7/22/2014 Product teardown - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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Product teardown
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A product teardown, or simply teardown, is the act of disassembling a product, such as a television set, to identify
its component parts, chip & system functionality, and component costing information. For products having 'secret'
technology, such as the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25, the process may be secret. For others, including consumer
electronics, the results are typically disseminated through photographs and component lists so that others can make
use of the information without having to disassemble the product themselves. This information is important to
designers of semiconductors, displays, batteries, packaging companies, integrated design firms, and semiconductor
fabs, and the systems they operate within.
This information can be of interest to hobbyists, but can also be used commercially by the technical community to
find out, for example, what semiconductor components are being utilized in consumer electronic products, such as
the Wii video game console or Apple's iPhone. Such knowledge can aid understanding of how the product works,
including innovative design features, and can facilitate estimating the bill of materials (BOM). The financial
community therefore has an interest in teardowns, as knowing how a company's products are built can help guide a
stock valuation. Manufacturers are often not allowed to announce what components are present in a product due to
non-disclosure agreements (NDA). Teardowns also play a part in evidence of use in court and litigation
proceedings where a companies parts may have been used without their permission, counterfeited, or to show
where intellectual property or patents might be infringed by another firms part or system.
Identifying semiconductor components in systems has become more difficult over the past years. The most notable
change started with Apple's 8GB iPod nano,
[1][2]
were repackaged with Apple branding.
This makes it more difficult to identify the actual device manufacturer and function of the component without
performing a 'decap' removing the outer packaging to analyze the die within. Typically there are markings on the
die inside the package that can lead experienced engineers to see who actually created the device and what
functionality it performs in the system.
Teardowns have also been performed in front of a live studio audience at the Embedded Systems Conference
(ESC). The first live teardown was performed on a Toyota Prius at the Embedded Systems Conference in San
Jose, April 2006. Since that time, additional live teardowns have been performed, most recently being the Sony
OLED TV, Gibson Self-Tuning Guitar, SuitSat space suit, and Sony Rolly MP3 player.
[3]
Major companies that publicize their teardowns include Portelligent and Semiconductor Insights, both of which
write featured articles in EETimes and TechOnline on their findings. The two companies were merged to form
TechInsights, headquartered in Canada. ABI Research also provides teardowns for all major mobile devices and
components in their Device Portal.
[4]
Other websites offer user-contributed teardown information at no cost.
[5]
See also
Reverse engineering
References
7/22/2014 Product teardown - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_teardown 2/2
1. ^ Tear Down: Inside the Apple 8GB iPod nano (http://www.eetimes.com/design/audio-design/4016200/Tear-
Down-Inside-the-Apple-8GB-iPod-nano)
2. ^ CODECs | WM8750 | Wolfson Microelectronics (http://www.wolfsonmicro.com/products/WM8750)
3. ^ http://www.cmp-egevents.com/web/esv/event-highlights/teardowns
4. ^ https://devices.abiresearch.com/
5. ^ TakeItApart.com (https://www.takeitapart.com)
External links
http://www.teardown.com/
https://www.takeitapart.com/
http://www.techinsights.com
http://www.engadget.com/tag/teardown/
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Categories: Technology Products
This page was last modified on 25 May 2014 at 07:08.
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