February 2007

My experience of meeting people at the Embedded World show earlier this month served to emphasise the difference between what electronics makes possible and what’s really useful. Blackberries grow in abundance in the hedgerows around our village in the west of England. I pick them during walks with the children and they are a free source of great enjoyment. Their namesakes, in the form of mobile phones with so-called ‘push email’ also seem to be growing in abundance, as was evidenced at the show. This is where the similarity ends. Users of the hi-tech Blackberries seem to become addicted to instant email access, spending unproductive hours scrolling through messages and trying desperately to be dextrous enough to reply to them using ludicrously tiny buttons. The devices are so difficult to use that messages become necessarily short, communicating only the most basic information with a total absence of humanity. Email can be a useful tool, but when it gets to the point that incoming email controls our every waking moment, it’s time to walk away! Onto the news...

Electronic Product News (EPN) is about to publish an extended editorial piece looking at the most promising start-up companies in Europe, North America and Asia. The magazine’s editorial team will need details of these companies’ VC funding, their key technology, their leadership, industry awards, and early customers. If you would like to propose a potential candidate, contact the managing editor by the end of March.

CONTACTS
Editorial: Mike Green, managing editor, mike.green@rbi.co.uk
Advertising: Nick Walker, sales director, nwalker@reedbusiness.fr

Marty Gold, until a few weeks ago the long-standing products editor at EE Times, has landed a job editing Hearst’s semiapps.com website, “We’re delighted to have such a well known and respected industry veteran on our side, said William Barron VP, Publishing Director, Hearst Electronics Group. Marty will be focusing on building more and better content on the site and he’ll be looking to partner with semiconductor vendors to do so.” In his three decades of reporting on the industry, Marty has held reporting and management positions at Electronic News, Electronic Design and EE Times.

CONTACTS
Editorial: Marty Gold, mgold@hearst.com
Web: http://www.semiapps.com

Embedded Systems Europe, which until now has often been referred to as ESE, the same initials as Embedded Systems Engineering, has changed its name to Embedded Systems Design Europe. The only remaining confusion will be remembering which ESE is the one that changed!

CONTACTS
Editorial: Colin Holland, editor, es@colinholland.co.uk
Advertising: Patrick Flynn, pflynn@cmp.com

E&E will run a special automotive edition in April that will cover trends, applications and new products for the automotive industry in Germany. Claimed circulation will be 30,500 copies.

CONTACTS
Editorial: Sabine Groethe, editor-in-chief, s.grothe@publish-industry.net
Advertising: Franziska Harfy, advertisign director, f.harfy@publish-industry.net

Just published, the 2006 report from Tidningsstatistik AB (Sweden’s ABC audit body) shows that Elektronik i Norden has grown its reader base to 25,000 subscribers, up from 24,900. The figure has increased every year since the start of the journal in 1992 and since the audit a further 1000 names have been added, says the publisher, taking the total circulation to 26,000 documented subscribers.

CONTACTS
Editorial: Gunnar Lilliesköld, editor-in-chief, gunnar@elinor.se
Advertising: Tommy Jägermo, advertising director, tommy@elinor.se

Hearst has appointed Bryan DeLuca as managing editor of Electronic Products Magazine. Bryan has twelve years of B2B publishing experience in the automotive, industrial, instrumentation, laboratory, petroleum, agriculture and foodservice sectors. Recently he served as editorial director at Keller International Publishing LLC for eight years, overseeing up to fifteen magazine titles and was the youngest editorial director in the companyÂ’s history. He recently spent two and a half years at Wilen Media as managing editor to help build, mentor and manage the creative staff. While there, he helped win various awards in the advertising industry.

CONTACTS
Editorial: Bryan DeLuca, bdeluca@hearst.com
Advertising: Todd Christenson, tchristenson@hearst.com

Hearst Electronics Group has announced that NEDA’s advocacy ads will be featured on Electronic Engineers Master (EEM) Distributor Inventory Search Tool. The ad will run on the Inventory Part Qualifier Page to encourage design engineers and purchasing agents to look for NEDAÂ’s Supplier Authorized Distributor logo when specifying product. Eventually, each NEDA distributor member’s listing on the site will feature the advocacy logo, making it easier for customers to identify a company as authorised, says the publisher.

CONTACTS
Web: http://www.eem.com

Global sources says that 12 of the world’s top 15 semiconductor companies will be amongst those exhibiting at the 3-location event this year. The largest part of the exhibition will be in Shenzhen on March 5-6, where there will be 486 booths. The event also runs in Beijing from 8-9 March and Shanghai from March 13-14. The organiser claims that a record 30,000 engineers will attend the events and that there will be 900 booths in total across the 3 locations. In Shenzhen there will be a Components Pavillion to exhibit components suitable for use in China’s export electronic products. 100 component manufacturers are said to be represented. Other activities at the series of shows include keynote speeches on next-generation technologies and vendor seminars covering embedded systems design, automotive electronics and EDA tools.

CONTACTS
Editorial: Yorbe Zhang, editor-in-chief, EE Times-China, yzhang@globalsources.com
Sales: Bennie Hiu, bennie@globalsources.com

A call for papers has been issued for the first international nanoPower Forum, “Energy Harvesting and Power Management Solutions for Low-Power Wireless Systems”. The forum, hosted by Darnell, is to be held at the San Jose (CA) Marriott Hotel between June 4-6, 2007. EDN is the media sponsor for the event and the ZigBee Alliance has added its support as the forum will have an audience of decision makers who are interested in learning about the latest practical developments in ultra-low power (ULP) wireless systems.

CONTACTS
Information: Jeff Shepard, president of Darnell, jshepard@darnell.com
Web: http://nanopower.darnell.com/index.php

Elektronik will publish a distribution special issue for the first time on May 24, 2007. The theme will be “How does the distributor support the design engineer?” The issue will active components, passive components, electromechanical parts and power supplies. Advertising closing date is May 2nd.

CONTACTS
Editorial: Guenther Klasche, gklasche@elektroniknet.de
Advertising: Sonja Diehl, sdiehl@elektroniknet.de