The readers of EDN Asia have chosen to recognize
Kuhwan Kim, manager of WIZnet Inc, as the
2002 Innovator of the Year. 
Kim embodies the spirit of innovation and diversity that guides today’s frontline new technologies. He combines knowledge of theory, design skill, and business savvy in his work. Kim holds a doctorate in computer communications. He is both head designer and general manager at WIZnet, where he led his team to design the Ether-3100 i2Chip TCP/IP chip. The chip, designed to implement home networking including Internet TVs, Web-phones, and Web-cameras, is positioned to meet a potentially huge market demand.
EDN Asia congratulates Kuhwan Kim on his success, and predicts that much more lies ahead for this talented and capable young designer!
We also want to express our thanks and congratulations to the other ten innovators who were nominated for this competition. Thanks to our online ballot, we received a record number of votes this year from all across the Asia-Pacific region, recognizing the achievements of every one of our nominees. There is no question that they represent a growing pool of outstanding talent in the region.
Kuhwan Kim will receive a specially engraved award crystal from EDN Asia. He will also receive the following prizes from
Altera, the sponsor of this competition:
- A 2-year license to Altera’s Quartus II development software for system-on-a-programmable-chip (SOPC) design. The software includes the LogicLock block-based design flow, and the SOPC Builder to automate the task of adding, parameterizing, and linking intellectual property (IP) cores, including multiple embedded processors, for SOPC applications.
- An Excalibur Nios 2.0 embedded processor development kit. The Nios is a five-stage pipelined general-purpose RISC µP that supports both 32- and 16-bit architectures. It includes a configurable CPU core and peripherals, a GNUPro compiler and debugger from Cygnus, ByteBlasterMV parallel download cable, a development board populated by an APEX 20KE device (EP20K200EFC484), SOPC reference designs, and a one-year subscription to Nios processor-related upgrades.
- The latest DVD player with electronics powered by an Altera chip.
Voter's prizeEDN Asia and Altera wish to thank all of you who voted in this competition. Two hundred voters will receive Altera’s latest Digital Library CD, which includes the Quartus-II web edition software. The tool enables you to design low to mid-density PLDs, and includes Altera HDL synthesis, schematic design entry, full-featured timing analysis, and simulation capabilities.