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OCTOBER 16, 2002 NEWSMAKER Q&A A Seamless Style for Wearable Computers Forget clunky, cyborg-like costumes. Chipmaker Infineon's Stefan Jung says the devices it makes blend right into the clothing
And that helps explain why the wearable-computing market hasn't become the hot industry that was predicted several years ago. According to technology-research firm Venture Development Corp. (VDC), wearable computing sales were just $70 million in 2001. Still, Stefan Jung, senior scientist at the world's sixth-largest chipmaker, Infineon Technologies (IFX ), isn't ready to toss wearable computers into the Goodwill bin yet. He says the industry has been thinking about the issue in the wrong way. Instead of draping people in wires and complicated, high-tech accessories, Infineon's researchers have created ordinary-looking clothing -- a vest and a sports jacket -- with tiny electronics woven into the fabric. Jung, who heads Infineon's wearable electronics research project, believes normal clothing with electronics sown in will be the future of wearable computing. A jacket with an MP3 player could take the world by storm as early as a year from now, he predicts. And he cites a September, 2002, study from VDC that projects worldwide shipments of wearable computers will rise 700%, to $563 million, in 2006. On the night of the fashion show, Jung spoke about Infineon's vision -- and fashions -- with BusinessWeek Online Reporter Olga Kharif. Edited excerpts of the interview follow: Q: How do the designs you offered at the show compare to what other companies are demonstrating here? A: If you look at the people at the conference here, they wear special glasses, have lots of wires hanging off of them, have whole PCs wrapped around their belts. This is not what we're doing. We show that it's possible to implement very small, invisible computer chips into garments. Not for the virtual-reality applications that everyone at the conference is focused on but applications you might want to have in everyday life -- like an MP3 player. The technology could also be used for medical monitoring of elderly people: For example, shirts that have sensors integrated into them so that your vital signs are monitored all the time. [Then] if something goes wrong, the system automatically calls the doctor. Q: So the wires and the chips are part of your clothes, and they can be washed and bent. How does the technology work? A: The fabric looks like and feels like regular fabric, and it is, in fact, polyester. To establish electrical connections, we integrate very thin copper wires -- you can't see or feel them -- into the fabric as it's being woven. The electronics itself -- for example, the MP3 player module, which is a very small circuit board, approximately 3 cm by 3 cm (1.18 square inches) -- is encapsulated in plastic. The conductive fabrics -- [the wires that are woven into fabric] -- come directly out of the module.
Q: How many times can you wash a jacket before the electronics are ruined? A: Up till now, we haven't seen any damage during washing. But we'll do more tests when we actually know how the technology will be used. Requirements for clothes are different depending on whether they'll be used as an MP3 player or a medical solution. Q: A few years ago, people were saying wearable computing was just around the corner, but it's still not quite here. Why? A: The technology wasn't mature enough. A couple of years ago, an MP3 player module was simply too large to be integrated into the clothing. But today the chip we use is only 5 mm by 5 mm (or about 1/5 square inch). Electronics are constantly shrinking in a way that will continue to make it easier to integrate more functionality into clothing. We think, in a year or two, some of these kinds of products [such as a jacket with an MP3 player] will be available to consumers. Q: How do you see this market developing? A: We expect that wearable electronics will first catch on with consumers. We think the health-care market will be next -- but that will happen a couple of years later, since medical applications require more testing. Eventually, the electronics could also be used in the upholstery of car seats and the carpets. You could integrate sensors into the car seats so that the car can detect how many people are inside. This might automatically trigger certain comfort and safety features, such as increased ventilation or seat-belt adjustments for different-size people. We also see some kinds of chips being inserted into clothing by manufacturers for inventory control and brand authentication. This would enable a retailer to verify that the jeans it receives in a shipment are from the branded manufacturer and not lower-quality knockoffs. Q: Why would people want MP3 players sewn into their clothes? Won't that be inconvenient? A: We think there are two reasons. First of all, it can be very awkward to use handheld electronics while doing other things, such as [playing] sports. By integrating a music player into the clothing itself, we eliminate problems like tangled wires and keypads that are too small to see. The jacket that was in the fashion show has a simple keypad integrated into the sleeve and also responds to voice commands. So it's very convenient to use, even if you're carrying other things or need to do something else with your hands. The second reason is that fashion is a subjective thing. There's always a desire for something new. We think a lot of people would like to have apparel with an integrated music player because it makes a statement about their sense of style. Q: What about the costs? A: We believe that electronics can be integrated into clothing in a very cost-effective way. We expect that something like music-player functionality can be added to a garment with only a 10% or 20% increase in the cost of the garment. This is essential to market acceptance. Infineon's goal is to address these types of low-cost applications. The company is well positioned to do this because we already make a broad range of chips for things like data storage, wireless connectivity, and security identification. What we're doing is finding new uses for chips that are already produced in a very cost-effective way. Infineon will also minimize the cost to clothing manufacturers by providing all the necessary hardware, software, and connectors in one easy-to-sew-in module. Q: But what about the batteries? A: The greatest obstacle in wearable electronics is the power supply. You always have to have batteries with you and recharge them. But we've developed a chip technology that can generate electrical energies from temperature differences.
Imagine you have a chip like that integrated into your jacket: Inside, it's warm, outside it's cold. There's a heat flow through the chip, and it can generate some energy. Not very much, at this point, only some microwatts. [But] that's still sufficient to power a wristwatch or a heart-rate monitor. And we believe that the MP3 player of the future won't be powered by batteries. Q: How do you get consumers to accept this technology? A: We can overcome this challenge by close cooperation with the fashion industry. If we develop a superb MP3 player but the customer doesn't like how the clothes look, at the end -- we lose. The clothing will have to be stylish and well-marketed. Q: How does wearable computing fit into Infineon's strategy overall? A: We're always looking for new applications for microelectronics. We want to make technology that will play an important role in the lifestyle of the future. And wearable electronics is interesting in that way.  Edited by Patricia O'Connell Get BusinessWeek directly on your desktop with our RSS feeds.  Add BusinessWeek news to your Web site with our headline feed. Click to buy an e-print or reprint of a BusinessWeek or BusinessWeek Online story or video. To subscribe online to BusinessWeek magazine, please click here. Learn more, go to the BusinessWeekOnline home page  | | OCTOBER |
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