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Electronics industry in the west (the lack of it)...(re-posted without naming)

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bd139:
Yes aware of that. I dabble in futures (Edit: mostly unsuccessfully  :-DD)

sam[PS]:
Interesting debate indeed.
I'll pass on the statement about power supply as i don't think that's really a good exemple.
But let's take simple microcontroler board as probably a better exemple. When i studied electronics at university, we where learning two things 1. basic theory so that we have the tools to understand what's going on 2. hands on starting from scratch using component's datasheet as textbook a breadboards a roles of wire. I'm now teaching at a university where we are asked to not do most of 1 because "it has to be more practical oriented" and for the 2 most colleagues use china maid arduino board with fully assembled china maid "shields" for all the more specific parts, and even the programming just consist on using a pre-made library from internet. I try to argue with them that if some student become competent EE that will be despite this education, not thanks to it. But i'm a minority voice. And here is how that rejoin our debate. The arguments of the other professor are exactly those i see used in some post here :
-That's cheaper this way
-Anyway nowdays that's how it works
-What's important is the system level (although we don't have any class about system engineering in our program   :wtf: )

But you know what's fun ? I also start teaching for a chinese university. And there do you know what they ask me to do there ? 1 basic theory and 2 hands on from scratch.

I do believe that anyone claiming to be electronic engineer should be able to design and build a basic microcontroler board with few basic sensor and LF analog frontend. But that's not how EE student are trained in most western university nowdays, that's how they are trained in asia.

So although psu may not be the right exemple i do think some profitable business can still be done in west in terms of hardware. I'm thinking about small volume niche application, tones of small simple product can be developed just around a small µC and few opamps/basic components. If you think more specific and less mass market then the business opportunities are there. And i know few company around me in Europe that do pretty well with this kind of model. The problem is financing such business model as investor only want mass market target, while this kind of company can be profitable enough to feed their men and invest enough to stay afloat for lifelong, these are not the companies that will produce any billionaire, so in the curent investment way of thinking these company are not interesting. And the second problem is do we really have the competent engineers for it ? The answer is probably no.
But for both this issue it can be solved with political decisions. So i think this question is totally relevant.

Just my 2cts...

coppice:

--- Quote from: sam[PS] on April 15, 2020, 02:50:00 am ---I also start teaching for a chinese university. And there do you know what they ask me to do there ? 1 basic theory and 2 hands on from scratch.

--- End quote ---
A degree course should prepare someone for a career, with top-ups for new technologies keeping the student relevant over the years. Basic theory is strategic knowledge that lasts. If you learned about analogue filters in the 60s, adapting to digital filters in the 80s only required a top up of your knowledge, as you already knew the basics. Hands on knowledge (or focussing on the latest trend for software people) is tactical knowledge, and what it teaches you will be obsolete in a few years. If your college course had too much of this, you will be left with little of value from your years at college. Even on the day you leave college its preparing you more for a technician job, than the sort of job traditionally associated with a graduate.

China graduates something like 400k people a year who have been through a course where they learned to do some basic things with a microcontroller. Its a small, very hands on, module within one of a number of much larger courses that focus on basics.

OwO:
Only up to calculus 2 really? That's high school level shit where I'm from (and that is not China). That means you can't appreciate Maxwell's equations (since you don't know what the divergence and curl operators do), understand wave behavior (also relates to time vs space derivatives), or visualize heat transfer/fluid motion (requires a mental model of sinks/sources which relate to the laplacian). Or are the calculus levels named differently in China?

tggzzz:

--- Quote from: coppice on April 15, 2020, 11:55:45 am ---
--- Quote from: sam[PS] on April 15, 2020, 02:50:00 am ---I also start teaching for a chinese university. And there do you know what they ask me to do there ? 1 basic theory and 2 hands on from scratch.

--- End quote ---
A degree course should prepare someone for a career, with top-ups for new technologies keeping the student relevant over the years. Basic theory is strategic knowledge that lasts. If you learned about analogue filters in the 60s, adapting to digital filters in the 80s only required a top up of your knowledge, as you already knew the basics. Hands on knowledge (or focussing on the latest trend for software people) is tactical knowledge, and what it teaches you will be obsolete in a few years. If your college course had too much of this, you will be left with little of value from your years at college. Even on the day you leave college its preparing you more for a technician job, than the sort of job traditionally associated with a graduate.

--- End quote ---

Very true. It baffles me why people don't understand that.

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