January 2007

After last month’s interview with Kurt Skupin of the leading German electronics publisher, WEKA, we invited EE Times Europe’s editor-in-chief, Richard Wallace, to present his side of the story. His unedited reply follows. This is an important media issue in Europe – is a message more effectively delivered through local media using local languages in print, or through pan-European media in English, supported by web sites in the local languages? I would welcome your views and we will include a selection of them in the next issue of Publitek Media News. Here’s the EE Times Europe story…..

With all due respect to Kurt Skupin, the publishing director at Germany’s largest electronics industry publisher, WEKA, who was interviewed in your last issue – and someone I have known and respected for many years – Mr. Skupin just doesn’t get it. Die Welt ist flach, as the German title of Tom Friedman’s bestseller suggests. In electronics, it’s been a flat world for a very long time, and globalization is a fact of life for engineers everywhere, and for publishers. The goal of publishing is to identify and meet the needs of a defined readership, and yes, in the case of EE Times Europe, that happens to be a diverse engineering audience –in print and online – drawn from across all of Europe, not just a single country. In his quoted comments Mr. Skupin asserted that:

“These global publishers still ignore country specifics and like to think of Europe as a single market. You simply have to be committed to publishing in the local language to succeed in France, Italy or Germany. And adding a web site that is only partly in German just makes it a weird mix that really doesn’t meet the needs of the market,” he says. On this subject our Brussels based EE Times Europe publisher, André Rousselot, noted: “It is a surprise to me that Mr. Skupin doesn’t realize that the EU has officially become a “single market” with a single currency and without internal borders (bar a few countries that are lagging behind). EE Times Europe recognizes this “single market” with its pan-European approach while also taking into account the needs of its multi-country, multi-language audience via online. Launched in July 2006, the eetimes.eu website together with its regional sites had an audience of over 50,000 unique visitors by the end of December 2006 and it has been growing at a monthly rate of 10%. We do expect the audience to grow to well over 100,000 unique visitors per month before the end of 2007 and we expect eetimes.eu will generate in excess of 3 million page views this year.”

The difference between the WEKA publications and EE Times is that we are not language-limited. I discussed this issue with one of my most trusted PR sources, Lou Covey, founder and president of VitalCom, a Silicon Valley agency with extensive client experience in Europe. I asked Lou to characterize the difference in his own words. This is what he told me: “The market is the world now and there needs to be some sort of access to information for all the world. Unfortunately for France and Germany, English has become the lingua franca of business so there has to be a primarily English-based approach to the dissemination of information. That’s the value EE Times brings. Reed is responding in kind with the EDN network.” We wholeheartedly agree, and this is precisely what customers and readers told us as we researched the market prior to last year’s launch of EE Times Europe Worse yet, Mr. Skupin clearly does not appreciate how or what it takes to be a global information source for today’s globally-challenged readers. When Bob queried the Mr. Skupin about the “international perspective that EE Times Europe brings to German readers” he replied: “Our editors spend a lot of time all over the world too.” Well, EE Times also sends reporters “all over the world” on international assignment, but sending editors around the world is no substitute for having editors in the leading electronics, technology, and business hotspots around the globe. That’s why EE Times and its global editions maintain a fulltime editorial staff of more then 50 experienced reporters and employs more than a dozen contributing correspondents around the world. It’s in-depth, on-the-ground coverage ranges from Silicon Valley to Tokyo, Taipei, Shanghai, Beijing, Seoul, Singapore, Bangalore, Munich, Brussels, Paris, London, Tel Aviv, Moscow, etc. When it comes to covering the global innovation and technology trends that shape today’s complex electronics design chain, nothing beats being there. And as far as Mr. Skupin’s other comment, that: “As far as I can see, the launch of another pan-European publication is driven by the needs of the publisher, not by the needs of readers, who are already suffering from information overload,” such a notion is absurd. If readers are in information overload in Germany they are probably swamped with too many look-alike titles all saying more or less the same thing. EE Times Europe brings its readers a fresh global perspective with unique technology and market insight from around the world, something engineers value very highly – something not available from WEKA or any other local publisher.

And with that, onto the news…..

According to media analysts, Mediaskop, the German electronics media market grew 11.8% in 2006. Total advertising volume rose to 5,535 pages. Around half the total growth was accounted for by increased advertising in WEKA’s Markt & Technik and Elektronik, which recorded 1,555 and 1,127 pages respectively.

CONTACTS
Advertising: Matthäus Hose, mhose@elektroniknet.de
Editorial: Peter Wintermayr, pwintermayr@markt-technik.de

Electronics Weekly is organising a conference on Clean Design on May 23 at the Wokefield Park Conference Centre close to junction 11 of the M4 motorway in Berkshire, UK. Richard Wilson, editor of Electronics Weekly commented: “Many companies are still looking for guidance on key issues around European legislation. This conference will cover design for manufacture, sustainable design, designing for lower power consumption and packaging.” A panel of experts will be on hand to help delegates with any specific problems they want addressed. A small table-top exhibition facility will also be arranged alongside the conference. The first Gold sponsor for the conference is Envirowise, the government funded organisation which offers independent and practical advice on environmental issues.

CONTACTS
Sponsorship: Dean Slade, dean.slade@rbi.co.uk
Participation: Sallie Edwards, sallie.edwards@rbi.com.uk

Nikkei BP Inc is offering a new advertorial service called MAP (Multilingual Advertorial Package). It has been introduced to assist companies needing to produce quality editorial and advertorial content in Japanese, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese (for Taiwan) and Korean languages. Advertorial packages can be booked in Nikkei Electronics in Japan or across Asia/China using Nikkei Electronics Asia and China and on Nikkei BP’s web portal ‘Tech On’ (http://techon.nikkeibp.co.jp/). The idea is to produce a one-stop-shop for advertorial content across Asia, utilising the experience and skills of Nikkei BP editors. Nikkei BP’s English speaking journalists take the brief via an interview of from a draft text. They then adapt this to the Asian languages. A single package price includes all production, translation, media placement and all other associated costs.

CONTACTS
Advertising: Matt Findel-Hawkins, findel-hawkins@nikeeibp.co.uk
Editorial: Atsushi Mochizuki, associate features editor, atsushi@nikkeibp.co.jp

EE Times has announced the finalists for its third Annual Creativity in Electronics (ACE) Awards at www.eetimes.com/ace. The awards are designed to recognise the electronics industry’s creators of technology who demonstrate cutting-edge breakthroughs, innovation and leadership. The honors will be presented at the EE Times ACE Awards Gala on April 3, 2007, as part of the Embedded Systems Conference Silicon Valley. EE Times ACE Awards are presented in 18 categories and are judged by a panel of industry experts, comprised of voices of academia, industry and Wall Street executives. The judges will choose winners in seven categories. Winners in the additional 11 categories are either peer-to-peer or editorially selected.

CONTACTS
Sales: Ross Ayotte, rayotte@cmp.com
Editorial: Brian Fuller, bfuller@cmp.com
Web: http://www.eetimes.com/ace

The ACE Awards in mainland China are organized by EE-Times China, and coincide with IIC-China 2007, mainland China’s largest showcase of IC application technologies and high-end components. Awards finalist have now been announced and winners will receive their awards at a gala dinner in the Marco Polo Hotel, Shenzhen, on March 5, 2007.

CONTACTS
Editorial: Yorbe Zhang, EE Times China, editor-in-chief, yzhang@globalsources.com
Sales: Bennie Hui, eMedia associate publisher, bennie@globalsources.com
Web: http://www.eetchina.com/ace

Electronic-Supply & Manufacturing-China will be re-launching its website, esmchina.com, on February 28, 2007. The new site will feature 60 percent more content, and a new structure which organizes content by end-market, says the publisher, Global Sources. The ten end-market channels include AV & Home Appliance, Portable Device, Communication & Networking, Computer & OA, Power Components, Automotive, Industry & Others, Distribution Service, Supply Chain Management and Manufacturing & Industry Service. The re-launch comes just three months after a significant front-end development of the site, which included a new user interface, top navigation and bigger, more prominent advertising positions above the fold. The current esmchina.com claims over 1.3 million page views a month, and 60,379 registered users.

CONTACTS
Editorial: Major Lee, majorlee@esmchina.com
Sales: Michael Liu, michaelliu@globalsources.com
Web: http://www.esmchina.com

eeNewsfeed is a new electronics news portal. It’s decribed by the publisher as “a powerful tool for product research, competitive analysis, or simply keeping in touch with the global electronics community.”

CONTACT
Everything: information@eenewsfeed.com Web: http://www.eenewsfeed.com

A monthly magazine, daily news on the web and a daily emailed newsletter are apparently not enough. Elektroniktidningen now also offers direct mail advertising and event services. “We’re continuously adapting our portfolio of marketing channels to meet clients’ needs. The demand for direct mail has been very strong, and we’re now extremely happy to introduce this service”, says sales manager Fredrik Soderberg. Subscribers to Elektroniktidningen can either pay cash for their subscriptions or opt for the direct mail register. By choosing the latter option a subscriber accepts to receive up to 10 direct mailings per year. “We hope that subscribers in the direct mail register recognizes the information from our clients as valuable, informative and very far from spam”, Fredrik continues. The events services will debut with the co-arrangement of FPGA World, a conference for everyone interested in FPGA issues, in industry and academia. The conference is now in its third year.

CONTACTS
Advertising: Fredrik Soderberg, fredrik@etn.se
Editorial: Adam Edström, adam@etn.se

Elektronik i Norden, (distributioin 26 000) is now also available on the web in a new format that enables it to be read page-by-page. It is not based on PDF pages but publisher Gunnar Lillieskoeld says it use unique software that makes it possible to quickly “turn over the leaves”, similar to a printed paper. The new format is designed for readers located throughout the world who would like to really see articles before the paper arrives by post, for Nordic subscribers travelling and for those who would like go back to previous issues (issue #1/ 2007 will be the first). The search engine is said to be fast and to handles Scandinavian characters well.

CONTACTS
Editorial: Gunnar Lillieskoeld, editor-in-chief and publisher, gunnar@elinor.se
Advertising: Tommy Jägermo, advertising manager, tommy@elinor.se

CMP has announced CMP India. The event will run from October 4 – 6, 2007 in Bangalore and the organiser expects an attendance of 2000 to 3000 engineer from all sectors of India’s developing electronics industry. The India Semiconductor Association predicts that semiconductor sales are forecast to grow from $2.82 billion in 2005 to $36.3 billion in 2015, a compound growth rate of 29.8%.

CONTACTS
Sales and sponsorship: Sean Raman, sraman@cmp.com
Web: http://www.embedded.com

A number of changes have been announced at eeProductCenter.com. Long standing editor-in-chief, Marty Gold and power specialist Vince Biancomano are leaving the organisation. Patrick Mannion takes over as lead editor, Alex Mendelshohn stays on as senior technical editor, Emily Gleason is appointed as associate editor, while Gina Roos and Ismini Scouras continue as contributing editors. (It seems that not a month goes by when you don’t have to update your CMP editorial address book! Ed.)

CONTACTS
Editorial: Patrick Mannion, pmannion@cmp.com
Advertising: Paul Miller, pmiller@cmp.com

The leading Finnish electronics magazine, Prosessori, will visibly participate in all Finnish fairs and exhibitions in electronics during 2007. The March issue of Prosessori will be the official publication of the Measurement and Testing Exhibition in Helsinki. The May issue will be distributed at Synergia2007 innovation and mobile event in Oulu, one of the most important cities in Finland for electronic). The August issue will be the Official Co-operation Medium of ELKOM2007, said to be Finland’s largest event of the electronics industry. This year, the industrial automation exhibition held simultaneously with ELKOM2007 will gather even more numerous decision makers of the branch to the event. In September, Prosessori will be present in the only subcontracting event in Finland Alihankinta 2007. The event will be held in Tampere.

CONTACTS Editorial: Jari Peltoniemi, editor-in-chief, jari.peltoniemi@prosessori.fi
Advertising: Tapani Mäkelä, sales manager, tapani.makela@sanomamagazines.fi

US publisher Hearst has purchased China’s 21IC.com electronics web site. The publisher claims that the site attracts 50,000 daily visitors and 1.5 million unique page views per month.

CONTACT
Sales: Lisa DeVine, lmdevine@hearst.com

Experienced US media sales executive seeks to represent print and online publishers

Sales executive with over 36 years of B2B advertising sales and management experience establishing a US-based publishers rep organization, and seeks business partnership with an established publishing company for sales of print and online advertising to the US market.

CONTACT
More information: Bob Jones, editor@publitekmedianews.com