Electronic Design Weekly: July 6, 2026
In This Issue
- Editorial: The Great Debate: Do We Use AI Tools to be Better Engineers?
- Featured Content
- New Products
- Cabe's Special Section: More About AI Tools and How to Use Them
- Multimedia on ElectronicDesign
- Editor's Choice: From the ElectronicDesign Archives
- Editor's Weekly Picks
- Illustrated Engineering
- Electronic Design Word of the Week
- New in Electronic Design's Member Library
- More Electronic Design Weekly
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Editorial: The Great Debate: Do We Use AI Tools to be Better Engineers?
On one side of the coin, artificial intelligence (AI) can make images, sound, and video — a final product presented by the user as if they made it. On the flipside of that coin, AI is able to make code, solve problems, analyze, automate, process and parse data — the user creates a machine that performs work or produces an output, invisible in relation to the final product they present.
I think we engineers have a unique and healthy relationship with AI. We’re asked to create a “thing” that does “something.” AI is at the core of that “thing,” helping it do “something.” AI is not the “thing” but how it does the “something.”
Let me give an example...
Continue reading this editorial.
Editor's Choice: From the ElectronicDesign Archives
These articles were chosen by the editors at ElectronicDesign that complement the new articles above. They’re included in our regular newsletters.
Bill Wong's Picks of the Week
No theme for me this week. Just some topics I find interesting like the EU's Industry 5.0 and MWRF's International Microwave Symposium coverage.
- The Coming Shift: Why Industry 5.0 Will Be Driven by AI in Mechanical @ Machine Design
The next wave of robotics depends on unifying code and hardware—embedding AI directly into the deterministic systems that power modern engineering. - What Were the Big Buzzwords at IMS 2026? @ Microwaves and RF
With each year’s edition, the International MTT-S Symposia proclaims consensus buzzwords that purport to point to the microwave industry’s future. 2026 was no exception. - What It Takes to Secure the 2026 World Cup @ Security Infowatch
From drones and cyber threats to AI-powered situational awareness, former FBI national security agent Carl Ghattas examines what it takes to secure a month-long sporting event spanning three countries and 16 host cities. - Microwaves & RF Online: June, 2026
Check out more of Microwaves & RF's (our sister publication) articles, videos, and other content for the month of June.
Andy's Picks from Around the Web
EV batteries are defying expectations after hundreds of thousands of miles. Link
UK sales of electric vehicles just overtook petrol cars for the first time. Link
Electric school buses tapped to shore up fragile US power grids during summer heat. Link
AI Data Centers Use Far More Water ["indirect" water use during power generation is not reported] Than Most Tech Giants Report. Link
Click here to see Andy's full list of the latest articles and news.
Dacia has reduced the price of the Spring electric city car to £11,990 [$16k. For another thousand quid you get a bigger motor and CarPlay], making it the cheapest new car and cheapest EV on sale in the UK. Link
Solar is crushing gas growth worldwide, a new report finds. Link
NASA needs volunteers to spend a year locked in a Mars simulation. Link
Palantir CEO Blows His Stack During Wild Interview, alleges data and model weight theft by AI. Link
Drone crackdown: More than 500 seized since start of World Cup. Link
Uh oh, tokens are getting too expensive... [with coined term of the week, "tokenpocalypse"]. Video
NASA prepares for daring rescue to save aging telescope from falling to Earth. [Hubble is also decaying...]. Video
War Stories from Detroit 3: Vehicle Development - How engineering got done in Detroit 1965-2000. Link
DARPA program aims to create a 30-year [nuclear isotope-powered] battery minimally viable prototype by early 2027. Link
Australia space agency has found 'likely source' of mystery space balls. Link
Windows 11 identifier code used to track Scattered Spider perp after Microsoft shared info with FBI. Link
German battery electric vehicles ( BEVs ) registered in June, had an increase of 78.2 percent compared to the same month last year. Their market share was 28.4 percent. In the first half of 2026, this type of vehicle saw a registration increase of 48.0 percent compared to the same period last year. Link
SoftBank Walks Away From Boston Dynamics for $325 Million, Hands Hyundai The Keys. Link
Unit sales of Daimler battery-electric trucks and buses increased by 21% YoY. Link
A sub–10-millisecond neural dynamical system based on phase-change memristors outperformed the A100 graphics processing unit by 50.38× to 478.18×. Link
Samsung chip division's single-year profits beat its past 40 years of profits, combined, due to increased memory and storage prices. Link
Power company hikes data center bills by 30%, cuts residential electricity costs by 1.3%. Link
How Phones Alerted Millions Before Quakes Shook Venezuela. Link
Meta’s AI Data Center Caught Leaking Deadly Bacteria Into Water Town Uses for Irrigation. Link
Andy's Video Pick of the Week
Remote locations like mines, military bases, and the (ant)arctic are difficult environments to deploy electrical power to without reliance on a supply, and transportation, chain of fossil fuels.
Solar doesn't work in places where there's a monsoon season or where it's dark for 6 months a year, and wind is not necessarily in prime locations such as in valley floors.
A while back, I did an Inside Electronics podcast with Nano Nuclear, who are in the midst of developing a series of small modular (nuclear) reactors, fueled at the factory, and trucked to the site in a self contained system, which has a shipping container form factor, that outputs electrical power for several years.
This video does a pretty decent job of describing the application of a similar SMR system, though it's about Nano's competitor BWXT who were awarded a contract for military base powering.
Unlike Nano's single container conduction cooled system, BWXT uses helium cooling and comprises multiple shipping containers. Check out the podcast (Hint content: "One ping only, Vasily") and this video.
enjoy,
-AndyT
Cabe's Picks of the Week:
We’re not the only engineering practice that is dabbing in AI tools. Machine Design is packed with them. Here’s a few to enjoy.
- Epicor Launches Secure AI tools to Form “Cognitive ERP” Platform @ Machine Design
Covers Epicor’s secure AI agents for ERP, manufacturing and supply-chain workflows. Worth reading for a look at how agentic AI could shape real business operations. - AI Enhancements to CAD and CAE: Faster and Better Design with More Possibilities @ Machine Design
Shows how AI is improving CAD and CAE through smarter selection, constraints and generative design. Useful for seeing where design software is headed next. - From Data to Decisions: The Race to Make Industrial AI Operational @ Machine Design
Explores how factories can turn machine data into faster operational decisions. A good read for understanding the gap between collecting data and using it well. - How AI Transforms Fragmented Data into Actionable Engineering Intelligence @ Machine Design
Looks at using AI to organize maintenance logs, sensor data and plant records. Interesting because it shows how scattered knowledge can become practical engineering insight
The last heroic deed by the creator of Yu-Gi-Oh, Kazuki Takahashi, inspired this cartoon. Kazuki also created, what I consider, the greatest engineer-hero-character in media today.
You can read about all this on the cartoon’s page.
Or see my whole Engineering on Friday cartoon catalog here.
The latest from AndyT's Inventors Comics Collection:
New in Electronic Design's Member Library
Are you an Electronic Design member? It’s free and you get access to content like our latest eBooks and editorial webinars. You can also provide feedback about articles.
About the Author
William G. Wong
Senior Content Director - Electronic Design and Microwaves & RF
I am Editor of Electronic Design focusing on embedded, software, and systems. As Senior Content Director, I also manage Microwaves & RF and I work with a great team of editors to provide engineers, programmers, developers and technical managers with interesting and useful articles and videos on a regular basis. Check out our free newsletters to see the latest content.
You can send press releases for new products for possible coverage on the website. I am also interested in receiving contributed articles for publishing on our website. Use our template and send to me along with a signed release form.
Check out my blog, AltEmbedded on Electronic Design, as well as his latest articles on this site that are listed below.
You can visit my social media via these links:
- AltEmbedded on Electronic Design
- Bill Wong on Facebook
- @AltEmbedded on Twitter
- Bill Wong on LinkedIn
I earned a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology and a Masters in Computer Science from Rutgers University. I still do a bit of programming using everything from C and C++ to Rust and Ada/SPARK. I do a bit of PHP programming for Drupal websites. I have posted a few Drupal modules.
I still get a hand on software and electronic hardware. Some of this can be found on our Kit Close-Up video series. You can also see me on many of our TechXchange Talk videos. I am interested in a range of projects from robotics to artificial intelligence.
Roger Engelke Jr.
Managing Editor - Electronic Design and Microwaves & RF
Roger manages the websites and print issues for Electronic Design and Microwaves &RF.
Cabe Atwell
Technology Editor, Electronic Design
Cabe is a Technology Editor for Electronic Design.
Engineer, Machinist, Cartoonist, Maker, Writer. A graduate Electrical Engineer actively plying his expertise in the industry and at his company, Gunhead. When not designing/building, he creates a steady torrent of projects and content in the media world. Many of his projects and articles are online at element14 & SolidSmack, industry-focused work at EETimes & EDN, and offbeat articles at Make Magazine. Currently, you can find him hosting webinars and contributing to Electronic Design and Machine Design.
Cabe is an electrical engineer, design consultant and author with 25 years’ experience. His most recent book is “Essential 555 IC: Design, Configure, and Create Clever Circuits”
Cabe writes the Engineering on Friday blog on Electronic Design.
See Cabe's cartoons & comic strips here.
James Morra
Senior Editor
James Morra is the senior editor for Electronic Design, covering the semiconductor industry and new technology trends, with a focus on power electronics and power management. He also reports on the business behind electrical engineering, including the electronics supply chain. He joined Electronic Design in 2015 and is based in Chicago, Illinois.
Andy Turudic
Technology Editor, Electronic Design
Andy Turudic is a Technology Editor for Electronic Design Magazine, primarily covering Analog and Mixed-Signal circuits and devices and also is Editor of ED's bi-weekly Automotive Electronics newsletter.
He holds a Bachelor's in EE from the University of Windsor (Ontario Canada) and has been involved in electronics, semiconductors, and gearhead stuff, for a bit over a half century. Andy also enjoys teaching his engineerlings at Portland Community College as a part-time professor in their EET program.
"AndyT" brings his multidisciplinary engineering experience from companies that include National Semiconductor (now Texas Instruments), Altera (Intel), Agere, Zarlink, TriQuint,(now Qorvo), SW Bell (managing a research team at Bellcore, Bell Labs and Rockwell Science Center), Bell-Northern Research, and Northern Telecom.
After hours, when he's not working on the latest invention to add to his portfolio of 16 issued US patents, or on his DARPA Challenge drone entry, he's lending advice and experience to the electric vehicle conversion community from his mountain lair in the Pacific Northwet[sic].
AndyT's engineering blog, "Nonlinearities," publishes the 1st and 3rd Tuesday of each month. Andy's OpEd may appear at other times, with fair warning given by the Vu meter pic. His cartoon series, "Inventors", appears each week in Electronic Design Weekly.
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