Driverless Tech, IoT Center Stage at Renesas Devcon 2015 in Orange Co.

Burney Simpson

Silicon Valley is moving south in October as Renesas Electronics Corp., holds its annual development conference in Orange County, Calif., bringing together semiconductor experts and autonomous-vehicle engineers and programmers involved in the explosive growth of driverless technology.

The Renesas Devcon 2015 runs October 12-15, offering dozens of seminars, 84 demonstrations in the exhibit hall, and a number of major autonomous industry firms. The show will be held at the Hyatt Regency, Orange County, in Garden Grove, Calif.

The overarching theme of Devcon 2015 is the Internet of Things (IoT), with autonomous vehicle technology being one major aspect of that.

The shows 15 tracks include Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS), Automotive Cockpit, Automotive-Safety and Security, Connectivity, Automotive Embedded Controls, Motor Control, Automotive Technology Insights, and Automotive Tools and Ecosystem. Tracks offer a mix of lab and lecture, with introductory, intermediate, and advanced approaches.

Seminars will be led by authorities from Arada Systems (on ADAS), GainSpan Corp., GM, Green Hills Software, Harbrick, Link Labs, Qualcomm Atheros, Semtech, the University of Michigan, and Zebra Technologies, in addition to Renesas.

In July, Arada and Renesas announced they were collaborating on connected car technology. Qualcomm closed in August on its $2.4 billion purchase of CSR plc, a provider of semiconductors and software for the Internet of Everything and for the automotive industry.

Renesas supplies microcontrollers and microprocessors worldwide, including the RH850/P1x-C automotive safety MCU series.

An influential player in autonomous- and connected-vehicle technology, Renesas Electronics Corp. grew from the 2010 merger of NEC Electronics and Renesas Technology Corp. The U.S. headquarters is Santa Clara, Calif., while Tokyo is the corporate home. Renesas reported fiscal 2015 net income of $683 million on net revenues of $6.6 billion.