Outsourcing. Effectively managing the supply chain. Deciphering the Asia growth phenomenon. The next killer app. These are all legitimate issues for the leaders of the industry to consider. However, as the industry increases in complexity, the constant thread is the requirement for continuous innovation to ensure competitive longevity. Significant, monumental innovation resulting in commercial success must be part of the executive vision and must be embraced by the engineering teams.

Innovation that breaks through traditional thinking, methodology and architectures to deliver commercially viable and highly differentiated products is fundamental to creating a long-term, profitable business model that can survive in a constantly evolving industry. What customers value is not pure innovation; it's the possibilities enabled by innovation that make it a commercial success. This incorporates industry-standard value propositions like smaller bill of materials (BOM), ease of use and accelerated time-to-market. This type of innovation opens up markets to new entrants and shakes up established market leaders. For example, RF solutions in CMOS that offered significant advantages in ease of use and lower BOM were very attractive to handset up-and-comer Samsung. Within two short years, Samsung's willingness to invest in highly integrated RF in CMOS was a contributing factor to its rapid ascension to become one of the top three cell phone manufacturers in the world. Concurrently, handset makers in China, with little or no prior RF experience, are creating hundreds of new models based on best-in-class RF solutions, opening up an entire market to new handset makers.

Innovation for innovation's sake is a losing proposition. But innovation in mixed signal, particularly in CMOS, is a strategy that ensures success amid the ups and downs in the semiconductor industry.

Dan Artusi, President, Chief Executive Officer, Silicon Laboratories Inc., Austin, Texas