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The Smart Techie was renamed Siliconindia India Edition starting Feb 2012 to continue the nearly two decade track record of excellence of our US edition.

Texas Instruments: Taking charge of the Indian electronics environment

Pradeep Shankar
Friday, November 30, 2007
Pradeep Shankar
Earlier this year, Texas Instruments President and CEO Rich Templeton made a profound statement, “In the last 20 years, India changed TI. In the next 20, TI will work with its customers to change India.” Twenty two years back Texas Instruments bet on the Indian talent and became the first multinational to set up an R&D center in India. The 1400 engineers here are developing complex silicon designs and embedded systems and software products, making it one of TI’s largest design centers outside the United States. There is hardly any product of TI today that is not touched by TI India engineers at this world-class R&D center. With 415 patents in its fold— the highest number of U.S. patents granted to an organization in India—TI India has won the laurel of being the most innovative company in India. Now TI is betting on the Indian electronics market. Though this market is relatively small compared to the other markets, the company believes it will be a different story in a few years.

Texas Instruments, the pioneering company where engineer Jack Kilby invented the integrated circuit and essentially launched the modern electronics business, has led the market for specialized cell phone chips— transforming a humble cell phone into a multi-featured portable device, with its highly differentiated and powerful OMAPTM applications processor. Today we find TI’s digital signal processing (DSP) technology in most of the cell phones sold across the world. Engineers at TI are integrating even more functions on a single chip, so that cell phones can be used as digital camcorders, digital TVs, and 3-D gaming platforms. You can even carry your slides in your cell phones, powered by OMAP, and make your presentations directly from the handset!

TI’s DSP chips are also used in security and surveillance, wireless infrastructure, video conferencing, IP phones, industrial, medical and automobiles. TI’s digital light processing (DLPTM) technology for digital cinema and front projection systems are becoming increasingly popular as well. As the global demand for electronics rises, so should TI.

Analog Everywhere

The company has enjoyed steadily growing sales in recent years, from $12.6 billion in 2004 to $14.3 billion last year, and profits have zipped along from $1.8 billion to more than $4 billion over the same period. While its supply contracts with mobile phone manufacturers including Nokia and Motorola grab all the headlines, the bulk of TI’s business comes from chips that are nowhere near as attention-getting, but vital to every electronic system in the world. About 40 percent of the company’s sales in 2006 are its analog chips.


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