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作者：游客 在 海归商务 发贴, 来自【海归网】 http://www.haiguinet.com
10 Tech Trends
Editors' pick of 10 technology developments sure to affect your strategic sourcing decisions.
October 9, 2003
Make sure you are not locking your company into technology that will be obsolete in the not-to-distant future. First step: check the next few pages for what we think will be the hottest technologies that will affect purchasing. They range from changes in materials structures--such as nano-sizing--to all new energy concepts, such as fuel cells. Miniaturization is certainly a common theme, particularly in the electronics area. Another important trend is in communications. Wireless high-speed data will dramatically change how we communicate, creating implications for shipment and inventory tracking.
Fuel cells grow micro
Long before you rev up your first fuel cell powered car you're going to see the devices popping up in things like notebook computers, cell phones, personal digital assistants, and other portable consumer electronic devices. Sooner than that, you're likely to see fuel cells showing up in such industrial applications as barcode scanners, handheld data collection devices, and the like. Advances in micro fuel cell technology are also going to speed the rate at which Wifi—another technology featured in this report—becomes ubiquitous because they'll provide portable devices with more power, more conveniently than batteries, allowing for longer operating times and/or greater device functionality.
'Micro fuel cells make the wireless revolution truly wireless,' says Bill Acker, CEO of MTI Micro Fuel Cells, Albany, N.Y., a developer of direct methanol fuel cells (DMFCs) for portable electronics and military devices. 'With fuel cell-powered devices, you'll no longer be tethered to the wall because you'll never need to charge a battery.'
Instead, you'll simply replace the device's fuel cartridge. In the case of a DMFC-powered device, that cartridge will contain methanol, which, according to MTI Micro, offers potential for energy density that is 5-10 times that of advanced batteries. 'One of our scientists calculated that the average cell-phone user will consume only a gallon of methanol over a period of ten years,' Acker says. —Anne Millen Porter
Watch wireless grow
Third generation (3G) wireless technology has the potential to be the next big driver of the electronics industry if it can live up to its hype. Third generation wireless technology is designed for both voice and data and will work with a variety of interfaces including Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS), Enhanced Data for GSM Evolution (EDGE), Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) and Wireless CDMA (WCDMA). Analysts say 3G can deliver transmission rates of up to 384 kilobits per second (Kb/sec.), compared to 58 Kb for dial-up Internet service. Such a transition rate will result in more advanced services being available including streaming video.
The problem is the 3G rollout is slow. Japan England and Italy have 3G wireless networks. Verizon Wireless offers 3G services at about twice the cost of its regular cell phone service, but its transmission rates are only 40-60 Kb/sec. AT&T Wireless hopes to serve four major cities with 3G by 2004 and T-Mobile recently delayed its 3G rollout. Many wireless carriers are upgrading to 2.5G technology.
The reason for the slow rollout is multiple standards. The conflicting standards have been difficult for carriers to integrate, much less upgrade for high-speed data. Both Cingular and AT&T are working to convert their networks to the European UMTS standard.
A wireless technology gaining traction is wireless fidelity (WiFi).
A WiFi enabled laptop uses so-called 'hotspots' to connect laptops and personal digital assistants (PDAs) through a 2.5 MHz radio frequency signal to a wireless access point (AP). The AP is connected to a wired network. A growing number of spots are public in parks or even on city streets, but many are located in coffee shops, hotels and airports. Those businesses contract with a wireless Internet service provider (WISP) who provide the access point for customers.
The chief advantage of WiFi is it is wireless so a computer user is not tethered to a phone line or cable. However, WiFi is also fast. WiFi speeds can be as a high as 11 megabits per second but can drop down to as low as one MB/ if signal strength is weak or there is interference. —Jim Carbone
Nano will go big time
You've been hearing about 'nano', or very tiny, materials for at least seven years. Now it's time to watch their impact on products you buy. The Freedonia research group predicts the U.S. market for nanomaterials will exceed $1 billion in 2007, up from a minuscule $125 million in 2000. Look for a niche application that spans broad market segments. These include high-density data storage media for the electronics industry, medical diagnostic tools, transparent sunscreens, improved paper and ink, and cost-cutting coatings. At the National Plastics exposition last summer, PolyOne Corp. introduced Nanoblend Concentrates, a new family of materials that are said to boost fire-resistance in applications that also demand reduced weight and better stiffness. Behind the technology is Illinois-based Nanocor, which has developed technology using tiny clay particles. The illustration shows an entirely new structure that is inherently nanosized. Nanoscale technology enables component design and fabrication on atomic and molecular scales. A nanometer is 1/1,000,000,000 of a meter, which is around 1/50,000 of the diameter of a human hair or the space occupied by 3-4 atoms situated end-to-end. The trend toward miniaturization, improving dimensional tolerances and controlling surface qualities dovetails with the nano developments. Structure widths of 0.25 microns are now widespread in the newest microelectronic devices. Example: Microelectronic and integrated devices contain functional films only a few atom layers in thickness.—Doug Smock
Magnesium sheet gets cheaper
Magnesium is attractive for its high strength, light weight and recyclability, and the race has been on for years to develop new low-cost technologies that would make flat-rolled magnesium manufacturing friendly and economical. The answer may have been found, at Australia's largest scientific research agency, where Daniel Liang leads a team that has developed the world's first production-ready low-cost magnesium sheet. Planners of advanced materials in the automotive and telecommunications components industries long have noted the potential of magnesium sheet as a lightweight, stiff, high-strength and machinable alternative to aluminum and steel. —Tom Stundza
Get ready for Bluetooth
One of the annoyances of the electronics age is the tangle of wires needed to hook up computers to printers, keyboards and monitors and other peripherals Bluetooth technology has the potential to do away with that collection of connecting cables by using a short-range radio signal.
Bluetooth is a radio frequency standard developed by about 1,000 companies of the Bluetooth Special Interest Group. While Bluetooth has been touted for several years it is just starting to gain in popularity. It is likely to become standard in millions of mobile phones, PCs, laptops, peripherals, cell phones and other electronics devices.
Hardware OEMs including Intel, Toshiba and Ericsson among others developed a specification for a very small radio module embedded into computer, peripherals, mobile phones and entertainment equipment. The module allows the equipment to be connected to each other without wires or cables.
The module uses a uses a short-range radio signal link on 2.45 GHz frequency to make the connection. Two Bluetooth equipped devices simply have to come within 30 feet of each other. Because it uses an RF signal, a line of sight is not required. A user could have a computer in one room and a printer in another and print out a document sans wires.
Bluetooth enabled equipment is expected to rise from 6.6 million units in 2001 to 473 million units in 2006, a 135% compound annual growth rate, says market researcher In-Stat MDR.
Notebook computers will be one of the biggest users of Bluetooth technology. In 2002 about 7% of all notebook computers shipped used Bluetooth. By 2006 nearly 70% of all notebooks will be equipped with Bluetooth technology.
That growth will be good news for Bluetooth chipset manufacturers. Bluetooth chipsets for equipment will rise from 10.4 billion units in 2001 to 510 million units in 2006.
It's not just computers that will use the technology. The automotive market is likely to be a big user of Bluetooth. Some high-end 2003 car models were equipped with the technology. Bluetooth will have multiple uses in vehicles.
The biggest one will be wireless hands-free usage of a mobile phone in the car. A Bluetooth-enabled speaker integrated into a vehicle's dashboard with a mobile phone that rests in a car cradle will provide that functionality.
Other potential uses for Bluetooth in vehicles include rear seat entertainment devices such as headphones and video game controllers, vehicle diagnostic tools such as tire pressure monitoring and collision avoidance systems. —Jim Carbone
Shrinking die sizes
Miniaturization in electronics is not new, but continues to be a driving trend in the industry. With each new generation of semiconductor process technology, the size of chips gets smaller, cost is reduced and OEMs can cram more functionality in their equipment.
Chip manufacturers are able to reduce chip feature sizes because of improvements in photolithography techniques. IC manufacturers use optical lithography with ultraviolet (UV) light sources to print features on chips with geometries as small as 90 nanometers (nm) to etch circuits on silicon. Manufacturers have been able to reduce the light sources' wavelength to gain better resolution that enables the printing of smaller features, according to chip industry researcher IC Insights.
In 2003, major semiconductor manufacturers such as Intel, Infineon, Samsung and IBM began making semiconductors using 90 nm process technology. It marks the beginning of a new generation of semiconductor process technology that will help guarantee that Moore's Law continues to hold true. Moore's law states that every 18 months the functionality of a semiconductor doubles at the same cost.
By reducing the width of the circuits on a die, chipmakers can put more functionality per chip, get more chips per wafer and increase the speed of the chip. Small process geometries also reduce the size of chips. Chip size is reduced by about 30% for each new process technology.
In 2003 only a small portion of chips will be built on 90nm technology. Most chips will be built on 0.13-, 0.18- and 0.25-micron process technologies. Ninety nanometer will ramp up in 2004 and 2005. Leading edge logic parts such as microprocessors, system on chip devices and digital signal processors will be the first chips built on 90nm.
However, the chief benefit to the entire electronics supply chain from component manufacturers to end user is reduced cost.
'The size of the IC is shrunk because the size of the transistors is reduced,' says Trevor Yancey, an analyst with IC Insights. That gives you a more cost effective way of manufacturing. You spread the manufacturing cost over a large number of devices,' he says. —Jim Carbone
Tuning in to RFID
When it comes to inventory tracking and materials management, radio frequency identification (RFID) technology is going to turn some heads in the next few years. The technology is already in place in various models (if you've driven through a fast lane at a toll booth— that's RFID in action), but its impact on the supply chain is causing some waves as applications and cost models are developed.
The concept for RFID is simple: attach tiny microchips with antennas or 'tags' to products or components that are read when they go through readers throughout the supply chain and transmit information about the shipment's contents. Component manufacturers will place tags on shipments, so buyers will be able to track the components along their way to the plant. The increased visibility on the inbound side can help buyers minimize inventory levels and improve demand forecasts.
Once in the manufacturing plant, major components (such as an automotive chassis) can be tagged and tracked throughout various stages in the production process. Once the product is completed and shipped out for sale, remaining RFID tags can be used to track time from manufacturer to retailer to customer, providing a wealth of point-of-sale data.
'Anyone who uses barcodes now should be looking into RFID,' says Rich Hardt, vice president technology services at Yellow Technologies, a subsidiary of trucking giant Yellow Corp. of Overland Park, Kans.
RFID technology is nothing new. In fact, it was even used in World War II to identify ally and enemy aircraft through RF waves. But lower cost tags and readers are combining to make the technology a bright spot on the supply chain horizon. Market research firm Allied Business Intelligence of Oyster Bay, N.Y. expects the RFID market to grow to $3.1 billion by 2008 and asset and supply chain management application revenue will grow from 20-48% of this projected market. ABI stated recently in a report that the automotive industry alone will spend $600 million on RFID technology in 2003 and today accounts for 46% of the total RFID market.
'It's a one-tag-fits-all solution, enabling the OEM to track shipments and work-in-process,' says Edward A. Rerisi, ABI's director of research. 'The same benefits that this technology can bring to retail supply chains are being realized—and proven—in the automotive supply chain. The time to build business cases, deploy trials, and firmly grasp the intricacies of the RFID marketplace is now. With over three billion tag shipments expected by 2008, and with retailers and manufacturers already seeing positive returns on investment, RFID will only gain more and more acceptance.'
The retail industry is the first to adopt RFID technology broadly, but not without controversy. U.S. consumer giant Wal-Mart put its weight behind the technology (just as it did with bar code technology), issuing deadlines for top suppliers to be RFID-ready. But privacy advocacy groups have objected to the tracking ability of RFID technology at the point of sale and targeted Wal-Mart, saying RFID tags in products that continued to transmit at the point sale of could constitute an invasion of privacy. The debate was elevated to a firestorm when health and beauty OEM Gillette (Boston) and Wal-Mart unveiled a plan that would use RFID tags to trigger a camera to take a photo of any consumer that lifted a package of razors from the shelf. The pilot for this project was put on hold when word got out about it and consumer advocacy groups called for a boycott of Gillette and Wal-Mart.
As with any new technology, another major sticking point is cost. In this case, the question is 'who pays for what?' Retailers and OEMs will benefit the most from RFID in tracking shipments both inbound and on the sales side, but component makers and suppliers are the ones most likely to pay for the tags, which must be installed at the point of production or packaging. The Wal-Mart example shows the catch-22 with the technology. The retail giant wants its suppliers to pay for and comply with a technology that will help it gain point-of-sale and inbound shipment tracking information.
'The responsibility for tagging the items will be with the manufacturer of the goods to be tagged,' says Hardt. 'The right information will be put on the shipment or product when it is created or some time during the packaging process. So for retail, [RFID tags will be implanted] during packaging, but for supplies coming into a manufacturing plant it will have to be done during manufacture of the part [because there is less packaging]. And everyone in the supply chain will have to install the reader systems and put in the infrastructure to manage the information.'
One British food retailer solved the cost problem putting the RFID tags in 3.5 million reusable trays to ship items and track them through their supply chain. The reusable trays minimize the cost-per use of RFID, but in retail, the tags will only be used once and cost-per-use will be much higher. —David Hannon
Computers, consumer equipment unite
A key trend to watch is the convergence of computers and home entertainment equipment. An example of this convergence is newly emerging devices called home media centers, media gateways or digital libraries.
The home media server is a box that stores video and audio files and acts as a conduit. It transmits the files throughout the home to displays throughout through an Ethernet or wireless network. Some analysts say they are more computer than consumer electronics devices. Some computer companies are marketing their computers as media centers for the home.
'They are very rich in semiconductors, but I wouldn't even count them as consumer products. They are a computing product,' says Paul O'Donovan, an analyst with market researcher Gartner. 'If you have a PC and it is running XP home or something like that, you can do pretty much do what you can do with a media server,' he says.
There are differences, A media server has a TV tuner card which a PC doesn't have. The devices are in their infancy and no one is sure what form they will take, computer or consumer electronics device.
Some analysts say the devices will catch on because of the proliferation of digital media content including still pictures, movies and CDs. All that content could be stored on a media server and then viewed or listened to on connected devices throughout the home.
HP and Gateway are touting many of their PCs as media content centers allowing a user to view digital still pictures movies and listen to audio in one room. However, that will change when the new version of Windows is released. The new operating system will have the capability to connect non-PC devices to computers.
Consumer electronics manufacturers such as Pioneer and Sony are developing similar home media centers than can move digital content to different devices such as televisions and CD players. Analysts say one reason Microsoft got into the video game business with its X-Box console was to develop the platform to offer more than just video games. It has software that allows a user to move audio files from a PC to the X-Box. Users can play music from the files and use the X-Box as a karaoke machine, and even and mix audio and video files. The future version of X-Box will let users move music files to other devices. —Jim Carbone
Mobile high-speed data is here now
As lightweight laptop personal computers shrink more and more, and personal digital assistants gain greater functionality, the two are slowly merging. So also, as more people carry both pocket computers and cellular telephones, manufacturers have begun to combine the two-either into 'smart phones' or wireless personal data assistants. At present, the mobile computing PDAs have the edge since these wireless data assistants constantly are changing with newer innovations. In fact, the developments in communications technology making wireless connection to the Internet possible have triggered resurgence in PDA popularity because of their e-mail and Web browser capabilities. 'Basically, the convergence of previously separate technologies has allowed the convergence of PDAs and mobile phones into a kind of 'wireless PDA' technology,' says Michael Mace, chief competitive officer at Palm Inc. in Milpitas, Calif.
Case in point: Palm's next-generation operating system, the Palm OS 6.0, is due out in early 2004 and is designed to expand current technology for wireless data transfer by a handheld personal computer. The firm's Mace says: 'OS 6 is the evolutionary path to the future with enhanced management of wireless connections, richer security, and more flexible input methods.' Earlier this year, the company began selling Tungsten 'C,' the first Palm to run on an Intel400MHz XScale processor and the software to view and edit Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint compatible documents.
Similar advanced wireless handhelds are expected soon from Handspring, BlackBerry, Psion, Linux and such other PDA suppliers as Compaq, Toshiba, NEC and Sony. Basically, these handhelds are moving toward the vision of people like Gene Roddenberry and Larry Tesler. In the early 1960s, Roddenberry, the late creator of the Star Trek entertainment franchise, ordered that no paper or pencils would appear anywhere on the sets of Starship Enterprise. Crewmembers were to use handheld Tricorders and Communicators to collect data and transmit messages. A decade later, researchers lead by Tesler at Xerox PARC, a research center in Palo Alto, Calif., ( which became Palo Alto Research Center Inc. in 2002) began to design a 'Dynabook' concept: a highly mobile, notebook-sized computer with artificial intelligence capabilities. Tesler later became chief scientist at Apple Computer and continued research into what would become Apple's Newton MessagePad.
But, it wasn't until 1992 that 'personal digital assistants' entered the marketplace, and PDA entered the lexicon. By 1993, there were numerous first-generation PDAs—Amstrad's PenPad, Casio's Zoomer, Apple's Newton MessagePad, Sharp's ExpertPad, IBM's Simon, and Motorola's Envoy.
Palm Inc., currently the world leader in handheld computers, didn't enter the scene until 1995 with the first two Palm Pilot models. Four years later, the first PDA with wireless access to the Internet, the Palm VII, was released. A PDA is effectively a handheld personal computer, capable of handling all the normal tasks of its leather-bound Filofax ancestor— to-do list address book, notepad, appointments diary and scheduler, and phone list. However, most PDAs offer many more applications besides, such as spreadsheet, word processor, database manager, data synchronization system, financial management software, clock, calculator and games.
In 2000, mobile phone producers began incorporating Palm's operating system into cellular telephones—paving the way for today's 'smart phones,' which integrate PDA features, wireless Internet access, and PC synchronization capabilities. And, to stay competitive with next-generation handheld PDA devices, mobile cell phone manufacturers are funneling millions of dollars into extending phones' data and application functionality. The problem with most of the new 'smart phones'—which combine the features of a PDA, an e-mail terminal, and a phone—is that they are pretty large, and often don't look much like phones. In order to properly display PDA functions, the screens have to be relatively roomy, and heavy e-mail use demands the inclusion of a small keyboard. But lots of people resist the idea of a big phone, or one that looks like a PDA. So, phone makers are striving to shrink the combo models, while keeping most of their extra functionality. —Tom Stundza
Optimization for sourcing
You're a category leader for a multidivisional global corporation. You're working on a corporate wide strategic sourcing contract for printed wiring board assemblies. The contract comprises hundreds of part numbers. It's risky business. You're facing serious internal political battles over things like standardization and outsourcing. Millions of dollars are at stake. So what's the right level of standardization? What's the optimum number of suppliers? How do you allocate business among that optimum number of suppliers? Naturally, you want to look at suppliers' quoted prices, leadtimes, and past on-time delivery, quality and customer service performance, but you also want to factor in their technology roadmaps, delivery capabilities, capacity constraints, customer dependency ratios and other risks. You want to apply accurate logistics-cost factors to account for different supplier locations. You want to estimate suppliers' probabilities of encountering external supply disruptions and currency exchange rate fluctuations. You need to answer questions like: What happens to the cost if our demand goes X% higher or lower than forecast? What if we need something Y% faster? What are the cost benefits of making this or that change to our specifications?
You could build an optimization model using a spreadsheet—permitting, of course, that you are really, really good at math, you have an unlimited number of hours in which to produce a solution, and your suppliers are exceptionally patient and willing to engage in a costly, multi-iterative information-exchange and negotiation process. Your alternative is to join the vanguard of corporate sourcing leaders deploying highly configurable decision-support solutions that combine applied mathematics with massive computing power to solve complex sourcing problems over large sets of interdependent variables.
An example of this is Sourcing Portfolio by Burlington, Mass.-based Emptoris. The solution pairs what-if modeling and optimization capabilities with market discovery—e-auction or e-RFQ-type—functionality. Like other market-discovery models, Sourcing Portfolio allows buyers to compare suppliers based on price plus nonprice factors such as past supplier performance, quoted delivery leadtimes, logistics and other costs. But instead of locking down nonprice specifications, as in classic reverse electronic auctions, the solution also permits suppliers the flexibility of providing their best, most creative bids on all or parts of a contract on offer. This, according to Kevin Potts, director of product marketing for Emptoris, preserves the suppliers' ability to introduce cost savings options that the spec-writing team might never dream up—without compromising the buyer's ability to compare bids in a meaningful way.
On top of that, the application allows buyers to build specific business rules into a bid, such as 'allocate business among a maximum of four suppliers', and/or 'no supplier can receive more than X% of the business', and/or 'the business can not represent more than Y% of any one suppliers' total capacity', and/or 'the business allocated can not exceed the supplier's total current capacity.'
Beyond that, the software permits buyers to rapidly investigate different scenarios by tweaking requirements (say, a slightly longer delivery date or less rigorous quality specification) or different award constraints (say, three instead of four suppliers). Optimization technology for sourcing can yield answers that aren't always intuitive, according to Potts. 'For example, one of our clients found that, for an additional $25,000, they could place $2.8 million worth of business with two suppliers instead of six as they had originally planned, which would be less expensive in the long run,' he says. 'The surprise was that the two suppliers were entirely different from the suppliers who would have won the business under a six-supplier scenario. Without the optimization analysis, the client would never have seen this possibility. They would have been negotiating with the wrong suppliers entirely.'
Xporta Global Sourcing Solutions, Santa Clara, Calif., is another example of a decision-support application for sourcing. Xporta's twist is to combine optimization mathematics with a vast database of up-to-date global trade intelligence—for example, 1.1 million duty rates, 80,000-plus dumping duties, 25,000-plus import license flags, information about import quota flags, physical latitude and longitude for 1.7 million locations, freight cost modeling, etc.—to assist companies in understanding the true cost impacts and best configurations for manufacturing outside of the U.S., sourcing and moving supplies across borders. Traditional analysis around global sourcing, according to Xporta CEO Dave Horne, has 'three garbage problems.' The first is that the mathematical formulas being used are often incomplete, crude, and/or inconsistent across the enterprise. 'They neglect to account for things like safety stock, tooling costs, setup times, leadtimes, etc.,' Horne says. The second problem is that source data is either inaccurate or out of date. The third problem is that information is not typically in a format that supports optimization. 'With optimization, you can look at a few hundred thousand alternatives and come up with the right answer in a matter of minutes,' Horne contends.
Xporta, for example, has models for 13 Incoterms built into its optimizer, which allows a company to pinpoint more options for lowering costs. Likewise, the optimizer allows users to consider different transit modes and different combinations of transit modes. 'They can look at air versus ocean and they can look mixing modes,' Horne says, 'say 80% by ocean/truck from China to Arkansas and 20% by air.'
For developers of optimization software for sourcing, the biggest challenges are in convincing sourcing managers to trust the underlying mathematics and in training populations of power users who can exploit optimization engines to their fullest analytic capacities. For sourcing professionals, the challenge is in data quality. After all, garbage in, garbage out.—Anne Millen Porter
Source: Purchasing
作者：游客 在 海归商务 发贴, 来自【海归网】 http://www.haiguinet.com
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 供 CEO们、stratergists、创业者、and to-bes 参考批判 - ZT -- 百丁 - (59218 Byte) 2003-11-20 周四, 06:04 (695 reads)
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