Eectronica 2010 in Munich saw 2, 595 international exhibitors from 45 countries who presenting their products, solutions and services to over 70,000 trade visitors. The international character of the trade fair was quite visible as 59% of exhibitors and 47% of visitors came from abroad to electronica 2010. 97% of exhibitors rated electronica 2010 as excellent to good. 79% of them will definitely or probably attend electronica 2012 while 93% believe that electronica has a very large, large or medium advantage compared with other trade fairs. Exhibitors agreed that companies can expect stable growth in future and are banking on innovative future technologies. The visitors came from a total of 115 countries. There was a marked rise in the number of visitors, for example, from Italy, France, the USA, China and Korea.

Indian Presence

This year Indian presence at electronica 2010 was the biggest ever with 61 exhibitors from the subcontinent. Electronics and Computer Software Export Promotion Council (ESC) the apex body for promoting Indian IT and electronics industry globally had a substantial presence with quite a few Indian exhibitors under its wing.

"I think the show is much better than previous years. We have not only met our old and existing customers but have met quite a few potential new customers," said Sanjiv Narayan, CEO, SGS Tekniks Manufacturing Pvt Ltd. Seeing the potential last year during Productronica SGS Tekniks opened their SGS Design & Engineering Services centre at Stuttgart in Germany called SGS Solutions GmbH. While Michael Lange is the Director of SGS Solutions GmbH, and based in Germany Ranjit Singh, Director for International Business, is overseeing the operations from India. When queried if it has justified the investment Ranjit Singh said "It has justified the investment costs and we have got plenty of development jobs. In fact we are now displaying our lawn mover which were developed in Germany, manufactured in India and sold in China. Also our brushless motors are catching quite a bit of attention."

SGS Tekniks that has been participating in electronica since 1996 are planning to take a much bigger booth in electronica 2012. First time participant Pulraj Electronics also was happy with the show. Hemesh Patel, Director, Pulraj Electronics said, "Last year, we had participated in productronica but were disappointed. But this show is much better and we were able to get some serious enquires. We hope next electronica will even be better." Having taken a booth under ESC he hoped that they will do more advertising to generate awareness about India in the European Union. 

Vick Aggarwala, an Indian based in Singapore and President with SCI, a Singapore based company has been visiting the show for 30 years and finds it the best place to network and meet old friends. "Ideal place to meet many suppliers from numerous parts of the globe. If planned well one can save a lot of time and money by meeting your global customers at a single venue," said Vick Aggarwala. The company has huge plans to expand to India next year.

Large Automotive Presence

The first thing that I and my colleague, Prasad Kerkar from Loksatta newspaper noticed was the large number of companies related to the automotive segment. A total of 1,281 exhibitors presented their products and services in the automotive exhibition segment - 559 of them with products and services relating to electro-mobility. The most important topics were therefore automobile electronics and electromobility. In addition to the exhibition segment and conference, the programme was supplemented by the automotive Forum. 

Just like in all areas of the exhibition segment, the topics of vehicle safety, energy efficiency and sustainability also dominated the programme of the electronica automotive conference. The exhibition segment was characterised by a large number of components and systems for electric vehicles - from components for power electronics and charging stations through to electric scooters and electric cars. However, electromobility was not the only focal point. Attention was also paid to energy-saving components and systems in regard to vehicle lights and vehicle control.

Photovoltaics & Renewable Energies

Alone in the area of photovoltaics, a total of 518 exhibitors presented electronic products for the management and monitoring of photovoltaic systems. The topic of renewable energies also generally played an important role during the trade fair. Exhibitors showed storage technologies for wind and solar power plants, components for power electronics, inverters and energy harvesting solutions for building services and industrial applications. Numerous talks during the electronica Forum also complemented the exhibition segment during the trade fair and provided information regarding the latest trends and developments on international markets.

Energy efficiency also became part of the trade fair itself. Entire stands were fitted with LEDs for the first time. The advantages compared with conventional lighting were that heat generation is reduced to a minimum and that energy consumption is also substantially lower.

Medical Technology

Electronic applications in medical technology were also very well-represented with 1,156 exhibitors who displayed many innovations. They presented, for example, electronic components for the latest generation of intelligent prostheses, portable medical devices such as blood sugar testers and pulse meters, implantable blood pressure sensors and remote monitoring and control systems for heart pacemakers, and therefore demonstrated the contribution which medical electronics now already makes to the quality of life of many people and can continue to do so in future.

Conference Programme

The conference programme turned out to be a total success this year with 323 delegates from 23 countries attending this conference thus clearly accentuating electronica's position as the international meeting-point for the electronics industry. In addition to the electronica automotive conference, the main features of the events programme included the Wireless Congress 2010 and CARTS Europe 2010 which were supplemented by the trade fair forums. A total of 237 talks were given during the supporting programme of electronica 2010.

One of the highlights was the traditional CEO Round Table during the trade fair. The CEOs of Infineon Technologies, Freescale Semiconductor, STMi- croelectronics and NXP Semiconductors discussed the economic crisis in 2008 and 2009, its background and the impacts on the semiconductor industry under the motto "What lessons have we learnt from the crisis?"

The participants agreed that, in particular, leading companies in the semiconductor industry had purposefully invested in research and development during the crisis in order to make sure that they now emerged from the crisis in better shape. However, the participants also conceded that there were still delivery bottlenecks at times due to the enormous upturn in the last two months. In future these bottlenecks can only be avoided through closer cooperation between manufacturers and customers in order to match requirements at an even earlier stage.

Products Showcased

ON Semiconductor expanded its innovative solutions for industrial sector applications with launch of two new products at Electronica 2010 - first-of-its-kind integrated stepper motor/CAN transceiver and new high power PoE-PD Interface Controller family. They also introduced three new automotive devices at Electronica 2010 to address in-vehicle networking, LED Lighting, and load management.

Weiss Umwelttechnik GmbH presented a world premiere: the first climate test chamber as a complete system with integrated measuring robotic. This climate test chamber can be used for function-dependent component tests under extreme climatic conditions and with rapid temperature changes in testing and production.

The combination of temperature, function and haptics is particularly exciting for the automotive industry, medical equipment, electric and electronic products, IT and domestic appliances. The climate chamber has a temperature range of -40 to +85 ?C at relative air humidity values from 5 to 95% humidity. Temperature can be changed at a rate of up to 5.0 K/min. The actual test chamber has a volume of about 1000 l, with outer dimensions of 2300 x 1600 x 2500 mm for the whole unit. Integrated Micro-Electronics Inc (IMI), a leading EMS provider to OEMs, showcased its comprehensive design-to-manufacturing solutions for the automotive, industrial, medical, storage device, telecommunications, and consumer markets.

The Conrad Group showcased quite a few products. Their colour camera endoscope Voltcraft electronic endoscope BS-150 XSD allows insight into complex machinery.

Inside complicated machines, equipment or control cabinets, it is not always easy to locate malfunctions or to perform visual checks. The Voltcraft electronic endoscope solves this problem and facilitates documentation and analysis of errors with its photo and video function. They also showcased how a pocket projector, mobile printers and scanners can convert a laptop into a mobile office; sygonix surveillance camera that is equipped with a Sony high resolution image sensor, delivering sharp images with even smallest visible details.

(The writer is with Global Features and can be contacted at chandraguptaa@hotmail.com)