Electronica 2024 in Munich attracted over 3,000 exhibitors from more than 50 countries and showcased a comprehensive range of products and solutions.  Its 16 forums covered topics from automotive electronics to cybersecurity, providing a platform for industry experts to share insights and discuss emerging trends.

Intelligent energy consumption and its role in shaping the world’s sustainable energy future and ecological footprint was a key topic at Electronica 2024.

The automotive field, one of the biggest economic arenas (€176 billion as estimated by Ernst & Young Global) and most important in our everyday lives, continues on its path to digitalization and electrification. The modern car has become a highly connected IoT device with intensive fused sensor applications. Future technologies are on the rise, such as assisted and autonomous driving, personalized driving experiences, and advanced driver-assistance and safety systems.

The event explored advancements in semiconductors and embedded systems that form the basis for all electronic devices. These include voice processing, automation, autonomous cars, health monitoring, sensing, computer vision, robots, industry 4.0, and security solutions.

The world’s shift to generative AI and always-connected intelligent edge devices has led to significant advances in all aspects of embedded systems, starting with sensors and embedded vision incorporating onboard processing and advanced machine learning in tiny devices. Electronica reflected these trends, from developing connected devices, energy harvesting, and low-power design to software, tools, and benchmarking.

Sensors on display included touch, pressure, vibration, movement, IR, and more. Sensors must be intelligent to avoid transmitting vast volumes of noisy raw data. In this regard, data processing near sensors becomes a critical question, and several exhibitors have brought neuromorphic processors to the show for that purpose.

At Electronica, POLYN met with existing partners and attracted potential new customers by presenting its Neuromorphic Analog Signal Processors—NeuroVoice and VibroSense—which support sustainability and low power consumption.

NeuroVoice addresses the most annoying problems of mass-market voice processing devices: the hearing experience amid irregular noises, short battery life, loss of cloud connection, and data privacy issues. It offers highly accurate, ultra-low-power AI voice processing in tiny devices without connecting to the cloud. Possible applications are voice management systems for home and industry; voice control in robotics; headphones for industrial workers, rescuers, bikers, and gamers; walkie-talkie and intercom systems; earbuds (TWS) and smartphones; hearing aids and hearing assistance (OTC).

VibroSense is an ultra-low-power neuromorphic front-end chip for vibration analysis. Integrated into sensor nodes in smart tires, it can supply important information about the road and tire condition to ADAS systems. Applied to machine health monitoring, VibroSense makes condition monitoring affordable for all rotating machines. Such on-sensor data optimization is set to transform the future of IIoT.

We expect neuromorphic signal processing to continue to grow in popularity, with a prominent place in future editions of Electronica.