Archive for the ‘Perspective’ Category

Insights from the 2010 EMF Survey of Embedded Developers

Each year EMF conducts a thorough and detailed survey of embedded developers. Using the EMF Dashboard – a web based tool that permits vendors and developers to correlate information between any responses to any question, EMF presents selected insights from its analysis of the 2010 data. The Dashboard enables vendors to look at the responses of their customers (and potential customers) as well as to their competitor’s customers. This provides invaluable insights for strategic and sales planning. Developers can see what their fellow developers are considering in their selection criteria

Product opportunity windows are fleeting and time-to-market issues dominate design considerations. The two factors that invariably make the difference between success and failure are first, the knowledge that comes with an accurate insight into the internal and external forces which drive product markets and second, an insight into the concerns, desires and thought processes of those customers who make the decision to purchase a particular product or deal with a particular vendor.

The following data, taken from the 2010 EMF Embedded Developer Survey, addresses many issues of which embedded vendors and developers should be aware. The data presented here represents embedded industry averages across many application verticals, many vendors, many OSes, etc. Subscribers to the 2010 EMF Market Intelligence Program have access to their custom Executive Dashboard with which they can create unlimited cross tabs to further examine the data presented here.

 Criteria Most and Least Important to Developers in Selecting an OS

Developers were asked to indicate which criteria were most important to their decision in selecting an OS. The top (most important) responses and the bottom (least important) responses are presented in the following tables.

There was an interesting reordering of priorities in 2010 with cost remaining the principal factor. Realtime performance fell (no surprise here) and safety certifiable and virtualization remained as a small part of the collective consciousness of embedded developers.

You Better Design Right, You Better Not Fail, if You Don’t Follow These Guidelines Your CEO’s going to Jail; The FDA/CDRH is Watching You Now

(Sung to Santa Claus is coming to town)

Yes indeed – and it’s about time.

The FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health (CDRH) reported that in 2006, 21% of all medical device recalls were for software defects – it is also estimated that one-in-three software-based products is recalled. They haven’t updated this data since, but one can assume that it might have gotten worse.

Medical device developers and company CEOs should be aware that this is an unacceptable situation and that it is going to rapidly change. Those that don’t get it straight won’t be around when the dust settles.

Is there enough aspirin to relieve the headaches that our government is giving medical device manufacturers? Moreover, is it deserved? The answer – depending on the specific question – is yes and no.

The Obama administration under pressure from Congress has combined the medical device industry with the drug industry as one, and has proposed taxing both industries to pay for universal health insurance (Obama Care). Hopefully thoughtful senators and representatives will see that these taxes will be passed down to patients and other users and will also impact the elderly who most require such devices and can ill afford them – then again it is more realistic to depend on the Easter bunny. But logic is no relief for the headache – particularly when it comes to Washington politicians. It’s no fun being a medical device executive today.

On July 31, 2008 a Senate Bill cosponsored by Senators Edward Kennedy (D – MA) and Chuck Grassley (R– IA) was filed that  would require senior officers or directors of drug and medical device companies to certify under penalty of perjury that all information submitted for a product’s approval is accurate and in compliance with federal regulations.

The Drug and Medical Device Accountability Act Bill expired at the end of the two year Senate session on December 31, 2008, but was refiled in the Senate (2009) with the hope of amending the current legislation by the end of October 2009. This is an important piece of legislation, and medical device executives should get their house in order to accommodate the provisions.

The Bill provided that product applications later found to have contained false or misleading information would be subject to stiff fines (up to $5,000,000), assessed both to companies and their senior officers, who, in addition, could face jail sentences of up to 20 years. These are serious issues. Currently the CDRH has a forensic group that looks at device software only after a device has been recalled.

This is a bad time, and a very costly time (regardless of the Act) for a medical device manufacturer – particularly if software development hadn’t been given the detailed oversight of using best practices. The new Obama tax on medical devices – used to pay for Obama Care – is allready a blow to the industry and to smaller medical device manufacturers.

The “Drug and Medical Device Accountability Act” will change the medical devices industry similarly to how the Sarbanes-Oxley bill impacted corporate accountability. Laws being what they are, we should expect overkill from its enactment. This is why medical device company’s senior management should take time to rethink their strategic approach to the delivery of their products.

EMF has available a report presenting alternative paths for developers to produce quality software for medical devices, minimize product recalls, and affordably provide comprehensive audit trails for CDRH inspectors (Critical Issues Confronting Medical Device Manufacturers). Keeping the company alive and your CEO out of jail are bonuses.

Fanaticism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim – George Santiago

Tough economic times create strange bedfellows. Does one need to purchase a technology, with its attendant costs and complications, when a lease or partner relationship would suffice? Do complimentary technologies and markets provide a return greater than the sum of the parts – or is the result characterized as “subtraction by addition?”

 EMF believes that embedded consolidation through acquisition will be the norm over the next few years as roll backs in DoD discretionary funding impact the larger purchasers.

 Let’s look to four recent acquisitions with an eye on compatibility, growth potential and whether there is a measurable outcome. Is this a trend, a lifeline or a passing strategic initiative – you decide.

 These include:

• IBM Rational buys Telelogic
• Intel buys Wind River Systems
• Cavium acquires MontaVista
• Artisan acquires Aonix

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On November 10, 2009, Cavium, a publicly traded provider of highly integrated semiconductor processors that enable intelligent networking, communications, storage and security applications, signed a definitive agreement to acquire MontaVista. Cavium stated that MontaVista would continue to operate separately and their customers would not be restricted to using only Cavium processors.

Immediately, questions arose: 

• Who is Cavium and why did they make this acquisition?
• Was Jim Ready clipping Burger King Coupons?
• Was MontaVista motivated by Intel’s acquisition of Wind River?
• Does this mean that commercial Linux is facing financial do-do?
• What is really going on behind the scenes and is this a good or poor marriage? 

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“You never know who’s been swimming naked until the tide goes out”  -  Warren Buffet
 

IBM gets it! Why don’t others? With $22 billion in annual software sales they certainly qualify as the 2000 pound gorilla – but they don’t act that way. They didn’t get to that level by being arrogant (like another large gorilla?) – quite to the contrary.

• They strongly support the analyst community
• They have no secrets – they show us their roadmap, tell us what they have in the works, confess their concerns, listen and encourage other views
• Unlike some embedded vendors, they see analysts/editors as a respected strength to their business
• They subscribe to the best market intelligence and they study it and use it

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Co-authored by: Dolores Krasner, VP Market Intelligence, EMF

Remember the old song “Signs”? The lyrics went “signs, signs, everywhere signs, messing up the scenery blowing my mind - don’t do this do that, can’t you read the signs”?

With all of the FUD, claims and counterclaims of misrepresentation between embedded vendors, what is a developer, manager or executive to believe, and how is one to make sense of whether one product or another is best suited for one’s use? No wonder potential users are leery of advertised and promoted claims.

Is it possible that those making the most noise and creating the most FUD are those messing up the scenery for the rest of us? Moreover, are these disruptions taking us away from the real signs that are defined by developers and managers that detail their likes, dislikes, and issues of greatest importance? Finally, what are the market trends that are characterized by revenue growth, best practices and ROI calculations?

I chose the above graphic to illustrate my frustrations (and I suspect the frustrations of others) with the misleading hype that has unfortunately become part of our embedded market culture. What I loved about the graphic was the ridiculous message that hid the information of most importance to the reader – the bridge was out!

So what should the embedded market signs tell us – based on year-over-year EMF Developer Surveys, vendor reported shipments and EMF privleged information - about the road ahead and how to avoid the bridges that are out?

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The Cheshire cat said to Alice, “if you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there – and when you get there, there’s no there, there” – Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland

The Cheshire cat could have been talking to some embedded vendors. If you don’t  understand or track the broader marketplace and what your customers and potential customers are doing and experiencing,  then how can you possibly develop the best strategic plan?

Historically, new and more forceful markets that redefine economic demand replace markets that create economic downturns. Today we are at a transition point in our economic recovery that will redefine markets, and we are currently witnessing an irrevocable upheaval in the marketplace for software design and development tools, components and services. There will be winners and losers. How then does an embedded vendor mitigate against uncertainty and find direction? We believe that market intelligence is the antidote to market uncertainty.

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It looks like Déjà vu all over again – Yogi Berra

OK. Every meeting I go to I’m asked my opinion regarding Intel’s acquisition of Wind River – so here goes. To be honest, people richer than me are behind and part of this acquisition, so who am I to think that I know better? To be sure, some of the people richer than I am have screwed up on a far grander scale than I have, so why not offer my perspective?

My first response to the question is a flashback to the “Shortest Book” jokes that I used to revel in decades ago. “Ethics for Enron Executives” would certainly be among the “shortest book titles”. My contribution to this arcane joke file was “Famous Jewish Weightlifters” a title that my rabbi didn’t understand.

Recently I thought of adding “Successful Intel Acquisitions and Spin-offs” to the list. Those of you old enough to remember Dialogic and Ziatech (as well as a number of software-based hardware analysis and virtual development platform spin-offs) will get my point.

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Sadly, like an All Pro quarterback whose arm has long ago lost its zip, the Embedded Systems Conference (ESC) returned to Boston the week of September 21, 2009. Once the “must attend event” of the fall season, this important venue continues to struggle with most of the major embedded vendors absent. Other company executives were present to speak with the press – but they didn’t host a booth. I was on a panel with Robert Day; VP marketing for LynuxWorks, who was in prominent attendance – but LynuxWorks didn’t have a booth.

Gone are most of the major chip companies. Only Microsoft, IBM Rational and Green Hills Software continue to host impressive booths. In year’s past Green Hills hosted a demonstration event in which was attended by a dozen or more viewers every hour. This year we saw only a handful of interested developers at each presentation

So what is it that accounts for this lack of participation? The decline began long before the economic crisis that we are experiencing – although the number of layoffs and the unwillingness of embedded OEMs and systems integrators to today invest in new technologies is certainly a contributing factor. In year’s past ESC Boston was a magnet for downscaled engineers to trot out their resumes. Given the severe downturn, many disenfranchised engineers didn’t see the point of pursuing a pointless effort.

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