February 2015
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PI of 3.7, which is dramatically better than the
initial ASIC NPV of $12.85 million and its PI
of 0.1. The NPV and PI for Zynq SoC deriva-
tives at that same 20 percent profit margin are
even more impressive. Xilinx customers have
shown that the cost of a derivative in a Zynq
SoC platform strategy is typically 60 percent
less than their initial design.
Comparing the Zynq SoC platform deriva-
tive at the same 20 percent profit margin as
the ASIC platform derivative addressing a
market 80 percent the size of the initial design,
the Zynq SoC platform NPV is $96.66 million
with a PI of 8.33. This is considerably better
than the ASIC derivative, which has an NPV
of $74.78 and a PI of 2.14. Similarly, the NPV
for the derivative Zynq SoC design addressing
a market half the size of the targeted market of
the initial Zynq SoC design would be $56.34
million with a PI of 4.86. This is far superior to
the ASIC platform derivative numbers. Even
if we leave the ASIC platform profit margin at
20 percent and compare the results to a Zynq
SoC platform assuming a lower, 15 percent
profit margin (accounting for perhaps higher
unit costs for the Zynq SoC), it presents a far
superior path to maximizing profitability. The
initial design at a 15 percent profit margin
would have an NPV of $73.67 million, yield-
ing a PI of 2.45. This is a vast improvement
over the initial ASIC NPV of $12.85 million
and its PI of 0.1 even when the ASIC has 20
percent profit margin.
For a Zynq SoC platform design that targets
a market of 80 percent ($1.04 billion), the
revenue size of the initial Zynq SoC targeted
market it would take 23 engineers two years to
develop a derivative Zynq SoC-based product.
In the end, the product would garner an NPV
of $69.78 million with a PI of 6.02. This com-
pares with the ASIC derivative NPV of $74.78
million, which is slightly better than the Zynq
SoC derivative NPV. However, the PI for the
Zynq SoC derivative at a 15 percent profit
margin is considerably better than the ASIC
derivative PI of 2.14, even when the ASIC has
a higher (20 percent) profit margin.
Further, a derivative Zynq SoC design (again
at a 15 percent profit margin) addressing a
market half the size of the initial Zynq SoC
design targeted market would garner an
NPV of $39.55 million and a PI of 3.41. That
is not only better than the ASIC derivative
PI of 0.98 but also better than the PI of the
initial Zynq SoC. It should be noted that
while profit margins will vary depending
on the volume needs of a given market, the
data shows that the Zynq SoC is a superior
platform choice even for high-volume appli-
cations. Even when comparing an ASIC plat-
form at a higher profit margin of 20 percent
to a Zynq SoC platform at a 15 profit margin,
the Zynq SoC is a far better platform solution
financially as well as technically. At lower
volumes, the Zynq SoC platform is of course
even more convincingly the best platform
choice to maximize profitability
Today, a number of customers in a broad
range of application areas are achieving
dramatically greater scales of economy by
leveraging the Zynq SoC as the heart of their
platform strategies. A prime example is a
world-renowned maker of high-end elec-
tronic control units (ECUs) for the automo-
tive industry. This customer is standardizing
on the Zynq SoC as a platform solution.
Wielding the Zynq SoC and heavily leverag-
ing the reuse of tightly coupled hardware and
software IP, the company has created a highly
flexible ECU platform that it can quickly
customize for the specific needs of multiple
automakers and their different lines, mod-
els/configurations and accessory bundles
(figure 3). By using the ZynqSoC as a central
platform, the company has achieved max-
imum economy of scale, reducing budgets
while increasing the number of products it
delivers to a growing number of customers.
The upshot is delivering tailored ECUs to
customers faster.
n
Hall-Stand 2-319
ARBOR: industrial Panel PC for
high-end applications
ARBOR Technology launched the LYNC-
817, a new 17” fanless industrial Panel
PC, power by Intel Celeron J1900, offer-
ing higher performance and lower power
consumption compared to previous gener-
ations of Intel processors. In addition to its
multitude of I/O ports and multiple inte-
grated wireless communication module,
the LYNC-817 also has the ability to accept
power input from 9 to 36 volts, making the
LYNC-817 a high value product with excel-
lent performance and cost-saving benefit,
and ideal for high end industrial applica-
tions such as factory automation, process
control and interactive media and commu-
nication.
Hall-Stand 2-220/338
Advantech: Computer-on-Module with
ARM Cortex-A9 i.MX6 processor
Advantech announced a RISC RTX COM
module, ROM-3420; powered by the Frees-
cale ARM Cortex-A9 i.MX6 Dual 1GHz
high performance processor. Advantech
introduced the RTX 2.0 (RISC Technology
eXtended) specification which is a RISC
standard platform form factor designed
for demanding applications. Through its
innovative mechanical and electrical design,
ROM-3420 designed with RTX 2.0 can
effortlessly perform complex and challeng-
ing tasks in demanding environments such
as military, logistics, transportation/fleet
management and many other fields.
Embedded World
News
Figure 3. A customer has maximized its initial design investment by using a ZynqSoC platform to
serve multiple carmakers and multiple lines and models for each manufacturer, improving profitability.
