FPGA Gurus

Actel Corp. announced two support moves for the Asian FPGA design community this week, and both emphasize embedded applications over traditional IT and communications. The Actel Cup China award winners were skewed toward handheld and robotic applications, while the new Actel Space Forum in Bangalore addressed India’s burgeoning space industry by emphasizing the mil-aero advantages of Actel's rad-tolerant FPGA family.

The 2009 Actel Cup drew more than 300 student entries from 190 academic institutions. The contest ended with a tie for first place – a handheld navigator from Xian University of Electronic Science and Technology, and a robotic arm from South China Agricultural University.

The former design, dubbed “Traveler’s Companion,” utilized the mixed-signal features of the Fusion FPGA in designing a handheld GPS device that also measures temperature, barometric pressure, humidity, latitude, and longitude. The student team from SCAU in Guangdong province designed a robotic arm for agricultural applications. The team used Fusion’s A/D converter and analog gate driver in designing a six-function arm that can be switched from automatic to manual control.

Is it necessary to point out that next-generation designers in China already consider IT applications to be sooo 20^th century? These students already have gone embedded, where the vast bulk of programmable applications will reside soon.

Actel also held its first Space Forum in Bangalore in late May, bringing together more than 130 design engineers, scientists, and managers specializing in aerospace applications. The event was co-hosted by Aeroflex Gaisler AB, and emphasized use of the rad-tolerant RTAX-S Space-Flight FPGAs.  IThe Gaisler unit that developed rad-tolerant IP cores, based on Sparc architecture, was acquired recently by Aeroflex, the same company that acquired rad-hard IC expert United Technologies Microelectronics Center.  Both the UTMC and Gaisler businesses now form Aeroflex Microelectronic Solutions, a partner with Actel in RTAX-S design.