Well some people (including myself) have started telling Zilog what they thought. And we haven't seen a single post by a Zilog employee, even if just passing by and having a little chat. It might be too early after the sale, but it might also be a good idea to actually pay attention to people who think that the company still has a chance, no?

Atmel has Ulf Samuelsson. Parallax has Chip Gracey (the company founder, no less) and probably every single engineer. Who will speak for Zilog?

Ed Dantes wrote:
Well some people (including myself) have started telling Zilog what they thought. And we haven't seen a single post by a Zilog employee, even if just passing by and having a little chat. It might be too early after the sale, but it might also be a good idea to actually pay attention to people who think that the company still has a chance, no?

Atmel has Ulf Samuelsson. Parallax has Chip Gracey (the company founder, no less) and probably every single engineer. Who will speak for Zilog?

Ed -
Zilog is listening. People throughout Zilog are paying attention to what is being posted and stated. In the past, most of the complaints, issues and desires came from the sales people, external forums or not at all. The forum is the first step to improving that situation. One of the big complaints we were hearing was the website, so we are working on ways to improve that. The first step was the Forum and the Video sections. There are more changes in the works.
The Zilog management is working with IXYS to identify synergies between the companies and how each can be advantageous to both. This includes the information that all the posters are providing.
We appreciate the information, discussions and criticisms, these will help shape what Zilog will be in the future.
Thank you for your continued support
Tom Ormiston
Zilog Forum Moderator

thanks for quick the reply,
this forum is a good thing , i really never heard about ixys before they bought zilog , i just understand that
ixys needs MCUs to complement their power solutions , i dont have any clue for synergies beyond that ...

Maybe one clue : power saving are big when using a low power process but even bigger when they are
thought at higher level : system level . So all in all this is linked to OS and software and applications so
here comes MCus , and more specficly 8bit mcus. I doubt ixys need zatara.

I just really really hope that Zilog will mantain itself as a brand and dont drive its strategy only with "power driving" point
of view , this company is well over than this , the brand "zilog" worth much more than 60musd or so , really ...

Leo wrote:
I just really really hope that Zilog will mantain itself as a brand and dont drive its strategy only with "power driving" point
of view , this company is well over than this , the brand "zilog" worth much more than 60musd or so , really ...

Indeed.

Well a few sources on the Net mention that the details of that sale are under investigation, as it seems that the price paid is below Zilog's market worth. Assuming the facts stated are true, the following URL doesn't paint a great picture:
Zilog Aquired by IXYS

Morevover, I must say that I don't have much trust in the current management. It's mostly a gut feeling, but basically Zilog stagnated since the takeover. And when I look at the Executive Management page, I see a lot of marketing, sales and stuff like that, but not much else. Where's the VP of Microelectronics? VP of Development Tools (software, hardware, doc)? VP of Professional Services?

Tom Ormiston wrote:
Ed -
Zilog is listening. People throughout Zilog are paying attention to what is being posted and stated. In the past, most of the complaints, issues and desires came from the sales people, external forums or not at all. The forum is the first step to improving that situation. One of the big complaints we were hearing was the website, so we are working on ways to improve that. The first step was the Forum and the Video sections. There are more changes in the works.
The Zilog management is working with IXYS to identify synergies between the companies and how each can be advantageous to both. This includes the information that all the posters are providing.
We appreciate the information, discussions and criticisms, these will help shape what Zilog will be in the future.
Thank you for your continued support
Tom Ormiston
Zilog Forum Moderator

Tom,

Thank you for your answer. I can't help but notice that while the first part is an honest statement of some facts (and I thank you for that), the second is pure PR c**p.

To quote Terry Pratchett (in Going Postal):
It was garbage, but it had been cooked by an expert. You had to admire the way perfectly innocent words were mugged, ravished, stripped of all true meaning and decency and then sent to walk the gutter for Reacher Gilt, although 'synergistically' had probably been a whore from the start.

I guess that "synergies" qualifies, too.

-Ed

You must be an engineer , like me .

Of course we all know that "synergies" means : headcount reduction , it s strange should not synergies have been
studied before buying ? , breaking into pieces keep some, sell others ... , dealing with R&D like pure cost or variable
you can adjust for one quarter to an other as if it was not taking years and years to build a team and expertise ...

That is the way it has always been in this industry (i mean last 5yrs), it is not a matter of zilog or ixys being
"too marketing/financial" and not enough "Engineer" , it s just like everywhere else .

The key is to know if ixys is the type of company that has an industrial strategy with the addition of mcu to its
product line , or it is just opportunism : did these two worked together for , lets say , serving the same customer
solution ?

It is hard to see the future of 8 bits mcu : some say everything will be 32bits ( Arm ) since its so more powerfull , sw
support , cheaper every year , but we see very strong "resistance" of 8 bit mcu's in market share and also applications
will never need more than that : battery charger , long play / low power mp3 , basic power management like
standy/wake up control (over ethernet ) , basic gps controls embedded in apps , etc ... mostly smart GPio's.

cheers,