Embedded Systems Conference 1998
The ESC show was the largest in its history. All indications are that the market for embedded computer devices is entering an accelerating period of growth. Industry forecasts show embedded appliances surpassing PCs and all traditional computing over the next four years. Embedded software is projected to continue to grow 25 to 30 percent per year.
ISI announced pRISM 2.0 at the ESC. In general pRISM 2.0 is a more mature product that is more tightly integrates development tools and a new fast start programming editor. pRISM also adds a significant new ability to field upgrade embedded appliances across the network. In addition, pRISM 2.0 includes the new pSOSystem 2.5 which provides 10 to 25% increased performance, additional networking support, and increased POSIX support for UNIX based applications. pRISM 2.0 is expected to ship in January. It is currently in beta use by ISI's large telecom and consumer customers.
In particular the new pRISM Editor enables users to begin application development right out of the box. It is in addition to ISI's SNIFF programming editor which provides powerful tools for large development applications, but with a heavier initial learning curve. Users can still upgrade to SNIFF as they need to.
pRISM 2.0 also includes a new product from ISI's Diab, the RTA module for visual, interactive analysis of run-time code integrated with DIAB's compilers to optimize performance. ISI partners also announced availability of PERC for pSOSystem - a small embedded version of JAVA VM specifically suited for embedded applications. ISI has also previously announced they will be supporting HP's JAVA VM - Chai, as well as a Sun version of JAVA from NSI. Another ISI partner Rapid Logic announced availability of their software for the management of networked devices with standard WEB browsers. ISI's Epilogue embedding networking group also announced support for SNMP v3 for increased security managing networked embedded devices.
In addition to the main ISI booth, ISI subsidiaries also had separate booths for TakeFive (SNIFF programming editors) and Diab (C, C++, and Java compilers). ISI had space in Hitachi's booth for pSOSystem for Hitachi's SH processors and in the Microsoft booth for ISI's Design Center which provides complete embedded design services for Windows CE, pSOS and other applications.
ISI added 6 new salespeople and field application engineers to the west coast which should improve sales activity on the west coast, which has been the weak area of ISI sales.
The company position on a new CEO is that they remain on track for a new CEO by January 1 which I assume that means sometime in December. It would be nice to hear something by the Q3 conference call around the middle of December. ISI clearly has a rich treasure of technology but they need a strong leader to realize the untapped value in ISI. In the mean time, acting CEO and VP of Marketing Joe Addiego is focused on meeting company goals set for the current quarter.
Wind River introduced its Tornado 2.0 which is expected to ship in Q1 1999. It is expected to go into beta testing by the end of this quarter. Tornado 2.0 features Wind's new suite of embedded GUI development tools including JAVA, HTML, and C++ GUI development tools. Wind took an very aggressive "in-your-face" stance towards Microsoft Windows CE; a stance which was very popular among embedded engineers at the conference.
Microsoft had a very large booth as they did last year but appeared to actually have less traffic than last year. Many embedded engineers believe that CE simply to does not meet the needs of most embedded applications. John Fogelin, VP Technology and original developer of Tornado for Wind River, speaking on a panel discussion "Windows CE: Hype or Hope" in the San Jose Civic Auditorium reeled off a long list of shortcomings of CE including reliability, support, hard determinism, scalability, modularity, configurability, size, performance, and half a dozen others. Fogelin said he was surprised that Microsoft could "still be so far off the mark" meeting the needs of the embedded market. His comments were met by repeated applause and cheering from the large crowd of embedded engineers.
Wind is tapping into current animosity towards Microsoft which is gutsy but smart (at least in the short run) given their products are positioned directly against Windows CE. Over time CE will improve and their will be plenty of applications for CE in a rapidly growing market. Microsoft could also come up with yet another OS for the embedded market. The embedded market is still in its early stages and there will be plenty of opportunities for different market segments. |
