EE Times Reveals the 2008 ACE Awards Finalists

SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 19 /PRNewswire/ -- CMP's EE Times (http://www.eetimes.com/) is proud to announce the finalists for the fourth Annual Creativity in Electronics (ACE) Awards (http://www.eetimes-ace.com/), which recognize the electronics engineering industry's most innovative companies and breakthrough technologies. EE Times ACE Awards are judged by a panel of industry experts, comprised of the leading voices of academia, industry and Wall Street executives.

Winners will be honored at the ACE Awards Gala taking place on April 15, 2008 from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. at the Fairmont Hotel in San Jose, California. The ACE Awards are part of ESC Silicon Valley (http://www.cmp-egevents.com/web/esv/home), the largest electronic systems design event in North America where the global design engineering community gathers to learn, collaborate and celebrate innovations.

Commentary:
  Junko Yoshida, editor-in-chief, EE Times

"These finalists represent the top notch innovators and innovations within the embedded industry. The panel of judges evaluated hundreds of leading companies with breakthrough technologies for this competition and selected only those who we felt really exemplified growth, innovation and commitment to furthering the technology and the industry."

The 2008 ACE Awards finalists are:

Company of the Year -- Small/Medium (Under $750 million in sales) award celebrates the company that exhibits the highest degree of professionalism, staff development and retention, customer focus, technical excellence and profitable growth -- a true leader in the electronics sector.

-- Green Hills Software
  -- Moschip Semiconductor
  -- National Instruments
  -- Silicon Laboratories, Inc.
  -- Wind River Systems

Company of the Year -- Large (Over $750 million in sales) award celebrates the company that exhibits the highest degree of professionalism, staff development and retention, customer focus, technical excellence and profitable growth -- a true leader in the electronics sector.

-- Altera Corporation
  -- Arrow Electronics, Inc.
  -- Microchip Technology
  -- Research In Motion
  -- WIPRO

Design Team of the Year award goes to a group of innovators whose system or IC-level design made a significant contribution to the furtherance of technology and whose project management abilities were creative, efficient and inspiring.

-- 3dLABS Semiconductor -- DMS-02 processor
  -- IBM -- Embedded DRAM (eDRAM)
  -- NXP Semiconductor -- PNX5100
  -- PA Semi -- PWRficient dual-core processor (PA6T-1682M)
  -- Research In Motion  -- BlackBerry Curve

Executive of the Year award goes to an individual who brought leadership, technological and fiscal vision to a company, organization or company division during a calendar year.

-- Bluetooth Special Interest Group -- Michael Foley, Executive Director
  -- Cadence Design Systems, Inc. -- Mike Fister, President & CEO
  -- Energy Curtailment Specialists, Inc. -- Glen Smith, President & CEO
  -- Research In Motion -- Mike Lazaridis, President & Co-CEO
  -- Sun Microsystems -- Gregory Papadopoulos, CTO, EVP R&D

Innovator of the Year award goes to an individual who has brought leadership, creativity and out-of-the-box thinking to technology, a product or business.

-- ARC International -- Carl Schlachte, President & CEO
  -- IBM Research -- Dan Edelstein and Satya Nitta
  -- Philips Medical Systems -- Binwei Weng, Software Development Engineer
  -- Tilera -- Anant Agarwal, CTO
  -- Tropos Networks -- Cyrus Behroozi, Chief Scientist

Most Promising New Technology award goes to a compelling electronic component or enabling technology, such as software, that is outstanding in its technical design, potential for market impact and demonstrates leadership in its area.

-- Element CXI -- Elemental Computing Array - ECA
  -- IBM -- Nanotechnology
  -- SkyCross Inc -- iMAT, Isolated Mode Antenna Technology
  -- Tilera -- TILE64
  -- XID Technologies -- Face Synthesis

Start-up of the Year award goes to a venture capital (or pre-IPO financed) start-up (under three years in business) electronics manufacturing (device or system) company that demonstrates excellence in business development and/or technology development processes with the potential to become a technical or market leader in the global electronics industry.

-- Blade Networks Technology
  -- Kovio, Inc.
  -- Stream Processors, Inc.
  -- Tilera
  -- XMOS Semiconductor

Ultimate Products of the Year awarded to the most significant product introduced in the last 12 months in each of seven categories, as determined by large-scale peer review. Finalists in each category were chosen by qualified readers of EE Times and eeProductCenter.com on a quarterly basis via electronic balloting, from a list of nominees submitted to readers by expert editors with accompanying editorial reviews. The top two ranking products from each category over the past four quarters automatically qualify as finalists. Electronic ballots will be sent to frequent responders to select the winner in each category from the field of finalists.

Analog
  -- Texas Instruments -- ADS5463
  -- Cirrus Logic -- CS4525
  -- Analog Devices -- ADA4937-1 and ADA4938-1 differential drivers
  -- Maxim -- MAX5092 LDO regulator
  -- Supertex -- HV758IC
  -- Vishay -- SiP12510, SiP12511 White LED Drivers
  -- OKI Electric Industry -- ML86V7665 Video Decoder LSI
  -- 4-channel -- ADS1274, 8-channel -- ADS1278, Texas Instruments -- ADSx


  IP&E
  -- DDP -- SL3 Series Stack Lamp
  -- OSRAM -- Platinum DRAGON LED
  -- Planar Systems -- 1080p Hi-Def LCD Thin Displays
  -- Planet82 -- Color SMPD
  -- Omron Electronic Components -- EE-SX1 photomicrosensors
  -- Corning Cable Systems -- OptiSnap Connector
  -- OSRAM Opto Semiconductors -- OSTAR Headlamp LED
  -- Nextreme -- eTEC


  Processor/Memory
  -- Texas Instruments -- TMS570 MCU
  -- Toshiba America Electronic Components -- TC904XX SoC Solutions
  -- Adtron Corp -- I25FB and A25FB Flash Disks
  -- AMD -- Athlon 64 Processors
  -- Freescale Semiconductor -- Multi-core Communications Platform
  -- Texas Instruments -- 16 MHz MSP430F47x4 Ultra Low-Power MCU
  -- NEC Electronics -- 400-MHz ARM926EJ-S processor
  -- Ramtron International -- FM111x 4-bit state savers


  Logic Interface & Programmable Logic
  -- Applied Micro Circuits Corp -- 3ware 9650SE SATA RAID Controller Family
  -- Xilinx -- LX330 - 65-nm FPGA
  -- Broadcom -- BCM7118 Cable Set-Top Box Chip
  -- Lattice Semiconductor - DDR2 SDRAM IP Core
  -- Xilinx -- Virtex-4 FPGA-based Deserializer Reference Design
  -- Altera -- EP3C120 Cyclone III FPGA
  -- Analog Devices -- ADV7520NK Low-Power HDMI v1.3 Transmitter
  -- Altera -- EP3SL150


  Power
  -- Vicor -- V-I Chip Evaluation and Validation Boards
  -- Analog Devices -- ADuC703x
  -- FDK Corp -- FPMR05SR75 Senpai Series Converters
  -- Endicott Research Group -- Smart Force Family of LED Driver Solutions
  -- Texas Instruments -- UCD9240 Integrated Power System Controllers
  -- Maxim -- MAX15020 High-Voltage DC-DC Converter
  -- Allegro MicroSystems -- A6281 Driver
  -- austriamicrosystems -- AS1301 Inductorless DC/DC Boost Converter


  RF/Microwave
  -- Telegent Systems -- TLG1100
  -- Comsol -- RF Module for COMSOL Multiphysics
  -- Jennic -- Reference Design for JN5139 Wireless Microcontroller
  -- Broadcom -- BCM4325 Wi-Fi/Bluetooth/FM Transceiver
  -- Xceive Corp -- XC4000
  -- Zarlink -- ZL70101 Transceiver Chip
  -- GCT Semiconductor -- GDM7003 RF chip
  -- Quellan -- QNx220 RF Noise Canceller


  Test/Measurement
  -- AEMC Instruments -- Model OX 7104-C Power Kit
  -- Pico Technology -- PicoScope 5204
  -- Link Instruments -- DSO-8502
  -- Agilent Technologies -- N5990A Option 102
  -- Agilent Technologies -- N6705A DC Power Analyzer
  -- Tektronix -- MSO4000 Mixed Signal Oscilloscopes
  -- LeCroy -- WaveExpert 100H
  -- Tektronix -- UWB Software for DPO/DSA70000 Oscilloscopes


  About EE Times ACE Awards

The EE Times ACE Awards honor the innovators who create embedded technology and demonstrate leadership in the global industry. To purchase tickets for the ACE Awards Gala visit: http://www.eetimes-ace.com/AwardsGala.htm. Early-bird priced tickets are on-sale until March 2, 2008, and all tickets, available until April 15, 2008, include a networking cocktail reception, three-course sit-down dinner, multi-media awards presentation ceremony, and entertainment by late night talk show host Craig Ferguson.

Sponsorship for the EE Times ACE Awards includes Platinum Sponsorship from Avnet (http://www.avnet.com/), Silver Sponsorship from Rambus (http://www.rambus.com/us), Association Media Sponsorship from IEEE Spectrum (http://spectrum.ieee.org/) and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (TSMC) Ecosystem Sponsorship from Analog Bits (http://www.analogbits.com/) and Cadence (http://www.cadence.com/).

About ESC

ESC is where the global design engineering community gathers to learn, collaborate and celebrate innovation. Held in Silicon Valley, Boston and India, the Embedded Systems Conference empowers the global design engineering community with hundreds of essential technical training classes and accreditation opportunities. For more information and to register for our events visit http://www.cmp-egevents.com/.

About CMP

CMP (http://www.cmp.com/) is a media and marketing solutions company serving the technology industry. With the leading online, event and print brands in all technology market categories, and with services and tools that reach beyond traditional advertising, CMP shapes and influences the technology industry worldwide. CMP publishes highly respected media brands such as TechWeb, InformationWeek, ChannelWeb, CRN, EE Times and TechOnline; produces major industry events such as Interop, Web 2.0 Expo, XChange, Game Developer Conference and the Embedded Systems Conferences; and provides business information and marketing services such as the International Customer Management Institute, Semiconductor Insights and Second Life consulting for technology marketers. CMP is a subsidiary of United Business Media (http://www.unitedbusinessmedia.com/), a global provider of news distribution and specialist information services with a market capitalization of more than $3 billion. For more CMP news, go to http://www.cmp.com/news.

Contact:
  Jessica Devaney or Leslie Denson, Horn Group (on behalf of CMP)
  jdevaney@horngroup.com / ldenson@horngroup.com
  617.431.1020

SOURCE: CMP

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