Replacement of Multi-Chip Solutions

By Amna Nasir Malik Jamal

re-printed from Cyber@Print, Jang News

He shared his thoughts and opinion - steps needed to put Pakistan on the scientific and technological map, along with India and China. In the development and advancement of high-tech business one prominent name is of Syed Jauher Zaidi, of Pakistani origin in Silicon Valley, founder and CEO of Palmchip Corporation. He has two decades of experience in system design and integration and inventor of System-on-Chip (SoC) CoreFrame Architecture. Before founding PalmChip, he was involved in the System-on-Chip initiative at Quantum Corporation, a leading hard drive manufacturer. The EE Times, a well-known industry publication, named him among the 'Top 20 Visionary CEOs.'

Palmchip Corporation is a pioneer in semiconductor Intellectual Property (IP) and SoC platform technology. It offers outsourced software and hardware design services to its clients in the US, Europe and worldwide. It is also leader in the development and licensing of Market Specific Platform (MSSP) - an SoC software and hardware technology.

Responding to a question about the company's projects and design centre in Pakistan Mr. Jauher Zaidi said, "Palmchip has three divisions in Pakistan. Our IT and Software outsourcing division provides design development for Network Security and Web2.0 products. Telecom division is active to design and develop products for Pakistan's telecom companies for Fibre and New long range Wireless Standard's (WiMAX) management which includes Graphical Information System (GIS) and network management and mobile phone applications for billing and games. Third division is SoC, designs SoC design platform for mobile devices like cell phone, digital camera, Voice-over-IP (VoIP) phones, Short Range Wireless Standard (WiFi) network routers, computer storage devices and DVD players. For Pakistan's market, we designed and introduced ParkSafe, a parking lot management and security system with remote data management. It is a user friendly system which can be operated by a person having average computer knowledge."

Further he explained SoC, "Single chip wireless mobility's Application Specific Standard Part (ASSP) will replace the multi-chip solutions available today for mobile phone, WiMAX and WiFi devices. Palmchip's customers will benefit from lower power consumption, lower system cost, and significant system performance improvement. These products target a growing need for inexpensive multitude of wireless mobility applications. Our extensive experience in working with Silicon Valley startups and Fortune 500 companies has given us appreciation of the importance of agility without compromising quality. Our startup clients find us in tune with their drive to reach the market quickly and benefit from our best practices for outsourced development to ensure that speed does not compromise quality."

About outsourced software and hardware design services he replied, "We offer optimal distribution of work between onshore and offshore resources to achieve top quality deliverables in a highly cost-effective manner within aggressive delivery timeframes."

US Patent and Trademark Office has awarded PalmChip a key patent for the company's technology, facilitating the easy connection of IP Blocks within a SoC design. On the question about being pioneer in SoC and this patent grant he replied, "It is a significant milestone in our company's history to get protected our intellectual property when competitors are roaming in market. The patented SoC technology enables greater integration of multiple functions on a single chip. Over 65 licensees and more than 30 consumer products use our patented IP and hardware and software technologies."

About next growth areas in the technology sector and current IT scenario he thinks there are currently many growth sectors in technology, such as digital TV, biometrics, security, Radio Frequency ID (RFID), Nano technology, storage and VoIP. He has decided to focus on storage, security and voice-over-IP. He believes that Pakistan has a long way to go before it becomes the next offshore design resource in the world, like India and China. He highlights some of the core areas that need immediate attention, including intellectual property protection laws, low-cost communication infrastructure for voice as well as video, and venture capital funding for startup companies.

While coming to the end of our discussion I put one final question to tell about future plans he replied "Palmchip possess a tremendous breadth and depth of skills that can be brought to bear on most software development projects. Pakistani youth has potential, well-educated and hardworking. Due to latest investment in education outcome is up to the mark. Future plan is we want more energetic people in software development and telecommunication and want to expand into Business Process Outsourcing (BPO), finance, banking and modernization projects. Palmchip invested in Palmchip Pakistan to setup three design centers, two in Lahore and one in Islamabad." About entrepreneurship promotion in Pakistan he added, "In order to promote entrepreneurship in Pakistan government and educational institutions need to provide platform to learn business, setup Venture Capital (VC) to fund the companies. Entrepreneurs have very bright future in Pakistan as Telecom, Software and finance sectors are at very fast growth. With little guidance Pakistani youth could be next Bill gates. They just need to find mentors," he concluded.

Jauher Zaidi is Founder, Chairman, President and CEO of Palmchip Corporation, a hardware and software design company. He is a pioneer in Channel based SoC interconnect architecture, bringing mainframe approach onto a single chip. He also pioneered the SoC Platform IP licensing business model. Jauher has over 26-year experience in executive management, mainframe processor, co-processor, fiber-optic networking design, and system integration at Unisys. He also led the System-on-chip Input/Output devices (single-chip I/O) processor for mainframe computer at Amdahl, and mass storage group at Samsung. Before founding Palmchip in 1996, he led the flash and disk controller system-on-chip (SoC) integration at Quantum Corporation. Jauher is also a Chairman and CEO of Palmchip Pakistan Private Limited, software and IT outsourcing company focused on VoIP and Telecomm. He is a board of Advisor for Savant Company, a leader in International System-on-Chip conferences. He has also founded Silicon Pakistan organization to bring SoC technologies to Pakistan. He received his Bachelor of Science in Electronic Engineering (BSEE) and Master of Science in Electronic Engineering (MSEE) degrees from Pacific States University in Los Angeles, California, USA. He has written and presented a number of articles and papers on the IP business model, future business and technology trends. He has also participated in many system-on-chip panels, and is a recognized expert in the area of SoC and Embedded System development. He invented the CoreFrame SoC Integration Architecture. He holds several patents on SoC technology and infrastructure.