Industrial Electronics

Industrial electronics are important drivers for the world’s development. Globalization, cyber-physical systems and industry 4.0 amongst other words currently sum up the most important economic and social developments. Robustness, miniaturization, reliability, safety and security are central to the implementation of electronics into products.

Fraunhofer IZM is known for its outstanding track record in safety and security technology. The area of automation is a key area of industrial electronics and with our broad experience in this area we create synergies. We can place them in this area, which includes equipment safety, identity verification and product traceability. 

A second key area is advancing automation technology. This happens through validating and introducing new developments from related areas in microelectronic and microsystem technology.

A current key priority is developing innovative solutions for autarkic, multi-channel wireless sensors used in control technology. We are currently assessing the real-time capability of such systems, because it is a key parameter for application in industry.

Threats and protection mechanisms for the trustworthiness of electronic hardware

RealIZM blog series “Hardware security” – Part 1 With increasing globalization and more complex supply chains, electronic hardware is also becoming more susceptible to manipulation. Jan Hefer, a member of the RF & Smart Sensor Systems department, is working hard…

Berlin Center for Digital Transformation: Digitization Solutions for Industry 4.0 and IIoT

The four Fraunhofer institutes – Fraunhofer FOKUS, Fraunhofer HHI, Fraunhofer IPK, and Fraunhofer IZM – have been cooperating under the umbrella of the Berlin Center for Digital Transformation since 2017, pooling their expertise in the fields of information and communication…

ICT: How can digital technologies become greener?

At the beginning of March, the ministry invited the project partners to the online conference “Green ICT 2023 – Sustainable Information and Communication Technologies”. In the run-up to this conference, RealIZM spoke with Dr. phil. Lutz Stobbe, head of the…

How do you develop the best radar systems in the world for the application in question?

Creating the best radar systems in the world for the application in question is an ambitious undertaking, But Dr. Christian Tschoban and Paul Perlwitz from Fraunhofer IZM are working on nothing short of that goal: The two scientists have developed…

A bionic sensor skin for semi-autonomous service robots in challenging land and underwater applications

A 50,000 square meter artificial reef off the Baltic coast and a green space following the trajectory of the Berlin Wall: Two places, about 240 km apart from each other and as different as could be. However, only a few…

Start-a-Factory at 5: A Modular Hardware Development and Production Lab

The borough of Wedding, situated in the north of Berlin, gets the hearts of electronics enthusiasts, startup entrepreneurs, and the R&D teams of SMEs racing. Since the end of 2017, Start-A-Factory (SAF) at Fraunhofer IZM has been offering a unique…

High speed with optical signals: Will the printed circuit board of the future be made of glass?

The backbone of our digital world is made of glass: A network of optical fibers spans the globe and lets data criss-cross our globe. We also experience the digital world through a pane of glass: We interact with the online…

Mission Impossible? The Art of Measuring Fluid Mechanics on Sails

To improve and enhance the performance of high-performance sails, it is important to know and optimize their fluid mechanical and structural properties. For ultralight textile structures – be it sails for ships or even paragliders and parachutes – it has…

When Software Meets Hardware, or: How AI Can Protect Power Lines

Better, faster and, above all, increasingly automated – this is the vision for many sectors of industry, from the automotive sector to energy suppliers. One solution that is becoming more and more popular is artificial intelligence. We spoke to Bernd…

Step Towards Secure Industrial Digitalization

Modern society is relying more and more on connected, digitalized, and automated technology – an epochal change that touches on all aspects of business life, including the manufacturing of products. Fraunhofer IZM is at the forefront of this trend, creating…