2 End User Roadmaps - Smithsonian Institution

THE ELECTRONICS MARKET

In 1996, the total electronics systems market was about $850 billion, and the semiconductor

market was $140 billion. By the year 2001, the semiconductor market is expected to double while

electronic equipment sales reach $1.3 trillion. This trend is shown in Figure 2-1.

INTEGRATED CIRCUIT ENGINEERING CORPORATION 2-1

2 END USER ROADMAPS

400

600

800

1,000

1,200

1,400

1,600

20022001200019991998199719961995199419931992

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100

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250

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400

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*Including captive "if sold" value.11082ADSource: ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology"

6885

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150

175

210

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1,120

1,545

315

1,380

1,243

920

851800

701

633585

1992-2002Worldwide Electronic

Equipment SalesCAGR = 10%

1992-2002Worldwide SemiconductorProduction Value*CAGR = 19%

Figure 2-1. Semiconductor and Electronic Equipment Sales Trends (1992-2001)

Of the total semiconductor market,

the top three categories, making up

a total of 83% of the market are com-

puters (50%), communications (15%)

and consumer electronics (18%).

The actual breakdown is shown in

Figure 2-2. These three areas are

also expected to at least maintain

their market share, if not grow,

through the end of the century. By

the year 2001, these three market

segments will represent over a one

trillion dollar opportunity, and the

corresponding market for electronic

packaging will exceed $60 billion. It

is not coincidence that these three

segments have had, and will con-

tinue to have a profound impact on

the directions for future semicon-

ductor and packaging technology.

The computer industry has driven the packaging industry for the past 20 years, first to support

mainframes, and recently to support PCs. High pin count ceramic packages, high density MCMs,

50 layer circuit boards and heroic thermal management schemes were the response for high end

computers in the 1980s. Low cost PQFP (plastic quad flat pack) and PPGA (plastic pin grid array)

packages, SOP (small outline packages) and low cost circuit boards were the response to PCs in

the early 1990s. Next generation computers are driving BGAs (ball grid array), CSPs (chip scale

packages), MCPs (multichip packages), and fine line substrates.

The telecom industry has leveraged the same technology as the computer industry. There is only

a slight difference between a circuit board used for a telecom or computer application. The ASICs

used for telecom applications have slightly fewer I/Os, and do not push the envelope of perfor-

mance as much as for workstations. Both next generation telecom and computer applications will

require digital clocks in the 200MHz to 400MHz range and the requirements for good high speed

design will be the same.

The consumer market, especially the portable market is undergoing the most rapid and revolu-

tionary growth. The need for low cost, small size and low power is driving TSOPs (thin small out-

line packages), COB (chip on board), and direct chip attach, with thin profile, fine line substrates,

and CSP.

End User Roadmaps

INTEGRATED CIRCUIT ENGINEERING CORPORATION2-2

1996 TOTAL MERCHANTSEMICONDUCTOR USAGE

Consumer18%

Industrial11%

Communications15%

Computer50%$135B

Auto6%

Military <1%

21580ASource: ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology"

Market

Computers

Communications

Consumer

84% of the industry

100% of the industry

Semiconductor

$175B

$53B

$39B

$267B

$316B

Packaging(@20%)

YEAR 2001 MARKET VALUES

$35B

$11B

$8B

$53B

$63B

Figure 2-2. A Top-Down Estimate of theYear 2001 Packaging Market

MATCHING PACKAGING TECHNOLOGY AND APPLICATION

Selecting the packaging technology to use to implement a product is a matter of balancing a

number of trade offs to find the optimum comfort level. The first order issues to balance are:

¥ system cost

¥ system size

¥ system power consumption

¥ performance: chip integration level

¥ performance: clock frequency

¥ performance: pin count of each die

¥ memory size

¥ thermal management

¥ reliability

¥ time to market, volume, dollars

¥ technical risk

Though the categories of concern are the same for each type of electronic product, the weigh-

ing of each element is very different. For example, the relative importance of these factors is

shown in Figure 2-3 for a super computer and a palm top. They share virtually no common

important concern.

Each product category has a different relative importance for each of these elements, making gen-

eralizations in the electronics industry difficult. What is of value to a palm top application may

not be important to a desktop personal computer (PC). This will ultimately result in the prolifer-

ation of a number of niche markets for packaging technologies, rather than one universal solution.

The important task will be determining the optimum packaging technologies for each application.

End User Roadmaps


Cost

Size

Power consumption

Performance

Thermal management

Reliability

Time to market

Technical risk

ConcernHigh end

Computers

High

High

High

High

High

High

2-5 years

High

Palm Top

Constrained low

Constrained low

Constrained low

Targeted low

Low

Low

6-12 months

Low

21603Source: ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology"

Figure 2-3. System Target Values Between High End and Low End Products

TIME TO MARKET

The entire electronics market is accelerating the pace at which products are introduced.

Competition between vendors to fill the vacuum in so many new computer, consumer and tele-

com applications pushes the limits of time to market for new products. The network computer

(NC) is a good example. It was first introduced as a concept in early Spring 1996. Products were

on the market from selected vendors within six months.

The design cycle time for a workstation is 18 months. The cycle time for a PC is 9-12 months. The

entire lifetime for a PC is only two years. This is dominated by the rapid rate of change for the

microprocessors. Figure 2-4, shows the product life cycle for the Intel microprocessor families.

Every two years or less, an old generation completely dies out and a new generation begins a high

volume ramp.

Within a product family, there is considerable pressures to improve the price/performance, again

driven by the silicon technology. Figure 2-5 shows the price decline over a 1 year period for a

133MHz Pentium, from $935 to $257. This saving is transferred to the customer.

This pattern transcends all consumer products. Portable hand held PDAs have a design cycle of

6-9 months and are obsolete in one year. As the expectations continue to build in the computer,

consumer and telecom markets for rapid change to meet the new needs, the product design cycle

times and the product life times will continually shrink.

End User Roadmaps


286

386

486

Pentium

Pentium Pro

P7

'85 '99'98'97'96'95'94'93'92'91'90'89'88'87'86

Year

Un

its

Sh

ipp

ed (

mill

ion

s)

Source: Intel/ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology" 22589

Figure 2-4. Product Lifecycle for Intel Processors

ÒKILLERÓ APPLICATIONS AND ELECTRONIC DEVICES

Electronic devices are merely tools that can be used to manipulate information, having no

intrinsic value in and of themselves. It is only through the value of the information content

and application that the technology and the device has value. Often, there is one application

in particular that suddenly opens up the value of an electronic device. This application has

been popularly termed a Òkiller appÓ. Having a killer app will help assure the success of a

new device, component or tool.

It is widely believed that Visicalc, the first spreadsheet, designed to run on the early IBM personal

computers, was a killer app for PCs. It completely changed the way accounting and forecasting

was done. Anyone who ever did bookkeeping, created a forecast or completed a profit and loss

statement had to have a spreadsheet and a PC to run it on. Word processing was another early

killer app for computers. It was primarily responsible for obsoleting typewriters. Desktop pub-

lishing was an early killer app for the first Macintosh computer and laser printer combination.

Killer apps will continue to have a profound impact on electronic products in the three markets:

computers, communications and consumers, with considerable overlap.

End User Roadmaps


1995 1996

* Pentium 133MHz microprocessor; price per chip basedon large volume purchases.

Source: ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology" 21608

$935*

$257

0

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

800

900

1,000

MayFeb.Nov.Aug.June

Do

llars

Figure 2-5. Pentium Processor* Price Decline

Killer Applications and High End Computers

At the high end of computer usage, the current applications of scientific or engineering tasks

involving floating point intensive calculations, or database and transaction operations will con-

tinue, fueling the need for higher and higher performance. The information processing needs for

some common functions is shown in Figure 2-6.

Killer Applications and Mid Range Computers

For the mid range computer, commonly termed server, there are two killer apps that will drive the

need for higher performance and ever more capable servers.

The first killer app is providing the portal to the Information Superhighway. The rapidly expand-

ing and critically important intranet and internet market is giving a large boost to servers. They

are the on and off ramps, and the traffic directors to the network. All the intelligence of the inter-

net and intranet reside on and are accomplished by the servers. How the information is condi-

tioned and formatted to the various end users is determined by the server. As bandwidth needs

increase, the performance and memory features of the servers will have to increase. This drives

the continual evolution to higher performance server systems.

The second killer app is as a central hub for a network of desktop computers associated with a

work group. In a typical office environment, a collection of from 5 to 100 desktop computers will

be linked in either a star or ring topology to one server, as a work group. The server provides for

local area network communication (intranet) shared database management, automatic backup,

and connection to external communication devices such as fax, modem, and internet contact.

End User Roadmaps


Simultation of Catalysts

Real Time Airplane Simulation

Brain Activity (?)

Stuctural Biology

Pharmaceutical Design

72 hour Weather Forecasting in Real Time

Simple Turbulent Flow (1 Day)

Real Time Image Processing

Real Time Translation

Real Time Transcription

Politician Brain Activity (?)

Transparent Word Processing

Arithmetic In Real Time

Watch Timing Functions

1010

109

108

107

106

105

104

1,000

100

10

1

0.1

0.01

0.001


Figure 2-6. MIPS Ratings of Various Applications

The term Òenterprise-client-serverÓ has been coined to refer to this architecture in a business or

ÒenterpriseÓ environment. This architecture is set to radically expand. Scott McNealy, founder

and CEO of Sun Microsystems, promotes the concept of Òfat server and thin clientÓ. The idea is

to concentrate more power in the server, and less performance in the client, or desktop computer.

In this vision, the desktop computer, coined by Oracle as a Ònetwork computerÓ or NC, runs soft-

ware locally, but does not have a hard drive, modem, or even CD drive.

All software and hardware connections to the outside world and long term storage capability is

located centrally on the server. In this way, the thin client would be a network-centric computer.

From its inception, Sun has evangelized the concept of Ò... the network is the computerÓ, empha-

sizing the value in networked activities and communication between co-workers across the next

cubicle or across the ocean, but linked as a work group.

Ideally, a fat server has to provide much higher performance in processing power, RAM, hard

drive space, and must support much higher bandwidths in the LAN. This means a much higher

perceived value to the server as well. It contains memory space for all the clients and perform 5-

10x the messaging traffic as current networks. The server must support a LAN with at least 5-10x

higher bandwidth so as not to add more perceived delay than current systems. All programs and

all data flows from the server to each thin client. If each user had 2Gbytes of hard drive space

reserved for it, a fat server needs to be able to access almost 200Gbytes from its local hard drives.

The architecture of fat server and thin client has a profound impact on the high end server ven-

dors such as Sun, IBM, HP and DEC. It might also provide stronger differentiation between a

server and high end PC.

Some early critics say this architecture is reminiscent of former computer systems. It recalls the

early days of computers when a mainframe connected everyone in a building and dumb termi-

nals sat on everyoneÕs desk. In this early time shared network, all the processing was performed

on the mainframe. When many users were on the system, there would be noticeable delays

between keystrokes and response even when typing at slow speed. The difference with the fat

server-thin client approach is that information processing is performed by the desktop PC. Delays

should appear only when software is being loaded or data exchanged.

The chief advantage of this architecture is the potential cost savings per seat in the use of an NC.

The initial hardware and software outlay for each NC will be less, and the maintenance to support

the network, over the life of the system should be lower in this configuration.

A study completed by the Zona Research Corp. showed that even for a small network of 15 seats,

there is a cost savings of about $8,000 per seat, over the 5 year expected life time of the fat server-thin

client system compared to a conventional PC/server network. This includes the initial hardware,

End User Roadmaps


software upgrades and system maintenance. The results of this analysis, shown in Figure 2-7, sug-

gest that a network with 130 seats could save almost $1M over its 5 year life compared with a PC

based network.

Killer Applications and Desktop Computers

If the fat server-thin client architecture is commonly adopted, it will have a profound impact on

the desktop hardware. An example of an NC currently offered by IBM is shown in Figure 2-8. The

system consists of a microprocessor, a minimum of 8M of RAM, keyboard, monitor, mouse, and

interface ports to the network.

By minimizing the hardware requirements of the client, the price of the thin client can be reduced

from the currently $2,000 range of PCs to a targeted price of under $500.

The NC will also create a potentially large market for thin clients, which would not have to be con-

strained to Intel/Microsoft compatiblity. Early units from Oracle are based on Advanced Risc

Machines Ltd (ARM) processors. It is SunÕs intent to offer NCs that use a low cost, $50 custom

microprocessor, designed by Sun and optimized to run Java, the net-centric language developed by

Sun as a counter point to Microsoft. A Java optimized processor may run 15-20 times faster than a

high end x86 processor because it is specialized for Java with a reduced instruction set microcode.

End User Roadmaps


0

500

1,000

1,500

2,000

2,500

3,000

3,500

4,000

Year 4 Year 5Year 3Year 2Year 1

$3,450

$2,581$2,608 $2,608

$2,815 $2,815

$843 $843 $943 $943

PC Solution

Boundless TechnologiesSolution

Do

llars

Source: Zona Research Corporation/ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology" 21604

Figure 2-7. Yearly Cost of Ownership per Seat for Fat ServerÐThin Client Network (Cost per Seat in 15-Seat Configuration)

Not every business environment will be inclined to use the fat server-thin client configuration.

Regardless of whether PCs or NCs sit on the desktop, there will also be a drive to higher local per-

formance to meet the other two most significant killer apps for desktops. These are a more intel-

ligent user interface that will increase the efficiency of the information worker, and the marriage

of all the office appliances: fax, phone, computer, and network interface into one device.

Intelligent Interface

Some of the elements of the intelligent interface are:

¥ Voice recognition and synthesis

¥ Voice to text translation

¥ Intelligent agents that learn your needs and assist in tedious, complex, time consuming or

routine operations, leaving more time for the user to participate in creative activities

¥ 3D graphics

¥ Virtual reality

¥ Translation into foreign languages

¥ Self diagnostics and automatic configuration

End User Roadmaps


Source: IBM/IEEE Spectrum/ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology" 22161

Figure 2-8. IBMÕs Network Station

One of the most important features higher local intelligence can provide is self diagnostics and

automatic configuration. When new software or hardware is added to current generation com-

puters, more often than not, conflicts arise, preventing smooth installation. The term Òplug and

playÓ was coined to reflect the goal of open standards. Ideally, all products, regardless of vendor,

would meet minimal standards, thus assuring compatibility. Frustrated users have renamed this

phrase, Òplug and payÓ. Trying to use help desks to assist in debugging and fixing installation

problems has been likened to a form of medieval torture.

Microsoft CEO Bill Gates has proposed a feature to be implemented in future computers in which

the computer calls up the technical support line directly and interacts with a support computer

that automatically performs diagnosis, installation or repair.

Information Appliance

Some of the elements of the new unified office information appliance will be:

¥ computer

¥ fax

¥ phone

¥ e-mail

¥ pager

¥ high fidelity multimedia

¥ video phone

¥ network access

¥ hyperlinked databases and personal information management, such as calendars, project

plans, contact databases, phone numbers, and mailing lists

These applications will drive the hardware toward higher performance, more memory and higher

bandwidth to the network. They will profoundly affect the life of the information worker.

Killer Applications and Consumer Market

The consumer market will see growth in two areas: the integration of portable information appli-

ances and the integration of the home based information appliance. The integration of multiple

functions into one appliance has been termed ÒconvergenceÓ.

End User Roadmaps


Portable Electronics

The mid-1990s welcomed an explosion of specialized portable devices which at first seemed con-

fusing. This phenomenon is illustrated by Scott Adams in Figure 2-9. There is a trend toward nat-

ural convergence and integration of several functions into one device, or a few specialized devices

with the following types of killer apps:

¥ watch

¥ wireless phone

¥ pager

¥ fax

¥ e-mail

¥ personal information manager, including scheduler and calendar

¥ database manager

¥ digital camera

¥ tape recorder/note taker

¥ video phone

¥ voice input, voice recognition

¥ real time voice to voice language translation

¥ pen input

¥ head mount display

¥ health monitor

¥ safety monitor

¥ information highway portal

¥ integrated GPS (global positioning sensor) with map database and navigational aid

End User Roadmaps


DILBERT reprinted by permission of United Feature Syndicate, Inc./ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology" 22098

Figure 2-9. Dilbert

In 1997, each of these functions are in their early stage of implementation as stand alone portable

and personal devices. For example, Figure 2-10 shows portable medical diagnostic tools based on

sensors, microcontrollers and a display. Figure 2-11 is an example of the convergence of the tele-

phone and palm top computer to enable e-mail access. Each one of these killer apps represents a

large potential market. As these specialized tools proliferate, one of the differentiators will be how

many functions can be integrated into just one device, and how easy it will be to use by the aver-

age consumer.

There may be two form factors for the personal information appliance. One device may be, as Bill

Gates suggests, wallet sizeÑportable products that are always carried around. Such a device

might become the new ÒSwiss Army knifeÓ of the information age. Figure 2-12 is an illustration

of this concept.

Another version may be about the size of a notebook computer. The minimum footprint is that

which allows a comfortable keyboard and screen large enough to view roughly a page at a time.

This might be the tool for the road warriorÑthe mobile information worker.

End User Roadmaps


Por table EKG Fr om Technology Transf er

Nonin’ s Non-InvasiveOxygen and Pulse Monitor

Heartstream’ sForeRunner Portable

Defibrillator

Source: Time Magazine/ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology" 21714

Figure 2-10. Pocket-Sized Medicine

End User Roadmaps


Source: InfoGear/ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology" 22162

Figure 2-11. ScreenPhone by InfoGear Allows Web Access By Telephone

Source: Hitachi/ICE, "Roadmaps of Packaging Technology" 22163

Figure 2-12. HitachiÕs Soft Touch Digital Wallet Prototype

The network computer is also being targeted to the home information appliance market. The con-

vergence of the home information appliance will include killer apps such as:

¥ cable TV ¥ direct broadcast TV

¥ CD/DVD (digital video disk) player ¥ video on demand

¥ home computer ¥ security

¥ control of other home appliances ¥ phone

¥ answering machine ¥ e-mail

¥ intercom ¥ fax

¥ VCR ¥ video games

¥ stereo ¥ musical instrument

¥ information highway portal

The hardware price point and the network access charges will greatly determine the viability of

the NC for home use. Oracle is targeting $300-$500 for their home NC, as a network appliance.

Other versions of this next generation home information appliance are evolving from its three

closest candidates: the telephone, the home PC, and the TV. Gateway 2000 currently offers a home

information appliance called The Destination Big Screen PC. This is basically a PC with large

screen display and full TV abilities. The home information hub combines functions of the TV, PC,

video game player, and information highway browser. Equipped with a remote control mouse

and limited keyboard, the Big Screen PC targets couch surfers as well.

From the other direction, the TV may evolve into the home information appliance with the addi-

tion of a Òset topÓ cable modem or phone modem interface. Early versions have been introduced

by Zenith, Diba, @Home and Apple. These are examples of the early integration of home based

information appliances as portals to the emerging information highway.

Evolving from the telephone in France, the MiniTel, has been a success since before 1990. This

early information appliance quickly replaced the phone book in most households.

Just as in the portable market, each of these killer apps will be initially implemented as stand alone

specialized devices, with a low entry price point. As the expectations evolve, these functions will

be integrated into one or a few appliances. Each will require high processing power, effortlessly

easy to use interfaces, high bandwidth communication, and low cost.

The market potential for home information appliances is huge. Currently, in the US, the market

penetration of TVs and telephones, the two current information appliances, is over 95% of house-

holds, for each. The PC market penetration is about 10% of households. This is an indication that

the home information appliance must be as easy to use as the TV or phone in order to capture a

comparable high market share.

End User Roadmaps


KILLER APPLICATIONS AND THE TELECOM MARKET

The Information Superhighway

The most significant killer app for the near term future, which has equally huge impact in the com-

puter and consumer market, is the creation and growth of the Information Superhighway. The

Internet is merely the beginning of the Highway.

A commonly used analogy is that the existing Internet is to the Information Superhighway as the

Oregon Trail was to current interstate expressways. The Oregon Trail was the first path that tra-

versed mountains, showing the way. The ensuing interstate superhighways built in the last 30

years really do not look anything like the original Trail. Likewise, todayÕs Internet is a trailblazer

for the future Information Superhighway. It probably will not look anything like the current

Internet.

The Information Superhighway will combine all the forms of information and communication we

currently use and will use in the future, into one unified and hyperlinked database.

Content

Our society has an unquenchable thirst for information. We are inundated with it through a wide

variety of media, such as:

¥ TV ¥ radio ¥ books

¥ magazines ¥ newspapers ¥ film

¥ mail ¥ catalogs ¥ CDs

¥ photographs ¥ video tapes ¥ video game cartridges

¥ software disks ¥ phone ¥ fax

¥ audio tapes

The future Information Superhighway will transmit all the information on all of these media in

digital form, residing on servers, accessible through information appliances. The same content

providers for the current media might provide for the new Information Superhighway. This is a

huge amount of information. Figure 2-13 compares the bits of digital data required to store vari-

ous types of information, uncompressed.

There are two key advantages of the information superhighway over existing media. The first

has been alluded to. In digital format, the entire database can be searched and accessed by the

integrated information appliances for personal, home or office use. The second key feature is

End User Roadmaps


the interaction possible on the Information Superhighway. Personal information, especially

billing information can be transmitted, encrypted, if necessary. This will drive the commerce,

education and games industries.

Bandwidth Needs

To receive a page per second of text information requires a transmission rate of about 20Kbits/sec.

To receive a single high resolution, 1024 x 1280, image with 24 bit color depth, in one second,

requires 30Mbits/sec. Individual images can often be compressed by as much as 10:1. Video,

which has less changing in each adjacent frame, can be compressed as much as 100:1. It may be

possible to use as low as 3Mbits/sec transmission rate for screen images. A typical TV channel

requires about 10Mbits/sec. A 100 TV channel network requires 1Gbit/sec transmission rate.

These rates are summarized in Figure 2-14.

As quickly as the bandwidth of the infrastructure can grow, the needs of the Information

Superhighway will grow faster.

For example, current phone lines use about a 10Kbits/sec transmission rate. For a low end video

phone, a transmission rate of roughly 1Mbit/sec can be used. As two way video communication

becomes more common, the information bandwidth available to support this must increase by a

factor of 100 over what exists in 1997. As expectations grow, the quality of the video phone will

have to increase. This means even higher bandwidth.

End User Roadmaps


All the text in the library of Congress

Typical information database for a Fortune 1000 company

Full length motion picture

1 second of high resolution, 24bit color motion picture

60 minutes of high fidelity audio recording

24bit color high resolution screen image

A book of text

1 sec. of high fidelity audio recording

A page of text

A sentence

A word

A single letter

100T

10T

1T = 1,000G

100G

10G

1G

100M

10M

1M

100K

10K

1,000

100

10

1


Information Element

Nu

mb

er o

f u

nco

mp

ress

ed b

its

Figure 2-13. Information Content

The Information Superhighway will push all the transmission media that are currently in use to

higher capacity. These include:

¥ coaxial cable to the home

¥ coaxial land lines

¥ intra-building coaxial LANs

¥ fiber-optic land lines

¥ fiber-optic into the home

¥ intra-building fiber-optic LANs

¥ intra-building twisted pair LANs

¥ twisted pair into the home

¥ wireless microwave

¥ wireless direct broadcast

¥ wireless cellular

Motivating Forces of the Superhighway

The four financial driving forces for the growth of the Superhighway will be:

¥ Advertising

¥ Entertainment

¥ Communication

¥ Commerce

For example, in 1995, 10,000 different companies distributed catalogs for consumer products.

Altogether, there were 10 billion catalogs printed and distributed. This is enough catalogs to have

every man, woman and child in the US receive 50 of them. At approximately $3 per catalog to

print and mail, this market opportunity alone is over $30B.

End User Roadmaps


100 TV channels

1 high resolution image/sec.

Real time video (compressed)

1 high resolution image/sec. (compressed)

Telephone digital audio conversation

1 page of text per second

10G

1G

100M

10M

1M

100K

10K

1K

100

10


Bit

s/S

ec.

Source

Figure 2-14. Information Transmission Bit Rates

As the security of the information flow becomes more stable, Òcyber cashÓ will be exchanged to

enable on-line purchases. With a hyperlinked database, if you see an item either on a commercial

or as part of a TV program, you might be able to purchase it by identifying it and clicking on it in

the middle of a show.

One potential problem the user is encountering is having too much information available, in no

particular order, and with important information mixed in with useless information. It is as

though you have all the books in the Library of Congress in random order on the shelves, with

only the card catalog to search with. This problem must be solved for the Information

Superhighway to work. One approach has been the recommendation of using software ÒagentsÓ

that learn your needs and search the net for what you want.

The communications backbone to support the transmission of all this information must continu-

ally grow in both bandwidth to the individual user as well as between servers.

The Information Superhighway will single handedly revolutionize how we live our lives. There

will be no part of either our business or home life that will not be affected. Because of this all per-

vasive impact, information appliances that connect to the Information Superhighway servers that

store and manipulate the information, and switching systems, interfaces and networks that trans-

mit the information provide an enormous business opportunity.

IMPACT OF KILLER APPLICATIONS ON ELECTRONICS HARDWARE TECHNOLOGY

The net result of these killer apps will be four trends in hardware features to implement and

enable them:

1. The accelerating evolution of general purpose computers in moving up their growth curves,

with an emphasis on higher performance, more memory, higher fidelity multimedia and

higher bandwidth connections to local area networks, all in a fixed form factor, and at a cost

target between $1,000 and $2,000.

2. The integration of all portable, personal information appliances into one device with ever

increasing wireless communication bandwidth, increasingly diverse local sensing, increas-

ing memory storage capacity, increasing information processing performance, longer battery

life all in a fixed form factor, and all evolving faster, at a price entry point less than $500.

3. The integration of computers and entertainment into unified home information appliances,

with higher bandwidth connections, higher processing performance, higher fidelity multi-

media and a low cost entry point, all in a fixed form factor, and evolving faster, at a price

point less than $1,000.

End User Roadmaps


4. Higher bandwidth on-ramps to the Information Superhighway, with faster switching and

higher capacity at hubs and routers, implemented at an accelerating pace, with a price point

based on bandwidth, number of nodes supported, memory, and maximum access time.

In summary, the direction of the market needs for computers, consumer products and telecom

products, driven by the increasing expectations of the end user include:

¥ higher performance

¥ more memory

¥ higher fidelity multimedia

¥ higher bandwidth communications

¥ packaging in fixed form factors

¥ lower cost targets

¥ less power consumption

¥ shorter product life cycles

The overall driving forces from the end user applications will be faster, denser, cheaper, lower

power, NOW.

End User Roadmaps


End User Roadmaps


Documents

2 End User Roadmaps - Smithsonian Institution