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EE Times Europe’s December 2020 issue, published on December 7, 2020 and edited by Anne‑Françoise Pelé, is a professional electronics magazine centered on memory technology and the market forces reshaping demand. It also features a long-range 3D time-of-flight (ToF) imager for photography and immersive AR/MR, industrial-cloud security, artificial empathy, conference coverage and power- and energy-system engineering.

Issue at a glance

Item Details
Publication EE Times Europe, December 2020 issue
Publication date December 7, 2020
Editor Anne‑Françoise Pelé
Central theme Memory technology and the forces changing memory demand
Other major areas 3D imaging, industrial cybersecurity, human-centered AI, power electronics and sustainable energy

Pelé describes the issue as exploring “the trends and technologies shaping the market for memory ICs.” She also writes that “A Special Report looks at how diverse memory technologies are and the market forces that are driving their evolution.”

Memory technology is the issue’s core theme

The special report treats memory as a moving target rather than a single product category. Demand is expanding and changing as edge computing, artificial intelligence, 5G and autonomous-driving systems generate new requirements for capacity, speed, power consumption and reliability.

How to evaluate the memory discussion

The issue’s technology comparisons are best understood through the workload they serve. Relevant axes include:

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  • Bandwidth and latency: how quickly data can be supplied and how long an operation waits for it.
  • Density: how much information fits in a given package, board area or system.
  • Endurance: how well a memory tolerates repeated writes.
  • Energy per operation: a critical constraint for battery-powered and edge devices.
  • Application fit: whether the technology suits edge inference, AI training, automotive electronics or 5G infrastructure.

This framing connects device choices with market demand: autonomous vehicles and AI may prioritize throughput and reliability, while edge products often impose tighter energy and thermal limits.

Cover story: long-range 3D ToF imaging

The cover story, “State-of-the Art Photography and Immersive AR/MR Experiences with Longest-Range 3D ToF Imager,” links depth sensing to two demanding user experiences: high-quality photography and immersive augmented- or mixed-reality systems.

What a long-range ToF imager contributes

A time-of-flight imager derives depth from the travel time of emitted light. Extending usable range gives a camera or headset more reliable three-dimensional information for subjects that are farther away or scenes that occupy a larger space. In photography, depth data can support scene understanding and computational effects. In AR/MR, it can help digital objects relate convincingly to physical surfaces and people.

The title identifies the imager as the longest-range device in its class at the time of publication; the issue overview does not provide a numerical range, laboratory protocol or independent benchmark, so no specific distance should be inferred from the headline.

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Industrial-cloud and operational-technology security

Several articles examine vulnerabilities in the industrial cloud, industrial-control systems (ICS), operational technology (OT) and connected Industrial Internet of Things environments. The emphasis is practical: connecting machines and control networks to cloud services expands capabilities but also creates additional paths for attack.

Why industrial attacks differ from ordinary IT incidents

  • OT systems can control physical processes, so a compromise may affect safety, production or equipment.
  • Legacy controllers and long service lives can make patching and replacement difficult.
  • Cloud links, remote access and IIoT devices increase the number of trust relationships that must be managed.
  • Availability and deterministic operation may be more important than immediate software updates.

The coverage therefore belongs alongside engineering decisions about architecture, segmentation, access control, monitoring and recovery—not as a separate corporate-IT issue.

Artificial empathy and human-centered AI

“Artificial Empathy in the Next Decade” considers how AI might recognize, model or respond to human emotional states. Its placement in the issue broadens the technology discussion beyond processors and sensors to the design of systems that interact with people.

Artificial empathy should not be read as proof that a machine feels emotion. In engineering terms, it concerns sensing human signals, interpreting context and selecting responses that appear more socially appropriate. That raises questions about data quality, privacy, bias, explainability and the limits of inferring a person’s feelings from observable behavior.

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Conference reporting from electronica and SEMI

All-digital electronica 2020

The issue reports on the CEO Roundtable, Embedded Forum and Power Electronics Forum at the all-digital electronica 2020. Together, these sessions connect market direction, embedded-system design and detailed power engineering.

SEMI MEMS & Sensors Executive Congress 2020

It also highlights Jens Fabrowsky’s keynote at SEMI MEMS & Sensors Executive Congress 2020, extending the issue’s sensor and systems perspective beyond the ToF cover story.

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Power Electronics Forum: from conversion to storage

The Power Electronics Forum is organized into four practical domains: power management, power supplies, energy storage, and power semiconductors and components.

Power management and conversion

  • GaN integrated circuits and 48-V computing
  • Parallel MOSFET current sharing
  • USB Type-C Power Delivery
  • Power-system design tools
  • Frequency-response analysis
  • Hardware-in-the-loop simulation

These subjects span architecture, control, measurement and validation. The recurring engineering trade-offs are conversion efficiency, thermal behavior, switching frequency, component count and control complexity.

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Power supplies and system robustness

  • GaN and system-in-package (SiP) power supplies
  • UPS robustness
  • AC/DC converter architecture
  • EMI and switching-loss reduction for SiC FETs

Integration can reduce size and parasitics, while higher switching speeds may improve power density but increase electromagnetic-interference and thermal-design challenges.

Energy storage

  • AI methods for electric-vehicle range
  • Semiconductor-based energy storage
  • Supercapacitors
  • Wireless-energy transfer

The issue cites a Zion Market Research estimate of about 6% annual growth over four years and a US$296 billion global energy-storage market by 2024. That is an industry estimate quoted in the magazine’s Power Electronics Forum, not a newly verified 2026 forecast.

Power semiconductors and components

  • Silicon-carbide (SiC) market growth
  • CMOS isolators and SiGe rectifiers
  • IGBT gate drivers
  • ASIC sensors
  • Automotive high-voltage discrete power products

For comparing these approaches, the useful questions are operating temperature, voltage and current range, switching loss, isolation needs, package and integration level, supply maturity, and the test method used to validate performance.

Solar and wireless energy applications

Beyond device-level power electronics, the issue covers solar energy as a source of electricity and wireless-energy transfer. This places renewable generation and power delivery in the same editorial frame as converters, storage devices and semiconductor switches: system performance depends on how energy is generated, conditioned, stored and delivered.

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Who will find this issue useful?

  • Memory and system architects: for a market-oriented view of memory diversity and workload pressures.
  • Imaging and AR/MR engineers: for the long-range ToF application perspective.
  • OT and IIoT security teams: for the industrial-cloud and control-system threat context.
  • Power designers: for coverage ranging from 48-V and USB-C systems to GaN, SiC, storage and validation methods.
  • Technology strategists: for conference reporting that connects component advances with broader market and application trends.

The Bottom Line

EE Times Europe’s December 2020 issue is a broad engineering snapshot organized around changing memory demand, with supporting coverage of long-range 3D imaging, industrial cybersecurity, human-centered AI, and the complete power-electronics chain from conversion and semiconductors to storage and renewable-energy applications.

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