HOUSTON — BP Microsystems, a device programming systems supplier, is changing its name and relocating headquarters. The company will now be known as BPM Microsystems.

“Our company has long been the leader in the manufacture of semiconductor programming equipment,” said Lyman Brown, vice president and COO. “Our new name will reflect the same high-quality company that customers and the industry alike have depended on for the past 21 years. However, we look forward to no longer being confused with BP Amoco, the oil company, who also has its headquarters in Houston.”.

The name change is effective as of Aug.28, and will coincide with the opening of its new headquarters building in Houston.

BPM Microsystems is now located at 5373 West Sam Houston Pkwy N, Suite 250 Houston, TX, 77041-5160. The new Website is: bpmmicro.com.

ROLLING MEADOWS, IL – The Institute of Environmental Sciences and Technology (IEST) has release the program for the 24th Space Simulation Conference. The conference will be held Nov. 6–9, in Annapolis, Maryland. Technical sessions run from Nov. 7–9 and are preceded by tutorials on Nov. 6.

 

The conference is an international forum in space hardware environmental testing for R&D and qualification. It provides an opportunity for engineers, technicians and scientists from industry, government and academia to present and exchange information and ideas on simulating the space environment to develop and test space mission hardware.

 

Tutorials will include Cryogenic Handling and Safety; Advance Leak Checking Techniques; Vibration Isolation in Space Simulation; and Acoustic Testing on Demand. The technical program will have sessions on Data Acquisition and Analyses; Contamination; New Capabilities and Facilities; Thermal Vacuum Testing; Simulations and Special Topic; and Structural Dynamics Testing.

 

The conference is co-sponsored by NASA, AIAA, ASTM, Canadian Space Agency (CSA) and Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (JHUAPL).

 

Cambridge, UK --In the past, RFID smart cards have been successful only as transport cards – typically for buses or trains in place of tickets and often for several modes of transport. In 2005, this started to change with about 20 million credit and debit RFID cards being issued in the US.
IDTechEx forecast a boom in RFID smart cards and related payment key fobs as a result of the reduced cost of the latest contactless card systems resulting in lower cost of ownership and the demand for new national identification cards.

Government/ health cards became increasingly popular in 2005, and are predicted to be the smart card success story of 2006, with increases of 42% forecast. A number of government ID and health card projects, implemented in countries such as Oman, Australia, Austria and Belgium, led to an increased demand for both memory and microprocessor cards in 2005, especially microprocessors.This demand shows little sign of slowing, according to IDTechEx. However, many use contact technology which is not RFID and is unreliable and user unfriendly compared to RFID. e-Passport projects – all using RFID technology – showed strong development in 2005, particularly in Europe where some reached the pilot and implementation stages. These schemes in particular are forecast to drive the sector growth in 2006.

SARATOGA, CA  – The U.S.’s gross domestic product is not a leading indicator for the performance of the semiconductor industry, according to analysis conducted by Advanced Forecasting.

The firm found that the GDP’s value as a leading indicator was only relevant during five out of the 16 years investigated.

“The GDP’s historical year-over-year quarterly growth rate correlated well with IC revenues from the end of 2000 to the end of 2004 with a three-month lead, but no correlation exists during the periods 1990 through 2000 and 2005 through the present,” said Rosa Luis, director of marketing and sales.

“Continuing to use the GDP as a predictive tool for the semiconductor industry today may greatly mislead decision-makers.”

The 2001recession was an anomaly with disastrous results for numerous U.S. industries including metal fabrication, construction materials and automobiles. The same analysis conducted on IC revenues was performed on each of the aforementioned industries with similar results for the 2000 through 2004 period.

In the years prior and following this period, the correlations vary from non-existent to strong. Conclusion: Due to the strength and depth of the 2001 recession, many industry segments were similarly affected. Each experienced the increasing growth rates leading up to a peak in 2000 and a severe decline following that peak.

The dot.com recession was an outlier. The fact that IC revenues matched GDP (with a lag of three months) wasn’t unique to the semiconductor industry, and like in other industries, this phenomenon vanished afterward. Therefore, continued use of the GDP as a predictive tool for the IC industry based on the strong correlation during that period is risky.