Sean's comment start around 41 min mark.
He initially said he cannot disclose the timeline on the breakdown, but later on finished off the answer to the asked question by linking the "100 employee" comment.
Edit: it says video can't be played, but if you click the link I should take you to vimeo website where you can play it.
The wording Sean used at the time, was maybe a little ambiguous, but at no time (in the statement I think people are referring to) did he mention "break even".Good post Chapman89, thanks for your thoughts. My recollection is Sean did say something like we would have enough revenue to break even by the end of 2022 at the last AGM. Clearly, something was in the works but something changed and I would like to know more about that. I believe a lot of the discontent stems from this comment and not just the falling share price.
However, the rest of your post I agree with. To put it another way, if you showed me all the progress the company has made in the last couple of years in the kind of summary AusEire did without showing me the share price chart and asked me if this is a company I would like to invest in the answer would be "Hell yeah".
Just returning to the share price chart, the market got way ahead of itself when Mercedes said they would use Akida in the EQXX. However, I've returned recently to look at some of those articles and actually if you read them carefully there is a lot to be encouraged about. If the articles are to be believed, Mercedes were suggesting much more than they planned to trial the technology in the EQXX. I'll let the article from Car Expert (a review of the EQXX) speak for itself:
'Yes, the Vision EQXX is a concept car. But Mercedes-Benz board member and chief technology officer Markus Schäfer says the technologies used to deliver its impressive efficiency are all production feasible.
“The technology programme behind the Vision EQXX will define and enable future Mercedes-Benz models and features” – and that’s why it’s such an important car.'
This suggests a much wider application of Akida. Of course, Marcus Schaffer has also been quite active recently talking about their neuromorphic technology on Linked In and said recently:
'We already made some interesting findings here with our VISION EQXX, where we applied neuromorphic principles to the “Hey Mercedes” hot-word detection. That alone made it five to ten times more energy efficient than conventional voice control. As AI and machine learning take on an increasingly important role in the software-defined vehicle, the energy this consumes is likely to become a critical factor. I’ll touch on our latest findings in an upcoming “In the Loop” and tell you my thoughts on where this is taking us. '
Marcus Schaffer's posts on Linked In are definitely something to be watching carefully.
Great post and thank you FMFJust reading an interesting article on MCUs.
Highlighted what I deemed some pertinent comments / requirements / observations as indicated by some industry players where we can definitely assist.
What’s Next for the Microcontroller?
February 22, 2023 Robert Huntley
Although the microcontroller market is set for sustained growth, do MCU technical features and functions need to evolve to continue meeting customer requirements? Is the general-purpose MCU being replaced by application-specific versions?
The humble microcontroller, now more than 50 years old, represents a sizable chunk of the overall electronic-component industry. MCUs continue to dominate the embedded scene, and with good reason: They are flexible, configurable, and easy to program. With microcontrollers used in everything from laser printers to washing machines and heating thermostats to forklift trucks, MCU shipment data provides a reasonable indication of the state of the electronics industry.
Over the years, application-specific versions have developed to meet the requirements of use cases such as motor control, wireless connectivity and ultra-low power. Some MCUs feature highly configurable analog and digital blocks, borrowing architectural concepts more associated with FPGAs than MCUs. Others are marketed as general-purpose controllers, incorporating an array of fixed-function blocks—from A/D and D/A converters to serial connectivity, timers/counters, GPIO, and cryptographic accelerators—to suit a broad range of applications.
The microcontroller market exhibits continued growth
According to recent research by P&S Intelligence, the global microcontroller market accounted for US$18.80 billion in 2021 and is expected to reach US$43.61 billion in value by 2030, for a 9.8 % CAGR. The reasons for the projected growth are many, from the increasing use of machine learning in smart sensors to the dramatic increase in industrial automation systems.
Joe Thomsen, Microchip Technology![]()
Although the microcontroller market is set for sustained growth, do MCU technical features and functions need to evolve to continue meeting customer requirements? Is the general-purpose MCU being replaced by application-specific versions?
According to Joe Thomsen, vice president of Microchip Technology’s 16-bit MCU Business Unit, the customers define the needs. “One of the things we do regularly is to evaluate what our customers are putting on their boards and what else is being implemented alongside the microcontroller,” said Thomsen. “Then we can determine how we can interface to those items more easily, more effectively, or [whether] we can actually integrate those features into the MCU itself.”
What technical innovations are happening?
Today’s MCUs are typically highly integrated devices with lots of functionality, intended to offer a single-chip solution for many designs. As customer needs and application use cases evolve, how is the MCU keeping up?
One focus is power. “Microcontrollers account for approximately 5% to 10% of the overall power consumption inside the vehicle, so we’re looking for further possibilities to reduce it,” said Ralf Koedel, vice president for microcontrollers at Infineon’s automotive division.
“Low power is one of the key items we need to look into to drive the MCU space further,” said Tim Burgess, senior director of the MCU Business Unit at Renesas. “The [MCU’s] low power is one of the major differentiators from microprocessors. As we decrease the process technology, it allows us to address low power by design. There’s always a conundrum with process technologies: When you go to a more advanced process node, you get better active consumption, but because the gate is very small, the leakage is significantly higher.”
Steven Tateosian, Infineon![]()
Steven Tateosian, vice president, IoT, Compute and Wireless Business Unit of Infineon, approached the question from an industrial and consumer perspective, pointing to innovation’s role in raising MCU performance for a broader range of applications. “What we started seeing in the last five years is more integration, such as multicore processors, mixed with DSPs and other accelerators,” he said. These additions are being made “without fundamentally changing things around [MCUs’] ease of use and power profiles, and the overall system cost advantages that the MCU brings over microprocessors.”
The versatility of low-power microcontrollers has made them extremely popular for intelligent edge node applications, particularly those based on tinyML. Many voice-assistant–based applications rely on continuous cloud connectivity to conduct interference, only recognizing a trigger word or short phrase locally. However, this approach introduces latency and the risk of a device exploit. The need for local, deterministic decision-making is a priority.
Most microcontroller vendors focus on incorporating neural network accelerators into their MCUs, Koedel said, citing Infineon MCUs that integrate accelerators for automotive functions including graphical displays and ADAS radar processing.
Microchip’s Thomsen called AI a game-changer for MCUs involved in real-time closed-loop control. “I think AI is probably the big revolutionary change for the MCU, and in a lot of cases, it’s going to be a revolutionary change for our customers’ applications,” he said.
Will MCUs reach a limit where MPUs become more attractive?
With the MCU experiencing so much innovation and the number of use cases expanding, one wonders at what point the MCU will reach its limit and MPUs will become a more viable choice. The considerations for or against such a shift extend beyond technical specifications alone. Embedded engineering teams invest substantial time and money when selecting an MCU family for their designs, so they will want to stay with that architecture for as long as possible. Also, MCUs typically consume less power and are lower in cost than MPUs. MPUs are typically selected based on a software decision, the choice of interfaces, or purely for performance reasons, whereas MCU selection is more often related to hardware factors.
Bernd Westhoff, Renesas![]()
For some MPU-based applications, there may well be a strong desire to migrate to an MCU, said Infineon’s Tateosian. “Some high-end smart thermostats with displays full of connectivity are MPU based, and some of them are high-end MCU based. The user won’t know the difference, but I can tell you the unit costs of those [two device types] are very different,” he said. “That’s a good example where some developers are willing to make the jump from an MPU to an MCU to save power and cost, and others see the software development effort as prohibitive.”
Bernd Westhoff, director of IoT product marketing at Renesas, noted that there has always been a degree of overlap between MCU and MPU performance. “MPUs in the past were already at 200 and 400 MHz, and MCUs are easily catching up with that,” he said.
Westhoff also cited some fundamental differences between MCU and MPU developments. “MPU people expect to have Linux, not an RTOS, so you may have a heavy issue in the future to convince a Linux MPU person to become an RTOS MCU person and develop their software there.”
The general-purpose MCU is here to stay
Tim Burgess, Renesas![]()
As MCUs benefit from more functionality, some inevitably become optimized for specific applications. Application-specific MCUs tend to focus on high-volume use cases, such as motor control. Could this trend continue so that the need for general-purpose microcontrollers declines?
“There are always going to be high-volume, low-cost solutions that ASICs [application-specific ICs] are going to take over,” said Microchip’s Thomsen. With shortening product development timescales, he added, the ability to select an MCU off the shelf today and start programming, even if it might be a bit more expensive, will meet a customer’s time-to-market requirements.
Renesas’ Burgess confirmed the continued need for general-purpose MCUs, observing, “It’s just not possible to tune or optimize application-specific processors for every single use case. There are thousands of different applications with so many different requirements, memories, packages, RAM, peripheral mixes, and when you get down to what you’d have to design for, there’s just not enough market to really justify it.”
Fifty years plus and still going strong
Ralf Koedel, Infineon![]()
The microcontroller market continues to experience year-on-year growth thanks to technical innovations and an endless list of use cases. In the automotive market, for example, Infineon’s Koedel told EE Times Europe he doesn’t see an end to growth yet. “If you look into motorcycles, for example, the trend now in India is to go from combustion engines to electrification, with a lot more electronic content, enabling a lot more [MCU growth],” he said.
Of all the MCU use cases highlighted by the executives we contacted, it’s clear that machine learning-based applications will become more significant this decade. With its low-power attributes, an architecture optimized with neural network acceleration, and encryption functionality, the MCU is a suitable choice for this use case.
![]()
Robert Huntley
Robert Huntley is a contributor for EE Times Europe.
Tags: Artificial Intelligence (AI), Embedded, ICs/Chips, MCU, Semiconductors
I agree, that is was Sean said. There were a number of us dissecting what he said afterwards. Whether it meant growth percentages or dollar figure amount but you are correct, he never mentioned break even.The wording Sean used at the time, was maybe a little ambiguous, but at no time (in the statement I think people are referring to) did he mention "break even".
My recollection (and it was the same discussion when he spoke of building to 100 employees) was that he said something along the lines of "expecting" revenue growth, to match the increase in costs, of building out the appropriate employee base.
So basically, that expenditures would remain status quo, or about the same.
Not aimed at you directly GDJR69, but it's getting a bit tiring, hearing people say that Sean "promised" this, or Sean "promised" that..
Things have not gone, as anyone has "expected" here..
But we are still moving forward!
Anyway, just my $10 (inflation adjusted)..
2 bob in my day ...The wording Sean used at the time, was maybe a little ambiguous, but at no time (in the statement I think people are referring to) did he mention "break even".
My recollection (and it was the same discussion when he spoke of building to 100 employees) was that he said something along the lines of "expecting" revenue growth, to match the increase in costs, of building out the appropriate employee base.
So basically, that expenditures would remain status quo, or about the same.
Not aimed at you directly GDJR69, but it's getting a bit tiring, hearing people say that Sean "promised" this, or Sean "promised" that..
Things have not gone, as anyone has "expected" here..
But we are still moving forward!
Anyway, just my $10 (inflation adjusted)..
“THERE’S BEEN A MOVE TO CREATE MORE FLEXIBILITY.
Even I could recall something on those lines. But a million dollar question here is if the same does not happen then what is the next best alternative. There is no doubt Sean is doing good work. Sometimes it takes time for sales to be materialized.Great post @McHale . I think you are right re Sean talking about staff numbers being around 100 and breakeven in staff/business cost by end of 2022, was said in Q&A as I recall.
Hi Ttm,Getting flexible
As automotive compute shifts from hardware to software, demand is growing for infotainment and cockpit features. According to Arm, more than 90% of in-vehicle infotainment (IVI) systems use the company’s chip designs. The architectures are also found in various under-the-hood applications, including meter clusters, e-mirrors, and heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) control.
Munich-based Apostera is using Arm’s designs to transform car windshields into mixed-reality screens.![]()
The shift to the software-defined vehicle has also stimulated another IT feature: updates. Historically, vehicle software was not only rudimentary, but also fairly static. Today, that’s no longer the case.
“There’s an opportunity to continue to add to the functionality of the vehicle over its lifetime,” says Laudick.
An expanding range of features, from sensor algorithms to user interfaces, can now be enhanced over-the-air (OTA). As cars begin to resemble personal devices, consumers can expect a comparable update service. As Simon Humphries, the chief branding officer of Toyota, put it: “People want control over their own experiences.”
Laudick likens modern cars to platforms, upon which software and functionality can evolve.That’s an obvious magnet for Arm, whose products and processes are fundamentally about running software.
Carmakers are also becoming savvier about software. For example, General Motors’ self-driving unit, Cruise, is now developing its own computer chips for autonomous vehicles. The company has previously used Arm designs, but is now exploring an open-source architecture known as RISC-V — which is becoming a popular alternative. The instruction set’s low costs and flexibility have created a threat to Arm’s automotive ambitions.
“One executive I was talking to said: ‘The best negotiating strategy when Arm comes in is to have a RISC-V brochure sitting on my desk’,” Jim Feldhan, the president of semiconductor consultancy Semico Research, said last year. “It’s a threat. Arm is just not going to have its super dominant position in five or 20 years.”
Currently, however, RISC-V could be regarded as riskier than Arm’s established standards. In a further challenge to RISC-V, Arm is gradually becoming more open. The Cortex-M processor series, for instance, now allows clients to add their own instructions, while extra configurability has been added to Arm software and tooling.
“We obviously try to control the products reasonably well, otherwise we just end up with a wild west. But there’s been a move in the company in the last several years to create more flexibility in certain areas,” says Laudick.
Mobileye, a self-driving unit of Intel that went public at $16.7 billion last year, is among a growing list of companies applying RISC-V architecture to vehicles. Credit: Mobileye![]()
RISC-V is far from Arm’s only challenger. Established rivals such as Intel and Synopsys are also fighting for a chunk of the expanding market for automotive chips.
Nonetheless, Laudick is bullish about the future. He notes that today’s cars run about 100 million lines of software code, while a Boeing 787 is estimated to have “only” 14 million. By 2030, McKinsey predicts that vehicles will expand to roughly 300 million lines of code.
“I see the vehicle being, without doubt, the most complex software device you will own — if not that will exist,” says Laudick.
![]()
Markus Schäfer
Our specialists have achieved a breakthrough in integrating AI!
They have tested it on our drive controllers – and it worked! Believe me – in the development context, that’s a huge step.
It means that, for complex applications, we will start using self-learning processes from the disciplines of deep learning and deep reinforcement learning. Building on these machine-learning processes, our specialists have developed an automated workflow.
This enables them to implement artificial neural networks (ANN) in series-production processors. Now patented, this workflow opens up all sorts of possible applications in a wide range of areas, including powertrain.
Back in 2019, we defined a set of clear principles for how we work with AI to provide us with an operational framework. The four guiding notions under which we develop and use AI are: “responsible use”, “ease of explanation”, “privacy protection” and “safety and reliability”.
I am very excited by this progress and at the same time acutely aware of our responsibilities as leaders in our field. By pushing innovation while at the same time adhering to our principles, I believe we can help unleash the true benefits of AI in a sustainable way.
View attachment 35491
Maybe Dio, could examine these.Was just about to post this, amazing news that points to some good things.
Is anyone able to find the patent mentioned?
I always thought the NASA SBIR was a bit bogus, calling for the removal of the Cortex processor from Akida 1 on the basis of SWaP.
The size would be less than a quarter of a fingernail, weight likewise.
For power there would be negligible difference.
The only real difference would be in the Cortex licence fee.