If This Is a Conference, then It Must Be November

November would appear to be Conference Month.

Of course, no one has conferences in the summer. Oh, wait! Semicon West does! OK, well, most folks assume no one is home during summer, so they wait until fall. Can’t do December because of the holidays… September, well, everyone is getting back from summer… October? Yeah, a few sprinkled here and there. And then there’s November.

Conferences are a dime a dozen these days. Some are big single-company affairs (Intel Developer’s Forum, ARM TechCon, for example). Others are put on by organizations, some venerable, some newly sprouted, having decided that events can be lucrative.

So, given all the conferences, which ones to go to? Your interests and mine should be broadly aligned, since you’re looking for new technology to help with your work and I’m looking for interesting stories about new technology that will help you with your work. Given all of the overlapping conferences, I’ve been pretty choosy about which ones to attend. That’s not to say that everything I’ve declined is not worthwhile; it’s more that I’m expecting a few of them to be particularly worthwhile.

Here’s what I’m looking forward to over the next several weeks.

Touch-Gesture-Motion in Austin 10/29-10/30: this has been my go-to event for, well, touch, gesture, and motion interface technologies. Put on by IHS, it normally ends up being a good two-day overview of what’s happening in those industries. It’s why most of my touch and gesture pieces come out in the December/January timeframe.
ICCAD in San Jose 11/2-11/6: this IEEE/ACM-sponsored EDA conference seems to have picked up steam over the last couple years. It seems to be the second node where EDA folks focus some announcement attention.
The MEMS Executive Congress in Scottsdale 11/5-11/7: This is the annual who’s-who confab of the MEMS industry, put on by the MEMS Industry Group. While there are MEMS- or sensor-related shows sprinkled throughout the year, this is a higher-level view, and it also becomes a focal point for announcements. Amelia and Kevin will also be here.
TSensors in San Diego 11/12-11/13: Organized by MEMS veteran Dr. Janusz Bryzek, this is the follow-on to the initial TSensors meeting of last year. There have been other ones since then in different parts of the world; I believe this to be the flagship session where we’ll get the latest on efforts to bolster the sensor market.
IDTechEx in Santa Clara 11/19-11/20: IDTechEx is actually the organizing entity, but it’s easier to say that than to name all of the collocated conferences happening during those two days. My focus will be in Energy Harvesting and Internet of Things, but there will also be sessions on wearable electronics, printed electronics, supercaps, graphene, and 3D printing.
IEDM in San Francisco 12/15-12/17: This IEEE conference is the go-to event for transistors and other basic devices. No tradeshow this: it’s serious technology, not for the faint of heart. If you think you really know your stuff, then come here for an instant humbling. Apparently this year will feature, among other things, a face-off between Intel (FinFET on bulk) and IBM (FinFET on SOI). I can hardly wait!