engineering

Work with the cool kids! Culture is a weapon in 2011's hiring battle

See that guy pictured above? The one with the beard grooming oil, the fancy tux and the spear gun? He's the best engineer in the world--and he has the toys to prove it.

Oh, the lengths startups are going to these days to get engineering talent.

Technology is evolving rapidly and engineers who know the latest and greatest coding languages and techniques are hard to come by, even in Silicon Valley. Undergrads are being wined (if they're, um, over 21) and dined by technology companies offering never-before-seen perks (cars! free apartments!) and impressive salaries.

Google currently pays recent … Read more

Another tech blogger joins the startup fray

Sometimes blogging about startups makes the blogger want to start one.

Marshall Kirkpatrick, a tech writer with ReadWriteWeb whose work is often cited by other outlets, is setting out to turn his ability to sort through the noise on the Web into a product and company called Plexus Engine.

Kirkpatrick describes Plexus Engine as an application and tool to help customers discover key information before their competitors do. His target customers are those in marketing and public relations firms.

He's been trying it out with a handful of trial customers and plans to launch officially in three months.

Kirkpatrick … Read more

Genelec's 'computer' speaker elevates the state of the art

Genelec isn't a big name outside the recording industry, but the company, founded in 1978, is a leader in professional monitor systems. More recently Genelec speakers are becoming known to discerning consumers. The company's active speakers have built-in amplifiers, like the tiny 6010A speaker I'm covering today, so it can be directly hooked up to an iPod, computer, or game.

I spent some time with the 6010A at the Audio Engineering Society convention held last week in New York. The listening conditions on the show floor weren't ideal, but on early Sunday morning it was fairly … Read more

A great week for Google challengers

For companies that would take on Google's near-monopoly in the search business, being big is a challenge. There is, in fact, only one truly big Google rival left: Microsoft's Bing. And while it's a worthy opponent in terms of features and raw ingenuity, it's still a hugely pricey, money-losing venture.

Being a smaller, more specialized Google competitor, however, can work. And good things happened for two of my favorites this week.

Favorite #1 is  DuckDuckGo. Despite the wacky name, it's a traditional search engine. In fact, part of its appeal is that it feels … Read more

Google threat? Search engine DuckDuckGo scores funding

Another little-known search engine--with the tall order of snagging users from Google--has landed financial backing.

Union Square Ventures today wrote in a blog post today that it invested an undisclosed amount in a search engine called DuckDuckGo, which promises super-fast search results with far less spam and clutter than you get on the biggies. (A number of angel investors also participated in the round).

The biggies, of course, is really just one biggie--Google. For all its forays into areas beside search, search is where it consistently crushes all competitors. Data released yesterday shows Google's market share stood at more than 66 percent in September… Read more

Mazda tweet hints the rotary engine is not dead

After it killed off the RX-8, we thought that Mazda had called off its love affair with the Wankel rotary engine. If the Mazda_PR twitter account is to be believed, perhaps the rumors of the rotary's death have been exaggerated.

The tweet comes out of the other side of Google Translate's tubes as:

To support a lot of RX-8 rotary engine, the message, thank you very much! We are excited together. Mazda "SKYACTIV" said aims to achieve technological breakthroughs, new models are being developed intensively with the next generation of rotary engines. Continued support thank you! … Read more

Apple has 1,000 engineers working on chips, report says

Some 5 percent of Apple's workforce is reportedly working on improving the company's mobile processors.

The company has 1,000 engineers working to refine its processors, Steve Jobs had told a "veteran Silicon Valley CEO," according to TechCrunch report. (The company has about 20,000 non-retail employees.)

"Getting low power and smaller is the key to everything," the unidentified executive said, adding that "form factor no longer becomes an issue."

Improving battery life without sacrificing speed is key for mobile devices. Apple's A5 processor, which will be used in the new … Read more

Google crowned world's most attractive employer

Google may have to prepare itself for a flood of even more resumes.

The search giant has been dubbed the most attractive employer by more than 160,000 people looking for the right place to work, according to a study released yesterday by employer branding company Universum.

Analyzing the choices from job seekers across the world's 12 largest economies, the study "The World's Most Attractive Employers 2011" (PDF) found Google tops among professionals with a business degree as well as those with an engineering background. This marks the third consecutive year that the search giant has … Read more

Solar dish maker Stirling files for bankruptcy

Solar company Stirling Energy Systems has filed for bankruptcy, another casualty of a brutal global price war that is favoring commodity photovoltaic panels.

The Scottsdale, Arizona-based company filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy late last week. The utility-scale solar company's largest investor is renewable energy developer NTR of Dublin, Ireland.

Founded in 1996, Stirling Energy Systems makes a large, 38-foot-high reflective dish which concentrates sunlight onto a Stirling engine to generate electricity. The 25-kilowatt SunCatcher dishes are designed to be used as building blocks for utility-scale solar farms in desert areas with sufficient sunlight.

After decades of development including a … Read more