standard. The company is also in the wireless space connecting devices, particularly for wireless video.Digitimes had the opportunity to speak with David Kuo, senior director of marketing, mobile devices at Silicon Image just before Computex. Below are excerpts of his comments.On the latest advancements in technical standards for connectivityOur HDMI technology has been used to connect set top boxes (STB) or Blu-ray players to big screen TVs for over 10 years and at Computex we expect that this technology will be everywhere. For example 4K (Ultra HD) video is a hot trend in the video market and the connectivity support for that is based on the HDMI 2.0 specification released at the end of last year. You will see a lot of companies, including us, talking about the increased bandwidth of HDMI 2.0 (up to 18Gbps) and showing off digital TVs with resolution of 4K at 30Hz (4K30) and 4K at 60Hz (4K60) .HDMI is important in the CE space and in the mobile space we expect that MHL will be the key connectivity technology. The latest development, MHL 3.0, was released earlier this year and it supports connectivity for 4K video (2160p30), a simultaneous high-speed data channel, power charging for up to 10W and the latest HDCP 2.2 content protection. This is going to be big at Computex.In addition, more and more people want the convenience of wireless technology, so we have developed a technology called wireless HD that allows users to support 1080p video without a cable.MHL 3.0 and multimediaAs smartphones and tablets become more powerful, they have the potential to serve as a gaming platform, a multimedia platform and a computing platform. The issue the device makers have is that all that power and capability inside the phone is trapped by the 5-inch display.With MHL, users are able to connect mobile devices to larger screens to provide a whole new experience. Previously, MHL supported only 1080p60 but at Computex this year we will be showing (MHL 3.0) 4K resolutions in products such as phones, tablets and TVs.These developments are based on the fact users are increasingly using their phones as multimedia devices. They download movie content and they capture video themselves at higher resolutions, up to 4K. They want to see that on the big screen and with MHL they can. Smartphones also feature more powerful GPUs, allowing users to play games just like on a gaming console. These users want to be connected a big screen.MHL 3.0 and productivityIf you look at the capability of the phone today compared to that of the PC just a few years ago, we are seeing implementations where the mobile phone can be used as a productivity device. One of the key features of MHL 3.0 is that it incorporates a high-speed data channel so you can combine a video link and a data link into a single link technology that allows you to support 4k video and USB 2.0 functionality at the same time. Previously it was an either/or equation with support for display or USB.So now, a device OEM can develop a mobile device that comes with a docking station. That docking station can have video output to a video monitor. It could also connect to a keyboard and mouse. With USB, storage devices can also be connected and now you have a fully functional PC.The other key aspect is that while the mobile device is connected to the plugged in hub, there will be output power flowing back down and charging the battery of the device.A good example of the potential there is shown with MediaTek's Smartbook concept. It looks like a smartphone connected to an ultrabook but it's not really an ultrabook because it has no computing capabilities. It's just a display, with a keyboard and a battery, and of course with an MHL input. The smartphone can use the notebook clamshell as the docking station and deliver PC productivity.Automotive is another area. Just about every OEM involved with cars is working on a strategy of how to incorporate the car infotainment experience with mobile devices. We are seeing a lot of automotive manufacturers excited by MHL in a lot of phones and video. Consumers want to connect phones to in-dash units or rear seat displays.Importance of MHL supportIf you look at the adoption rate of MHL, there are more than half a billion devices combined out there in the marketplace that support MHL. Samsung and Sony have their flagship products supporting MHL. There is also a wide ecosystem of phones, tablets and PCs that support MHL.Connecting two MHL-supported devices is as simple as using a passive cable but there are plenty of users out there viewing HD video on their TVs by connecting MHL-supported smartphones to the HDMI port in the TV using a converter adapter. But a lot of OEMs see the benefits of supporting MHLs in their displays, as more multimedia content is being viewed from mobile devices. If both devices have MHL support, then the mobile device battery would be charged by the display while they are connected, which makes sense if a two-hour movie is being viewed.The role of wireless videoWireless HD is also a standard and allows a display to present content from a mobile device at 1080p60. We'll be displaying the technology with various products accessories. Sony has seen the potential of Wireless HD and has come out with personal 3D head display based on wireless HD.Wireless HD technology supports the same type of usage models as any other video link using cables but provides the flexibility of wireless. The technology also consumes power at 400mw in 1080p60, which is much better than Wi-Fi.David Kuo, senior director of marketing, mobile devices at Silicon Image Photo: CompanySony HMZ-T3W Personal 3D ViewerSony HMZ-T3 Display