Chairman's Corner

I first joined the Board of Directors of the Industry Standards and Technology Organization (ISTO) in 2010 after bringing the Liberty Technical Advisory Board (LTAB) program from another organization, and starting Interconnect Modeling Technical Advisory Board (IMTAB) as a second program on behalf of Synopsys, my previous employer. While serving on the board, I served as secretary and on the finance committee. I was also involved in auditing the operations in 2014 and 2016. With all these experiences, I am really delighted to succeed Mr. Don Wright as the Chairman of the ISTO Board of Directors. It has been a great privilege to closely observe the operations of ISTO for the past seven years and see how several new programs have entered and flourished under the ISTO Federation.  

As I pick up the baton, I consider myself privileged and blessed to have the able guidance of Don Wright (most recent past Chairman), Marco Migliaro (President), Gerald Lane (previous Chairman), Myron Slota, as well as Tom Wettech (Legal Counsel). All of them will be continuing on the Board to provide the much-needed continuity in overseeing the wide range of consortia and alliances activities under ISTO Federation. We also elected three new directors – Dan Burnett, Brian Daly, and Menno Treffers. The breadth and depth of their experience in forming and managing consortia in diverse industry segments will strengthen ISTO in the services it offers. I am truly excited about having this team of industry stalwarts lead ISTO in years to come.

As your new chairman, and speaking for the entire board, we seek your input in keeping ISTO on the cutting edge of providing services that are most effective and productive for your consortia. Please make your suggestions through your ISTO Program Manager or feel free to reach out to me directly.

Yatin Trivedi

Chairman, IEEE Industry Standards and Technology Organization

IEEE Industry Standards and Technology Organization Announces New Chairman and Expanded Board for 2017

New Board Members Elected Bring Vast Expertise from Across the Technology Spectrum

The IEEE Industry Standards and Technology Organization (ISTO), an international federation of leading industry groups and consortia dedicated to the advancement of standardized technologies for the benefit of industry, recently announced its new chairman, Yatin Trivedi, and the 2017 ISTO Board of Directors.

Comprised of leaders from various fields of electro and emerging technologies including mobile, wireless charging, high-performance computing (HPC) and lighting industries, the ISTO Board of Directors oversees the financial operations of the organization, as well as the development of the ISTO Business Plan and other related strategic and operational activities. Directors also serve to promote the benefits of industry and government organizations partnering with ISTO.

Chairman Trivedi succeeds Forrest D. (Don) Wright, president, Standards Strategies, LLC. Don had served as chairman since 2011 and will remain a director on the ISTO Board.

Zhaga Books 14, 15 and 16 approved for use by Zhaga members

The latest specifications approved by the Zhaga Consortium cover linear, socketed light engines, rectangular LED modules for use with lenses, and circular LED light engines with on-board drivers.

The Zhaga Consortium, a global association of lighting companies that is standardizing components of LED luminaires, has finalized three new specifications that cover different types of LED modules and LED light engines (LLEs).

The specifications – designated Zhaga Book 14, Book 15 and Book 16 – define components including linear, flat, socketed LLEs; rectangular LED modules for use in combination with lens arrays; and planar, circular LLEs.

The full specifications are currently available to Zhaga members only. Details of all Zhaga Books can be found on the Zhaga website.

Synopsys Announces Expansion of Liberty Modeling Standard, Paving Way for Ultra Low-Power IC Design

Liberty Technology Advisory Board Approves New Liberty Variation Format Additions

Highlights:

• Statistical moment-based Liberty Variation Format (LVF) extensions added to Liberty library modeling standard
• Models non-Gaussian timing variation due to extreme low-voltage operating conditions
• Applications include mobile and IoT, where low energy consumption is critical 
• Synopsys EDA tool support available now

Synopsys, Inc. (Nasdaq: SNPS) today announced ratification of new statistical moment-based extensions to LVF by the Liberty™ Technical Advisory Board (LTAB), an IEEE Industry Standards and Technology Organization federation member program. The new extensions provide a more precise static timing model based on non-Gaussian variation observed in designs operating at near sub-threshold voltage conditions. Applications include mobile and IoT IC designs, where low energy consumption is a dominant requirement. Synopsys' Galaxy™ design platform support for these new extensions is available today with PrimeTime® signoff static timing analysis (STA), SiliconSmart® library characterization and Library Compiler™ library checking solutions. Synopsys IC Compiler™ II physical implementation tool will also provide support in its upcoming release.

OpenCAPI Consortium Continues Momentum in 2017

It has been less than six months since the announcement of the Open Coherent Accelerator Processor Interface (OpenCAPI) Consortium. We are proud to say that progress has been constant, even before the October announcement last year. Membership continues to grow in the consortium since the five founding companies. There are now twenty-two members and includes the following Board Level members: AMD, Google, IBM, Mellanox Technologies, Micron, NVIDIA, Western Digital, and Xilinx.

Not only has membership grown, but also active participation in the development of OpenCAPI based products for 2017. Two examples of publicly announced products include IBM’s POWER9 Microprocessor at Hot Chips 2016 (OpenCAPI code named ‘New CAPI’) and the server (codenamed Zaius) which was recently exhibited by Google and Rackspace at this year’s Open Compute Project Summit. The message has been consistent. OpenCAPI product development is not only enabled, but products using OpenCAPI technology will start appearing this year along with additional demonstrations and announcements.

MIPI Alliance Releases MIPI I3C Sensor Interface Specification

MIPI I3C Solves Engineering Community’s Pressing Need for a New Chip-to-Chip Interface that Integrates Sensors in Smartphone, IoT, Automotive and Other Product Designs

The MIPI®Alliance, an international organization that develops interface specifications for mobile and mobile-influenced industries, recently released MIPI I3CSM, Improved Inter-Integrated Circuit, a sensor interface specification that streamlines sensor integration in smartphones, wearables, Internet of Things (IoT) devices and automotive systems.

“Today’s release of MIPI I3C is an important milestone for MIPI Alliance and the developer community because it brings together multiple sensor interface approaches around a unifying specification that provides conveniences and system-level benefits for many applications,” said Joel Huloux, chairman of the board of MIPI Alliance. “We expect MIPI I3C will play a fundamental role in expanding opportunities for sensor-based applications in mobile, mobile-influenced and embedded systems markets.”

Smart Street Lighting Products Getting Ready for Global Standard

The TALQ Consortium, developers of the global standard interface for smart outdoor lighting networks, have just released the formal beta version of the entire TALQ Test Suite for its members. With this test tool companies can now start testing their smart lighting solutions for multi-vendor interoperability. The Test Suite will allow first products to be TALQ certified later this year – ensuring interoperability without the expense and delay of plugfests. Furthermore the tool enables the Consortium to work on extending the TALQ Standard to other smart city applications.

Cities and municipalities, when planning long-term investments like street lighting, always try to choose future-proof and interoperable solutions that will not constrain their future
investment decisions. That is why, in 2012, the TALQ Consortium was founded to develop a global interface standard to connect and manage heterogeneous street lighting networks from many different hardware and software vendors. The TALQ Specification focuses on the so-called ‘application layer’ of the interface protocol, allowing maximum freedom for outdoor lighting manufacturers to develop optimized solutions within an interoperable framework. The TALQ Interface is built on standard internet protocols and security standards, such as XML/HTTP and Transport Layer Security, and is independent of connectivity technology.

Takeaways of CES 2017

by Menno Treffers

“What’s new?” That’s what people usually asked when they visited the WPC booth at CES 2017 in Las Vegas a couple weeks back.

Before I share how I responded to that question, let me share an observation about the show’s visitors. The atmosphere was quite different this year. We didn’t have to explain what wireless charging or Qi is about. Admittedly, some struggle with the pronunciation of “Qi” but that will come with time. Almost every visitor already knew enough to get straight to the point.

A surprising number of visitors wanted to talk about their own product plans. They wanted to know more about integrating Qi chargers in larger products such as alarm clocks and furniture. They wanted to know about sourcing modules, and about the procedure for Qi certification. These are questions you typically hear in a mature market.

PWG Candidate Standard 5100.1-2017: IPP Finishings v2.1 (FIN) has been approved. This specification defines new “finishings” and “finishings-col” Job Template attribute values to specify additional finishing intent, including the placement of finishings with respect to the corners and edges of portrait and landscape documents, expanding on the definitions from Finishings 2.0 (5100.1-2015).

On 23 February 2017, ISTO held its annual member meeting at the Hutchinson Island Marriott Beach Resort and Marina, Stuart, FL. Delegates from each ISTO federation member alliance came together to share strategies, demonstrate accomplishments, identify possible synergies and build relationships. Member Program presentations were offered a valuable opportunity for participants to learn from their fellow industry leaders' experiences.

A special thanks to the following Member Program Delegates:

• Ruud van Bokhorst, Secretary General, Fairhair Alliance   
• Peter Lefkin, Managing Director, MIPI
• Myron Slota, President, OpenCAPI
• Ruud van Bokhorst, Interim General Manager, DiiA
• Dan Burnett, Founder, VoiceXML
• Menno Treffers, Chair, Wireless Power Consortium

Recent ISTO Program News

Fairhair Alliance

• 27 February 2017 - Fairhair welcomes Trilux-ITZ and Runtime as new members
• 11 January 2017 - TCLA ends activities, but work continues in Fairhair and elsewhere

MIPI Alliance

• 18 January 2017 - MIPI Alliance Introduces MIPI Discovery and Configuration (DisCo) Base Architecture and Class Specifications

OpenCAPI Consortium

• 3 March 2017 - Video: OpenCAPI Founding Members

OpenPOWER Foundation

• 21 March 2017 - Clarkson University Joins OpenPOWER Foundation
• 28 February 2017 - Red Hat Joins the OpenPOWER Foundation, adds open source leadership and expertise to community-driven hardware innovation
• 23 January 2017 - OpenPOWER Academic Group Carries 2016 Momentum to New Year

Printer Working Group

• 24 February 2017 - WG February 2017 Face-to-Face Meeting Summary
• 16 March 2017 - PWG Approved: IPP 3D Printing Extensions v1.0 (3D)

TALQ Consortium 

• 23 February 2017 - Perfect Priming for Smart City Expansion

VoiceXML Forum

• 5 December 2016 - Interactive Media Announces VXML Certification

Wireless Power Consortium

• 11 February 2017 - Wireless Power Consortium Names Paul Golden as Vice President of Market Development
• 15 December 2016 - Consumers say wireless charging is the must-have feature for smartphones and cure for “battery anxiety”

Zhaga Consortium

• 16 March 2017 - COB holders included in new edition of Zhaga Book 12
• 15 March 2017 - Zhaga Book 17 approved for use by members
• 19 January 2017 - Zhaga takes part in Lighting Industry Association's Technical Forum

Upcoming ISTO Program Events

Fairhair Alliance

• 26-28 April 2017 - CABA Intelligent Buildings & Digital Home Forum

MIPI Alliance

• 11 April 2017 - MIPI Webinar - MIPI CSI-2 v2.0 Imaging Features and Capabilities
• 26-27 April 2017 - MIPI at IoT Developers Conference
• 15-17 May 2017 - 5G North America
• 12-16 June 2017 - MIPI Member Meeting North America

OpenPOWER Foundation

• 5-6 April 2017 - DataWorks Summit 2017
• 2-4 May 2017 - Red Hat Summit
• 16-18 May 2017 - SAP Sapphire
• 18-22 June 2017 - ISC High Performance 2017

Printer Working Group

• 25-27 April 2017 - April 2017 Face-to-Face Meeting

About ISTO

ISTO is the premier trusted partner of the global technology community for the development, adoption, and certification of industry standards and emerging technologies. Its mission is to facilitate the life cycle of industry standards development through a dedicated staff committed to neutrality, quality support and member satisfaction.

Fostering the market acceptance, adoption and implementation of standardized technologies, programs of ISTO Federation span the spectrum of today’s information and communications technologies. ISTO is the recipient of the 2010 Tenzing Norgay Interoperability Achievement Award, which recognizes success in driving market acceptance, adoption and implementation of standardized technologies. For more information, visit the ISTO website.

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