Last month, Microsoft held its inaugural Global High Tech Summit where leaders in high-tech manufacturing met to discuss the future of their industry. Key topics included communication, collaboration, innovation, and convergence.

In high tech, competition is ferocious, the rules of the game change overnight, and the rate of change is accelerating due to new markets, customers, products and technology.
- Microsoft

Phil Hester, AMD’s corporate vice-president and chief technology officer, centered on this idea of technology convergence. He emphasized that the future technological frontier for exploration is the space between your cell phone and laptop computer.

Everything is essentially becoming a network device.
- Phil Hester, AMD

Hester believes that the focus should not only be on the progression and improvement of technology that already exists, but also the progression and improvement on the mechanisms to package and deliver that technology. He considers the new LEGO Mindstorms NXT as one of the prime examples of technology convergence today.

[via Cadalyst]