Power – Answers provided by Tony Armstrong, director of product marketing power products Linear Technology Corporation

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EONEWS: What are your opinions regarding the major trends for this market (slowing, growing, booming…)?

ARMSTRONG: With 2014 global outlook likely to be another slow growth year, it is imperative that a company be in the right markets at the right time if it is going to outperform the market. The effects of the past financial crisis, subsequent deep recession and now a subdued recovery continue to pose enormous challenges to businesses and their customers. But even in this subdued global business environment, markets are shifting and sometimes in unnoticed directions.

In the analog semiconductor market, the sands have shifted favoring the automotive and industrial markets and away from the consumer and communications markets. This seems extraordinary since there appears to be no bounds on the parade of new consumer electronic devices that are served up daily. But with feature integration and performance stagnation, the analog communications and consumer markets have in the past several years declined or shown only modest market growth.

EONEWS: What are the key strategies adopted by your company in the short/medium period to address (or to better address) the needs of the market?

ARMSTRONG: Linear Technology’s new product design and development has shifted away from the communications and consumer market segment to the automotive and Industrial markets. It is pretty clear from the current economic conditions that the automotive and industrial analog markets are in a new electronic age. The industrial segment of the analog market has grown from 6% of the total market 10 years ago to 21% today. Also, in just the last 4 years, the analog automotive market has grown from 14% of the total analog market to 20%. Even if global economies are only showing modest recoveries, being in the right markets at the right time matters if a company is going to outgrow the market. In the past several years, Linear Technology revenue derived from the automotive and industrial market has grown to 62% of revenue and 86% of revenue comes from non-consumer end markets.

Success in these markets needs more than market and sales focus. It needs products that bring value and innovation. Both the Industrial and automotive systems environments demand products which are precise, reliable and can operate over wide temperature ranges with efficient thermal management.  The automotive and industrial markets are in an innovation cycle and need compelling analog products to improve performance, efficiency and drive end market differentiation. Furthermore, these requirements are in alignment with our recent new product introductions, as well as being synchronized with many of our products currently in the design phase.

EONEWS: What are you doing in order to implement your strategies (partnership/agreements, new acquisitions, investments in activities like R&D, people….)?

ARMSTRONG: We always have an eye to the more distant future, which markets will drive future growth, and what products we should design today to capture this growth. Linear has concentrated efforts in several emerging innovation-rich new markets. These includes the micromodule family of products, digital power products, energy harvesting products and low power wireless sensor network products through the acquisition of Dust Networks. The areas of smart low power wireless networks and energy harvesting are emerging markets with boundless opportunities. Imagine millions of smart connected devices powered autonomously by energy harvesting devices, which offer staggering opportunities for Linear products. Our SmartMesh wireless technology offers complete wireless sensor network solutions using low power electronic components that can be powered by our energy harvesting products.

Furthermore, we have been working with technology partners to introduce products targeted at the wireless power transfer market. For example, we introduced our LTC4120 wireless power transfer and battery charging IC just a couple of months ago incorporating Dynamic Harmonization Control (DHC) developed by PowerbyProxi in New Zealand. PowerbyProxi has been working to deliver wireless power solutions for industrial customers since 2007. We have not invested a great deal of money into marketing. Instead, we have continued to develop and improve our technology, and to partner with industry leaders like LTC to bring our technology to market. With significant success and a broad portfolio of technology embodiments to our credit, we are now gaining recognition as the leading global wireless power company.

EONEWS: What are the most important applications?

ARMSTRONG: Energy efficiency is a major driving force in many applications found across multiple market segments. Its benefits are obvious in data centers, wireless sensor networks and Enterprise computer systems. This, in turn, drives the need for innovative products such as the Linear Technology unique family of Micromodules, which have already gained broad acceptance in these markets. Micromodule products are complete solutions in a semiconductor package that minimize design time and solve the common problem of board space density, transferring the design burden from the designer to the micromodule, greatly reducing design time. Furthermore, systems designers need to reduced energy use and improved system performance under the pressure of vanishing development times. This challenge is met with Linear Technology Power System Management products (PSM) that use powerful GUI software, LTpowerPlay, providing control and monitoring of power usage, voltages, sequencing, margining and fault data logging. This is just a small sample of the many innovative analog products that Linear Technology provides to its customers.

EONEWS: Which are the key factors that set your company apart from the competition?

ARMSTRONG: In the analog market, it’s no longer enough to have compelling products, but as the products become more complex, mixing analog and digital functions frequently needing software and applications support. As a result, having a skilled worldwide field applications engineering team is a prerequisite for success. This is particularly necessary in the industrial and automotive markets. The products in these markets are complex systems that may be designed and manufactured at multiple locations with a global footprint. Linear Technology is one of the few analog suppliers that provides consistent customer application engineer support, interconnected anywhere on the globe from design to manufacturing to sales support.

EONEWS: And in the middle/long term (if you have a crystal ball!)?

ARMSTRONG: Refer to the answers of questions 2 and 3 above.

Read the Italian version on EONews 572-February

Tony Armstrong

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