Don't Stop Talking

January 12, 2011

 

Sherry Hess is vice president of marketing at AWR, bringing with her more than 15 years of EDA experience in domestic and international sales, marketing, support, and managerial expertise. For the majority of her career Sherry served in various positions at Ansoft Corporation including director of European operations and later as vice president of marketing. Before joining Ansoft, Sherry spent two years with Intel Corporation, where she worked in the ASIC Group and developed relationships with companies such as Bell Northern Research and Northern Telecom. Sherry holds a BSEE and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. www.awrcorp.com.  This blog is part of Microwave Journal's guest blog series.

To comment or ask Sherry a question, use the comment link at the bottom of the entry.

 

I can’t remember at which airport I was when I read this USA Today headline: “The Year We Stopped Talking.”

And without reading anything more, I knew the article had to be about social media, texting and the many wonderful wireless gadgets that have become necessary to our survival in the 21^st century. We have certainly moved away from voice as the primary means of exchanging information and replaced it with text messaging. While I accept that we have become a world of ‘thumb’ and ‘touch screen’ typists, I can’t agree that we don’t need to communicate by voice as well, whether via skype, cell, or even the old fashion way...face to face.

Yes!  Face to face. This personal interaction is important for our industry. I recently attended APMC in Japan last month and experienced first-hand the value of one-on-one direct interaction. Not only did I engage in meaningful conversation with AWR customers from Panasonic to Murata but also with other partners, colleagues and coworkers on topics such as coupled thermal/electric co-simulation of MMICs, as well as PCB layout integration through ODB++ .

I also bumped into friends at R&S and Anritsu. The first traveled from Germany and the latter from California. We all agreed that getting personal time with our coworkers was critical to ensure we are communicating clearly and working toward our corporate goals. And just as important, exchanging experiences, information and stories with respect to “emerging” technologies and trends seem much more effective in person. For example, connecting companies such as R&S, Anritsu, Mesuro and HFE with AWR in the emerging field of non-linear behavior modeling ensures we all stayed plugged into the latest and greatest developments.

Sherry Turkle, director of the MIT Initiative on Technology and Self, also agrees on this topic and reminds us that technology can be turned off. "We've come to confuse continual connectivity with making real connections," Turkle says. "We're 'always on' to everyone. When you actually look more closely, in some ways we've lost the time for the conversations that count."

To further make my point, consider these statistics: according to a semi-annual wireless survey released in October by CTIA-The Wireless Association, 93% of Americans now use a wireless device or cellphone — and not just for voice calls.  From June 2009 to June 2010, subscribers sent 1.8 trillion text messages (up 33% from the previous year) and 56.3 billion multimedia messages (up 187% from the year before).

But short of sharing insights and getting answers to questions, face to face time allows other personal connections to happen and free-form dialogue to emerge. How else would I learn some of you out there enjoy reading my blog! So thank you MWJ for asking me back as a blogger during APMC and our face to face dinner meeting.

Here’s to more face time within the RF & Microwave community in 2011 and not less.

The New Company Culture—Play vs. Pay

June 12, 2010

 

Sherry Hess is vice president of marketing at AWR, bringing with her more than 15 years of EDA experience in domestic and international sales, marketing, support, and managerial expertise. For the majority of her career Sherry served in various positions at Ansoft Corporation including director of European operations and later as vice president of marketing. Before joining Ansoft, Sherry spent two years with Intel Corporation, where she worked in the ASIC Group and developed relationships with companies such as Bell Northern Research and Northern Telecom. Sherry holds a BSEE and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. www.awrcorp.com.

To comment or ask Sherry a question, use the comment link at the bottom of the entry.

 

Well, another IMS has come and gone, and once again we survived the chaos of getting ready and then pulled off a fantastic show. While wandering the show floor and perusing other exhibitors’ booths, I couldn't help but notice a clear divide between booth personnel who looked happy and excited and those who looked a bit disconnected, and yes, even bored. Then after I returned to the office I coincidentally viewed two interesting videos, one on YouTube and one on 60 Minutes –thank you Mom & Dad for making me watch this over the years- that gave me one possible answer.

The first clip on YouTube was from Innovation Daily: RSA Animate — Drive: Dan Pink and the Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us.  A very clever animated cartoon presentation that was indeed surprising, it discussed irrefutable evidence that workers are motivated not, as you would think, by more money or pay, but instead by the sheer pleasure of creating or working on something meaningful that receives positive feedback. The typical motivation scheme within organizations is to reward performance with a monetary incentive. Tests have found that once cognitive skill/ conceptual creative thinking comes into play, a larger reward led to poorer performance!  Studies have found that if you pay people enough so that money is not an issue, three factors lead to better performance and personal satisfaction: autonomy or desire to be self-directed, mastery—the urge to get better at stuff, and sense of purpose.

So why are there people in the world who have jobs and get paid, but do the same thing during their limited discretionary time for free? Examples: Linux, Apache, Wikipedia. More and more corporations are operating with a transcendent purpose, and that makes coming to work better for employees, and also attracts more talented workers. Conversely, when profit motive separates from incentive motive, bad things happen. Not only bad ethics, but bad products and services, uninspiring place to work, people don’t do great things. Companies that are flourishing today are animated by a sense of purpose.

Interesting. Hmm. Could that be why some folks at IMS were busy, excited, smiling and engaged with others while some were disengaged, mopey even, and unhappy looking?  Is it the difference between a job/paycheck and a job/passion?

Then, a couple days later, I watched 60 Minutes, which did a segment on the online shoe company, Zappos. (Believe it or not, I have yet to purchase shoes on this site…for those who know me, I like shoes :-) so this doesn’t compute.)  I digress.  Anyway, the theme of the segment was that Zappos is an unusual company with an unusual business model—they are constantly trying to find ways to improve on employee happiness, fully believing that employee happiness leads to customer happiness and investor/shareholder happiness.

Tony Hsieh, Zappos' CEO, has even written a book: Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose. Zappos believes that focusing on company culture will enable them to provide great service, which will lead to financial success down the road. Clearly, Zappos has bought into, and successfully implemented, the same concepts outlined in Dan Pink’s presentation: a company culture focused on employee happiness results in a company that has passion and purpose, and that will ultimately lead to profits.

 

 

Both of these video segments, coupled with my own exhausting but highly enjoyable experience at IMS, led me to conclude there is indeed a lot to be said for job happiness.  And once again for those who know me or have read my blogs in the past, I’ve found a company and job that delivers happiness to me and hopefully I deliver some of it back!  Now, let me log in to www.zappos.com to celebrate!

Seeds of Change

May 25, 2010

 

Sherry Hess is vice president of marketing at AWR, bringing with her more than 15 years of EDA experience in domestic and international sales, marketing, support, and managerial expertise. For the majority of her career Sherry served in various positions at Ansoft Corporation including director of European operations and later as vice president of marketing. Before joining Ansoft, Sherry spent two years with Intel Corporation, where she worked in the ASIC Group and developed relationships with companies such as Bell Northern Research and Northern Telecom. Sherry holds a BSEE and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. www.awrcorp.com.

To comment or ask Sherry a question, use the comment link at the bottom of the entry.

 

AWR’s current ad, “Ideas Grow Faster in the Right Environment” graces the front of our 2010 AWR Magazine (6mb PDF) this month. There are many interpretations stemming from this visual (pun intended) that can be explored. But for now and for the purpose of this blog, the sprout portrays AWR’s corporate culture: innovation, spawning new ideas, the right environment for creativity, growth into new markets, seeds of change…

Rather than recreate that cover story here, I invite you to download the magazine online and read it for yourself. Instead, in this blog I’m going to sprout out in another direction.  .. academia and university outreach. 

AWR recently gave root to a new growth opportunity for our software in the academic community. At the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department Heads Association (ECEDHA) Annual Conference in Florida this past March, I announced in my ECEDHA Perspectives interview AWR’s Graduate Gift Initiative, which provides qualified* 2010 graduates a free, fully-functional, one-year term license of  Microwave Office and Visual System Simulator (VSS) software suites - inclusive of AXIEM 3D planar EM software. The goal of the initiative is to give graduating electrical engineering students a career head start by providing hands-on exposure to AWR's high-frequency design software.

This initiative is a follow on to our Preferred University Program, which works with universities worldwide to provide students with access to RF/microwave software tools. These programs have been launched  in direct response to industry and academia expressing the need for students to have hands-on experience with these tools prior to graduating and entering the job market.

And, most recently, AWR has announced the donation of free licenses of our software as the prize award to the winners of the IMS/MTT 2010 Power Amplifier Student Design Contest.

What better way to sow seeds of change and spawn the growth of new ideas, new engineers, new technologies, etc. than to enrich the academic environment by providing the software engineering students need to learn and grow from the classroom and into their first job? Our students of today are the future of the industry—we need to empower them with the best and latest tools so they are prepared to flourish.

What About Bunny?

March 11, 2010

 

Sherry Hess is vice president of marketing at AWR, bringing with her more than 15 years of EDA experience in domestic and international sales, marketing, support, and managerial expertise. For the majority of her career Sherry served in various positions at Ansoft Corporation including director of European operations and later as vice president of marketing. Before joining Ansoft, Sherry spent two years with Intel Corporation, where she worked in the ASIC Group and developed relationships with companies such as Bell Northern Research and Northern Telecom. Sherry holds a BSEE and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. www.awrcorp.com.

To comment or ask Sherry a question, use the comment link at the bottom of the entry.

 

Yeah, what about Bunny? Early in February, I attended DesignCon 2010, and, aside from having a number of really great meetings with customers, partners, and media, I was curious if there would be a return of Bunny. As all of you who attended DesignCon 2009 will remember, Bunny was the talk of the show (for better or worse is a personal judgement call).

No Bunny at DesignCon this year, but following Altium’s lead at taking a risk by trying something new, AWR exhibited for the first time this year as a partner within the Anritsu booth. DesignCon 2010 proved to be a successful venture. We exhibited our AWR Connected™ solutions with Anritsu, and our unique joint solution for signal integrity that combines Anritsu¹s VectorStar test equipment with AWR's Microwave Offic® high-frequency design software. The value of this combination is that Microwave Office adds functionality above and beyond what can be done with the hardware itself – in particular adding to S-parameter measurements the ability to visualize eye diagrams and time domain simulation results- and this is especially useful in signal integrity applications. AWR Connected™ for Anritsu makes the MS4640A the first microwave instrument in the world to physically integrate a full suite of design software within its firmware. You can see AWR’s DesignCon 2010 video interview as well as a demo of this solution on AWR.TV.

Also at this show, for those of you with keen vision, you would have noticed a yet-to- be-released link to Cadence Allegro.This new capability enables Allegro/APD users to export their layout (or portion thereof) into Microwave Office. And last but not least, AWR’s industry expert on EM, Dr. John Dunn, presented a three-hour tutorial entitled The Use of Computer Clusters and Spectral and Domain Decomposition in 3D FEM Analysis. The year prior, John presented a tutorial called Understanding Grounding Concepts in EM Simulators that was a big hit with the audience and has since been turned into an extremely popular white paper and a 6-part EM tutorial on AWR TV. Stay tuned for more on the 3D FEM analysis tutorial!

“What about Bunny” was the take-away line from DesignCon 2009 for me. This year it was certainly all… “What about AWR!”

Is Your Business Socially Useless?

February 3, 2010

 

Sherry Hess is vice president of marketing at AWR, bringing with her more than 15 years of EDA experience in domestic and international sales, marketing, support, and managerial expertise. For the majority of her career Sherry served in various positions at Ansoft Corporation including director of European operations and later as vice president of marketing. Before joining Ansoft, Sherry spent two years with Intel Corporation, where she worked in the ASIC Group and developed relationships with companies such as Bell Northern Research and Northern Telecom. Sherry holds a BSEE and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. www.awrcorp.com.

To comment or ask Sherry a question, use the comment link at the bottom of the entry.

 

Dane Collins, our CEO, recently sent me a link to a thought-provoking blog by Umair Haque on the Harvard Business Review website. The headline boldly asks, "Is Your Business Useless?"

Before I read the first word, I knew I'd likely smile as I read through it.  Having spent nearly my entire career in high-frequency (HF) EDA, I was already willing to admit that this industry isn't overtly socially friendly.  I mean, we are largely a group of engineers whose typical stereotype is introverted, so stepping out into the spotlight to draw attention to ourselves, and, on top of that, to make a point of being "socially useful".... this was going to be good.

Nonetheless,  I read it.  Interesting points:

• Socially useless business has a cost - just in the last five years -  $12 trillion in bailout packages for socially useless banks alone 
• Socially useless business is what has created a global economy on life support 
• Socially useless business is what has created a jobless "recovery" and is why we don't have a better education, healthcare, finance, energy, transportation, or media industry

Okay Mr. Haque, how do you really feel? 

He continues, "How is it that socially useless business is to blame for this adverse affect on our society? Socially useless business is the status quo — and the status quo says: 'You don't matter. Our bottom line is the only thing that matters.' "

This is a tough dose of his reality to swallow, but does it have merit in HF EDA--or high-tech in general for that matter?  If we look at recent technology products that have succeeded, Apple's iPhone/iPod, Nintendo Wii, and Google Search all come to my mind.  Somewhere in here, these technologies and tools tapped into the value of being socially useful to the population at large.  By using these appliances, we find ourselves more productive in life or enjoying our free time more, or even using them as ways to be more social?

I doubt this is a winning strategy in and of itself (build a better mousetrap) but the way a product or service can connect with a user or consumer and make the experience personal or emotional is timeless.  Maybe today the "socially useless" tagline makes the HBR post seem more hip or current but the emotional appeal has worked for many years to build brand loyalty, from Walt Disney to Coke and Pepsi and hundreds more examples I'm not listing here.

In my own experiences within the world of EDA, I have to say that AWR is one of the few places I've worked that encourages its employees to have a sense of self and personality that isn’t constrained by the corporate logo but actually defines the brand.   Starting the blog on MWJ site was a step into the e-social fabric for me and for AWR... and an experiment that I believe has been a success for the company by enabling us to connect more with our customers and with the larger community of users out there, and to open up a dialogue to figure out how our company and its tools can improve society (our society of users).

AWR has always been customer focused. It’s the reason Joe Pekarek founded the company in the first place. Since the economy began shrinking nearly two years ago now, everyone at AWR has stepped up their commitment to the corporate mission of improving the productivity of our HF customer base --if there's one thing we understand, its that in order for AWR to be successful, our customers have to be successful.  AWR's philosophy is the polar opposite of the socially useless business. Our culture is focused on ensuring that customers know they DO matter, and that we fully understand that our bottom line depends on their success. 

Haque says that socially useless business is built on shoddy, poor economics, and like most things too good to be true, it rarely lasts for long. Socially useless businesses are living on borrowed time. The new order is "constructive capitalism." Constructive Capitalists are better businesses. They've learned how to create value that's socially useful. They are doing things that matter to people, communities, and society. 

So, the question big business and small start-ups alike should be asking themselves these days is, "How useless is my business?"

Let's do lunch

September 23, 2010

 

Sherry Hess is vice president of marketing at AWR, bringing with her more than 15 years of EDA experience in domestic and international sales, marketing, support, and managerial expertise. For the majority of her career Sherry served in various positions at Ansoft Corporation including director of European operations and later as vice president of marketing. Before joining Ansoft, Sherry spent two years with Intel Corporation, where she worked in the ASIC Group and developed relationships with companies such as Bell Northern Research and Northern Telecom. Sherry holds a BSEE and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. www.awrcorp.com.

To comment or ask Sherry a question, use the comment link at the bottom of the entry.

 

Let’s do lunch! 

(Aka grab a coffee, have a chat, ah heck, let’s just meet face to face!)

 Now that I have your attention…. Yeah. Let’s do lunch.  I was just reading my “Working Mothers” magazine the other day - their ‘100 Best Companies to Work For’ issue –and came across a factoid that said taking a lunch break is a great way to reenergize yourself.  Step out of the office, stretch your body and mind, and recharge your spirit.

 

I agree.  I am not one to eat at my desk. I need to get out of the office even if it is eating out with co-workers.  The few minutes of walking out the door and into the sunshine/rain/cold/heat - whatever it may be - wakes up the mind, body and spirit.  And it is definitely a much better way to get that jolt of energy for the afternoon rather than relying solely on the lovely vice of caffeine.

 

So why am I talking about lunch?  Going out for lunch and the upside it brings in the way of fresh ideas and new connections with people is the exact same benefit that tradeshows and conferences give us.  So, let’s step out of the office, stretch our bodies and minds and recharge our spirits at EuMW.

 

How can you make the most out of EuMW? Get out and meet people. Talk, exchange ideas, and fuel one another’s creative and technical psyche.  That’s what a business lunch or a well-organized conference can do for us.

 

This year at EuMW, I know I’ve set up quite a few meetings, lunches, breakfasts and dinners to make this tradeshow a worthy place to conduct business. Going to the show and spending time “just standing” at your exhibit or spending your free time “by yourself” is the same as eating lunch at your desk.

 

So here’s my challenge to you:

• Take advantage of the close proximity of the venue and the many colleagues gathered together.
• Challenge yourself to “do lunch” with at least one other partner, customer or friend at the show.
• Maybe even visit with the publications and hear what others in the industry are saying.

 

I know you’ll be pleasantly surprised by the ideas that flow. And if for some reason, you can’t locate a willing participant for lunch… come find me. I’ll be at AWR Booth #84!

 

 

   

 

 

5 Things to Know about 3D CAD Software

December 22, 2009

 

Sherry Hess is vice president of marketing at AWR, bringing with her more than 15 years of EDA experience in domestic and international sales, marketing, support, and managerial expertise. For the majority of her career Sherry served in various positions at Ansoft Corporation including director of European operations and later as vice president of marketing. Before joining Ansoft, Sherry spent two years with Intel Corporation, where she worked in the ASIC Group and developed relationships with companies such as Bell Northern Research and Northern Telecom. Sherry holds a BSEE and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. www.awrcorp.com.

To comment or ask Sherry a question, use the comment link at the bottom of the entry.

December is the time for lists in my house.  Dear Santa lists and New Year Resolution lists.  So perhaps I’ve been preconditioned to take note of others producing lists as well?

 

This one caught my eye with its headline:

 

“Engineers spend 60-80% of work time changing designs.” 

 

Really? 

 

We spend that much of our work life “changing,” “reusing,” “repurposing,” “recycling” existing/past/legacy work?  Wow.  Even if its 50%, that’s significant—so I read on to find out what PTC had to say.

 

Five Things You should Know About 3D CAD Software 

(Perhaps this applies to any type of software…you be the judge)

 

 

1. Easy-to-use doesn’t have to mean dumbed down.

I read this to mean software and technology have come a long way over the past three or so decades.  Easy-to-use no longer means “it’s a toy”…but, now-a-days, with Apple’s success, if it isn’t easy to use, it won’t get used.  Dumbed down?  Tell that to Steve Jobs.  I’d love to see his reaction.  In software, and with other things as well, the easier something is to use, often times the more elegant it is underneath and the more hours and hours of hard work that went into it. 

 

To take us away from software, think about writing an article or a report or even a well penned letter.  Isn’t it true that the more time /edits that go into it, the better the end piece?  Easy to read doesn’t mean dumbed down either.

 

But likely what PTC was trying to infer is that the market windows of opportunity today are too narrow to spend a lot of time learning a piece of software, while at the same time, today’s complex designs require tools that are powerful, technology-rich, and intuitive.   I couldn’t agree more here. This is AWR 100%.  Our novel user-interface in the world of high-tech design got us noticed back in 1998 and, complemented by our powerful underlying and innovative technology has kept us growing over the years.

 

2. Designs should be both robust and portable

What you design must, of course, work—preferably the first time. Being able to refine, reuse, repurpose is also important and should be straightforward…not cause you to throw the baby out with the bathwater. This seems obvious enough, but if the software isn’t built with this in mind, its possible that it could be easier to start from scratch than to try to reuse something that was built prior with so many tricks, tweaks, fudge factors etc.  Learn to work around bugs in the software in order to be productive?  Short lived.

 

3. Shouldn’t make changes hard to deal with

PTC has a different spin on “changes” than I do but instead of just thinking about changes made possible within the tool itself, what about enabling co-simulation / collaborative design with tools that are complimentary with your software? 

 

Software that has been developed with flexibility and open integration in mind can readily grow/adapt to your changing/evolving needs without requiring a large time investment in changing the design.  AWR’s charter is to provide seamless integration with third party tools in order to make you more productive and successful.

 

4. You shouldn’t have to hit a functionality ceiling

What’s the next gotcha in your design complexity?  Maybe you don’t have good visibility into it but you sure need to know that the tool vendor is thinking this through for you and will be there for you, providing you with the functionality you need today but also in the near and longer term.

 

 AWR’s software is built by microwave engineers, so we know what engineers need, and we’ve got them covered.  We are tuned in to our customers’ needs, and we innovate constantly (look at our recent innovation of multi-rate harmonic balance (MRHB) and AXIEM planar EM) in order to provide the technologies needed to solve this year’s challenges, as well as next years’ and the year after that.

 

5. Maintenance shouldn’t break the bank

Keep up-to-date and current with the latest releases of your software as well as provide access to solid technical support – this is part and parcel of the software business these days—particularly EDA software.  This one is so self-explanatory I’m not going to expand J

 

For all you out there, thanks for reading my blog these past seven months on the MWJournal site. I’ll be ending my place here come the New Year but hope you’ll find me again on AWR’s own website in 2010!

 

All my best,

Sherry

 

 

Nerd is the New Norm

December 07, 2009

 

Sherry Hess is vice president of marketing at AWR, bringing with her more than 15 years of EDA experience in domestic and international sales, marketing, support, and managerial expertise. For the majority of her career Sherry served in various positions at Ansoft Corporation including director of European operations and later as vice president of marketing. Before joining Ansoft, Sherry spent two years with Intel Corporation, where she worked in the ASIC Group and developed relationships with companies such as Bell Northern Research and Northern Telecom. Sherry holds a BSEE and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. www.awrcorp.com.

To comment or ask Sherry a question, use the comment link at the bottom of the entry.

I like to watch CBS’s Sunday Morning show on "you guessed it” Sunday mornings. Recently they did a piece on “Once Objects of Scorn, Nerds Now Rule.” And it got me smiling!  It’s not that being a nerd has become trendy per se but that with the new culture of wireless gadgets and the Internet, you have to be nerd-minded in order to communicate, be connected, survive in the 21^st century.  So, voila.  Nerd has become the new normal! I like this a lot.

 

So if nerd is the new normal....welcome to the most normal place on earth.... MWJ:-)

Ok, I'm teasing but can't we all use a little happy side bar these days?  Enough already with the economy, dismal unemployment figures, global warming and Tiger Woods.  Let's talk about how good it feels to finally be "in vogue" with our nerdiness.  I for one enjoy working on my computer, checking emails, blackberry, the new Google Wave, etc etc and helping my kids with their math homework.  When I posted this link onto my facebook page recently, a coworker from AWR shared the following with me in return: “Men Who Use Computers are the New Sex Symbols of the ‘90s.”   Seem to me that at least some of my friends are proud of this new normal nerdy phenomena.

So come one, come all and celebrate this nerd is the new normal era with me.  Mark your calendars now for Tuesday night, May 25^th from 5:30-7:30pm for a Women in Microwave Engineering Happy Hour at IMS 2010 in Anaheim.  Bring your normal male friends if you like but come and network with the female form of normal.  The renowned Peggy Aycinena, freelance nerd journalist and editor of EDA Confidential, will be our special guest speaker. And if this isn't enough to entice you, I’ll be raffling off Spa-finder gift certificates every 15 minutes throughout the evening—what normal female (nerdy or not) doesn't like a spa?

Check your IMS Program for more details on the location closer to the actual event but I for one am looking forward to meeting all of you there!

 

Location, Location, Location

November 18, 2009

Sherry Hess is vice president of marketing at AWR, bringing with her more than 15 years of EDA experience in domestic and international sales, marketing, support, and managerial expertise. For the majority of her career Sherry served in various positions at Ansoft Corporation including director of European operations and later as vice president of marketing. Before joining Ansoft, Sherry spent two years with Intel Corporation, where she worked in the ASIC Group and developed relationships with companies such as Bell Northern Research and Northern Telecom. Sherry holds a BSEE and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. www.awrcorp.com.

To comment or ask Sherry a question, use the comment link at the bottom of the entry.

Thanks to a coworker, who convinced me that it would be a good thing to do (for the greater good), I've signed up for the IMS Steering Committee for Anaheim 2010.   I'm not one to be quiet (oh gosh..why have I not learned)—so now I find myself attending meetings on my birthday, on Saturdays, etc.

I've also managed to get myself enlisted for two thing: I’m organizing the Women in Microwaves Reception (upcoming blog...stay tuned) as well as being part of the MicroApps committee.  In case someone out there reading this doesn’t know what the MicroApps program is, it is a series of concise, 20-minute technical presentations given at IEEE-IMS shows by exhibitors that are distinct and separate from the IEEE technical sessions.  The MicroApps provide an opportunity for exhibitors to showcase their technical prowess through presentations that detail their products, services and applications in a less formal, yet peer-reviewed forum during IMS.

In the past, I've not participated in many MicroApps programs because the sessions were tucked away into the deep dark corners of the convention center, which takes too long to get to and too long to return, plus if the session isn't all that you hoped, you are kind of stuck. Last year in Boston, MicroApps got a new lease on life—it was located for the first time front and center at the entrance to the show floor. Talking to a few people in Boston who had the pleasure of being next to the new, big, MicroApps theatre, they loved the extra traffic it brought by their booth.  And whenever I passed by the MicroApps booth, it was full of attendees.  The relocation of MicroApps reminds me of the well known expression …”Location, location, location!” 

This year in Anaheim, the venue will be right in the middle of the show floor (Booth 524), next to many industry leaders’ booths, and near a large refreshment area. This new location makes it oh so easy to stop in, catch the buzz in a matter of minutes, then stay for the full 20 minutes or gently bow out and continue on your way along the show floor.  Voila! This is a fantastic win/win for MicroApps and IMS.  Now we have another convenient venue for getting a little more technical substance from exhibitors and the like.  

Last year, the MicroApps sessions were going all the time, from the first day the show floor opened to nearly the final hours on Thursday. Let's get the same activity level this year. Sign-ups for MicroApps are open until the end of November. I'd like to hear from all of you out there either for suggested topics for which I can go off and track down speakers, or for your own firm to present.  What about partnering/teaming up with another company in your space to co-present a joint solution?  My last blog on OWF (Open Wave Forum) would be ideal to fill up an entire morning on content from the various players in this space and allow for a one-stop shop for prospective customers/users to get a quick and pretty heady immersion into the topic.  Perhaps there are other issues along this line of thought we should explore?

Location, location, location. For any of you out there exhibiting, you know the value of a good booth spot!  So click here to take a sneak peak at the location for the MicroApps theater and you'll quickly see that it is prime real estate. Don’t miss this great opportunity to showcase your new products/technologies/applications to a captive audience. Submit your abstacts for MicroApps ASAP.  I'm looking forward to seeing you there and blogging about all that I learn from you as a result!

 

 

The OpenWave Forum takes on Behavioral Modeling

October 26, 2009

Sherry Hess is vice president of marketing at AWR, bringing with her more than 15 years of EDA experience in domestic and international sales, marketing, support, and managerial expertise. For the majority of her career Sherry served in various positions at Ansoft Corporation including director of European operations and later as vice president of marketing. Before joining Ansoft, Sherry spent two years with Intel Corporation, where she worked in the ASIC Group and developed relationships with companies such as Bell Northern Research and Northern Telecom. Sherry holds a BSEE and an MBA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. www.awrcorp.com.

To comment or ask Sherry a question, use the comment link at the bottom of the entry.

If you’ve been reading the MWJ website these past few weeks, you’ve no doubt noticed a lot of information on “behavioral modeling” coming into the public domain.  Just this past month, the MWJ website hosted interviews with NMDG’s Marc Vanden Bosch on S-functions and David Root of Agilent on X-parameters.

During IMS in Boston, AWR interviewed Marc of NMDG and also Johannes Benedikt of Mesuro (Cardiff model) on their behavioral modeling approaches.  You can view those here:

While the concept of “behavioral models” has been around for a while now, it seems that 2009/2010 will see its coming of age.  Just a week or so ago, Anritsu showcased its behavioral modeling approach with HFE Sagl’s Dr. Ferrero bringing all major T&M players into the realm of behavioral modeling.

Understanding the power of behavioral modeling and what it can do for the designer has inspired AWR and others in / around this space to cooperate in understanding how we can ensure that the deployment/ use of behavioral models is streamlined to most benefit the customer.  What came about was the notion of the OpenWave Forum (OWF).    www.openwaveforum.org

Members of this emerging forum include AWR, Anritsu, HFE, Mesuro, NMDG, Rohde & Schwarz and Tektronix, and we encourage and hope that many more will join us. AWR’s motivation for being a founding member of the OWF is, of course, our on-going strategy to make it as easy as possible for customers to focus on design productivity. It’s refreshing to see competitors recognizing the value of working together for the benefit of all our customers.

I remember an experience back in the days when I was in sales and launching the European division of another software company. I marched into BMW HQ in Germany in the mid 1990s, determined to sell them more than the two seats they were using at the time.  At the end of the day, the engineering manager imparted these words of wisdom to me: “Sherry, I need my EEs to be designing, not drawing and doing file translation. My EEs (who were one for every 10 MechEs) are too valuable to spend their time drawing.  Enable ready import of our existing CAD files and then we’ll have something to discuss.”

For me this was a “no brainer” moment.  Anyway, I have digressed a bit but I think the point is the same. Engineers should be engineering, not toiling away on unnecessary steps like drawing a box.  We (in the collective sense of engineering tools/vendors) should be focusing on providing and differentiating our own IP and not mucking about explaining/convincing users, for example, about the benefit of dxf vs. sat file formats.  Be competitive on the subjects/technologies that matter most to the engineering community—it’s about how the models are developed and how customers’ bottom line can be improved!

If your curious to learn more about this topic, you can visit the OWF website and/or by visiting any of the other members of the OWF websites.