Chip designer packs tool kit
HOW I DO IT
Tundra Semiconductor president Adam Chowaniec, shares the core
ideas that he uses to help his four-year-old
'systems on silicon' business continue to flourish.
Thursday, November 5, 1998
SHAUN MARKEY
Special to The Globe and Mail
Ottawa -- Adam Chowaniec, president of Tundra Semiconductor Corp., has a corporate tool kit designed to help his four-year-old
company continue to flourish.
Tundra, a Kanata, Ont.-based designer of silicon devices, is a "fabless semiconductor" company that doesn't make chips. Instead, it
concentrates on the "thinking side" -- design, development and customer support. The company's products -- called "systems on silicon"
-- are used primarily in telecommunications. Annual sales for the 100-person company recently topped $20-million.
Here are Mr. Chowaniec's tools, explained at a session sponsored by the Ottawa Centre for Research and Innovation:
No. 1: Concentrate on applications, not on fundamental technology. It is much more difficult and expensive for a company to
attempt to develop new, fundamental technology. And while a young company can't afford to ignore anything, an applications focus can
help it develop a next generation of a product.
No. 2: Don't wave your own banner. Let others wave it for you. If you're a small company, align with a larger one. Create
situations where your larger partner talks about your contribution to a project. When a bigger company talks about you, it makes your
firm seem all that much bigger.
No. 3: Know what your customers want before they do. Make it your business to know as much as possible about your customers
and strategic partners. If they are making internal management changes, for example, you should be among the first to know about it
because the changes may have an impact on your business.
Predicting what your key customers are going to do will help your revenue predictions. Visit their key technology locations at least three
times a year.
No. 4: Manage the company as a team and use cross-functional teams aligned by product mandate. Everything done in a
company should focus on building the strongest team possible. Build and use cross-functional teams and give them clear
decision-making responsibility. And don't change a team's decisions. Doing so can undermine the entire effort.
No. 5: Meet your delivery commitments. Be open and honest in your business communications. When there's a problem with
delivery, tell your customer right away. Customers usually wait for you if at all possible.
No. 6: Build excellence into your company's mission-critical operations. Excellence is a nice word but unless you can measure it,
you will never know when you have achieved it. Collecting data and constantly feeding back information about your business is at the
heart of building excellence.
No. 7: Be observant. Watch for shifts in applications as opposed to technology. Putting systems on a piece of silicon is a reality. That's
where the big changes are going to happen in the next five to 10 years.
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