-
- News
- Books
Featured Books
- smt007 Magazine
Latest Issues
Current IssueBox Build
One trend is to add box build and final assembly to your product offering. In this issue, we explore the opportunities and risks of adding system assembly to your service portfolio.
IPC APEX EXPO 2024 Pre-show
This month’s issue devotes its pages to a comprehensive preview of the IPC APEX EXPO 2024 event. Whether your role is technical or business, if you're new-to-the-industry or seasoned veteran, you'll find value throughout this program.
Boost Your Sales
Every part of your business can be evaluated as a process, including your sales funnel. Optimizing your selling process requires a coordinated effort between marketing and sales. In this issue, industry experts in marketing and sales offer their best advice on how to boost your sales efforts.
- Articles
- Columns
Search Console
- Links
- Events
||| MENU - smt007 Magazine
Seeing Clearly: XR Headsets and Flex’s Reference Design at AWE
June 26, 2018 | Dan Feinberg, Technology Editor, I-Connect007Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
At the recently concluded Augmented World Expo (AWE) in Santa Clara, California, Flex invited I-Connect007 to attend an event where they presented an update on their XR progress since the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in January in Las Vegas, Nevada. At this year’s CES, they announced the launch of an extended reality (XR) reference design for the next generation of XR headsets. As the “sketch-to-scale” solutions provider, as they describe themselves, that designs and builds “intelligent products for a connected world,” they have now introduced an augmented reality (AR or, as we now call it, XR) reference design to reduce time to market for companies wishing to make and market XR devices.
As we increase our coverage of megatrends, and because we consider XR to be one of the more interesting and growing industry segments, we were happy to attend AWE. In doing so, we gained significant insight into the development process used by Flex for this segment.
The Flex AR reference design is a complete, virtually market-ready product specification, including a head-mounted display (HMD), an external processing unit (EPU), and a gesture-based software interface to manage interaction between the virtual world and the hardware. A company wishing to enter the XR market can use the Flex AR reference design instead of developing their own AR hardware. Companies can make modifications and tweaks to the reference design, but by using what is now available from Flex, they would significantly reduce product development costs and quickly scale manufacturing. Basically, once they have decided to do so, they can quickly and economically enter the market with a quality system.
In addition, by using a reference design from a company such as Flex, companies can avoid the challenge of assembling a team of experts in hardware, design, optics, and thermal issues. While many companies may have such a team, others may not have enough experts to enable the design in a timely manner. In addition, many may not have the resources for their teams to design state-of-the-art human machine interfaces (HMIs) or head-up/head-mounted displays (HUDs or HMDs). This may be true for anyone wishing to enter or expand into a new market, but it may be especially true for a startup or skunkworks project at a larger company. If this is the case, it is probable that a reference design could give you a leg up in a rapidly advancing area of technology—what isn’t rapidly advancing these days—and make the difference between success or failure due to being a little late to market with a design slightly past its prime.
While this all makes sense, a company considering market entry or a next-generation product announcement has to ask about using a reference design as a foundation: “Is this platform significant enough to allow us to compete in the areas of performance, usability, and quality?” After listening to Flex and their key partners in this endeavor—Qualcomm, Atheer, and Lumus—and having a chance to see the product, ask questions, actually use the resultant reference hardware, and mentally compare it to others I have used in the last few months based on usability, comfort, response, and quality, my opinion is yes, Flex’s platform does allow for these things.
Now, let me describe the Flex reference design and the features and abilities available to companies entering or looking to expand into the XR megatrend as presented to us by Eric Braddom, VP of XR solutions for Flex, Amar Dhaliwal, senior VP of marketing and sales for Antheer, Sivan Iram, VP of business development for Lumus, and Patrick Costello, senior director of business development at Qualcomm.
The Flex XR reference platform incorporates cutting-edge technology from its partners, including the Snapdragon 835 mobile platform from Qualcomm, designed to deliver full-color, high-definition 1080p AR experiences. The Snapdragon 835 draws 25% less power than previous models by using an advanced 10-nanometer design. Atheer Inc., a leading provider of AR solutions, supplies the AR interaction module and enterprise software support. The design also incorporates new OE Vision optics from Lumus, which is a high-resolution (1920 X 1080), top-down configured transparent display incorporating the most desired specs for advanced immersive AR headsets. Some highlights of the display include true see-through optics in a compact form factor showing lifelike images in full daylight conditions.
Using a reference design may be the best solution for any company looking to deploy a complete AR solution with minimal development costs and an accelerated time to market. It seems to be an option that any company planning to enter the XR market should consider.
Page 1 of 2
Suggested Items
Real Time with… IPC APEX EXPO 2024: My Role as a Technology Solutions Director
05/02/2024 | Real Time with...IPC APEX EXPOPeter Tranitz, senior director of technology solutions at IPC, shares insights into his role as the design initiative lead. He details his advocacy work, industry support, and the responsibilities of the design initiative committee. The conversation also covers the revamping of standards, the IPC Design Competition, and the implementation of design rules in software tools.
Real Time with… IPC APEX EXPO 2024: Ventec Discusses New Pro-bond Family of Advanced Products
05/01/2024 | Real Time with...IPC APEX EXPOChris Hanson, Ventec's Global Head of IMS Technology, outlines the launch of four pro-bond formulas that deliver an outstanding combination of low dissipation factor (Df) with a dielectric constant (Dk) range to maximize the design window for critical PCB parameters. As Chris points out, Pro-bond is designed for low-loss, high-speed applications, while thermal-bond dissipates heat from a component through the board to a heat sink.
IPC's Vision for Empowering PCB Design Engineers
04/30/2024 | Robert Erickson, IPCAs architects of innovation, printed circuit board designers are tasked with translating increasingly complex concepts into tangible designs that power our modern world. IPC provides the necessary community, standards framework, and education to prepare these pioneers as they explore the boundaries of what’s possible, equipping engineers with the knowledge, skills, and resources required to thrive in an increasingly dynamic field.
On the Line With… Talks With Cadence Expert on SI/PI for PCB Designers
05/02/2024 | I-Connect007In “PCB 3.0: A New Design Methodology—SI/PI for PCB Designers,” subject matter expert Brad Griffin, Cadence Design Systems, discusses how an intelligent system design methodology can move some signal and power integrity decision-making into the physical design space, offering real-time feedback.
iNEMI Packaging Tech Topic Series: Role of EDA in Advanced Semiconductor Packaging
04/26/2024 | iNEMIAdvanced semiconductor packaging with heterogenous integration has made on-package integration of multiple chips a crucial part of finding alternatives to transistor scaling. Historically, EDA tools for front-end and back-end design have evolved separately; however, design complexity and the increased number of die-to-die or die-to-substrate interconnections has led to the need for EDA tools that can support integration of overall design planning, implementation, and system analysis in a single cockpit.