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Jerry McGuire It Takes an Ecosystem
Decades in the making, ADI's DSPcosystem gives our customers (and in turn, our customers' customers) access to what Novum analyst Jessica Figueras calls, "new levels of collaboration, knowledge-sharing and partnership." "New levels of collaboration, knowledge-sharing and partnership..."In an example of how our DSPcosystem is broad and deep, as well as geographically widespread, ADI partner Mistral Software recently created a Bluetooth-based hands-free car kit (HFCK) based on the Analog Devices Blackfin Car Telematics Platform. Mistral, whose incredibly relevant tagline is "Partners in Real Time," describes itself as a "premier product-realization company." With state-of-the-art development centers in Bangalore and Hyderabad India, Mistral's 280+ engineers focus on real-time embedded hardware and software solutions. Mistral designed multiple variants of the HFCK development/reference platform, from a low-cost basic version to advanced hands-free versions. The scalability enabled by the use of Blackfin allowed the company to customize a range of OEM and after-market telematics solutions in a small form factor, at low cost, and with the shortest time-to-market. Not only was the HFCK project managed by one third party, Mistral in turn brought in a potpourri of other DSPcosystem companies to provide particular functionality including acoustic echo cancellation, noise reduction, the Bluetooth stack and various profiles, speech recognition, text-to-speech, audio/video codec, GSM AT, soft GPS, FM TMC, navigation and dead reckoning. For some of these application segments, multiple third parties were even supported. Analog Devices is working hard to continuously develop more complex and deeper relationships within its industry ecosystem. Companies like Mistral take ADI's raw DSP technology and help realize concrete market potential through concept development, feasibility studies, product design development, management of other third party vendors, testing, prototype release and documentation, certification support and production support. New technologies and the growing importance of intangible assets are constantly pushing ADI towards new levels of collaboration, outsourcing, joint ventures, alliances and consolidation. Come to the think of it, it's almost becoming hard to use the term "third parties" these days, since a well constructed ecosystem essentially defines a virtually contiguous entity that serves our customers seamlessly and more completely than ever before.
Jerry McGuire is a Vice President of Analog Devices' General Purpose DSP Group. His column appears here regularly. |
Corporate ecosystems are defined as collections of interdependent companies that together form a complete solution or industry. And successful 21st century companies are "connected corporations" whose customers can leverage a giant value chain of interdependent technologies and services. For ADI's customers, the world's growing DSPcosystem (say it out loud...) means greater access to a big world of product design and consultancy services that capitalize on ADI's DSP platforms.