The CAD Insider

Coronavirus Kills Another Event

SXSW 2020 is cancelled. South by Southwest is the biggest show we (as TenLinks or as engineering.com) have ever attended. In 2018, 160K attended. Officially, it has been delayed "delayed" past it's March date until who knows when, another victim of the Coronavirus. As late as last week, SXSW planners were bravely saying the show must go on, but on Friday, the city of Austin cancelled it.

The economic effect of cancelling such a big event will be felt by downtown businesses, to put it mildly. Most Austin natives know to avoid the downtown during the music/movie/tech festival but the convention facilities, hotels, bars and restaurants count on the out-of-town revelers to pump in millions of dollars. A 34 year old show, last year's SXSW set a record when it brought an estimated $356 million.  

The shock waves from this big an event being cancelled is bound to add pressure on smaller events. Look for AIA to cancel its annual gathering of architects next – or have its host city do it for for them. AIA hosts over 20,000 architects a year. This year it is planned for May in Los Angeles.

Until the Coronavirus panic abates, event owners who may not have wanted to take the losses of cancelling an event, same as convention facilities, may be forced to do so by pressure from the cities they are in. The natives of those cities do not want to have disease carriers visit. And as much as city officials will hate to listen to complaints from local businesses who cater to conventioneers, they will most certainly not want their city to be the one the Coronavirus bursts out from to infect the rest of the country.

More on Coronavirus is Killing Conferences at engineering.com

 

Goodbye, Kobe. Rethinking Air Taxis.

Basketball loses one of its stars. Kobe Bryant, NBA legend, died in a helicopter crash over the weekend. With him was his daughter and 7 others. No one survived. It is a tragedy.

Kobe was in a Sikorsky S-76B, known as a “workhorse” and a “flying the Lincoln Town Car.” It is  repudiated to have an excellent safety record. An investigation is underway but preliminary reports say it was foggy, the visibility so bad the pilot had to get special clearance to fly in conditions worse than allowed for VFR, or visual flight rules. The helicopter crashed into the side of a hill.

Air Taxi’s Anyone?

Air taxi promises a 5 minute hop from Los Angeles' LAX to downtown.

The tragedy comes amid hype surrounding an upcoming air mobility, which involves small aircraft, that take you from big aircraft, to your destination, usually a downtown. It is a favorite subject for engineering software vendors because the aviation industry will use engineering software to design and analyze the small aircraft. It can make lighter parts, more powerful batteries (the flying taxis are usually electric powered), even new materials. The aircraft will open up a new chapter in aviation, making it more personal, more convenient. Wouldn’t everyone love to get from the airport to downtown in minutes rather than hours?

One company with a strange looking small plane shows how the wings fold up to become a stranger looking car. You can go from the Los Angeles airport to downtown in 5 minutes, point to point, flying over the dreaded US 110 Interstate. Your time is too important to waste on a clogged highway.

Flying taxi scheduled to land in Singapore in 2020.

Uber is so interested in air taxis that it has hundreds of companies bidding on designs of air taxis for its Air Elevate program. According to Uber, the FAA, the agency in charge of air safety, has been “amazing” in its “progressive stance to support the development of dedicated sky plane,” according to Aviation Week and Space Technology article.

Missing in the go, go attitude is any consideration of safety. Let’s face it, putting heavier than air objects above the ground is inherently risky. Credit engineers for making as safe as it is today but don’t forget, what goes up must come down. Here’s praying it all comes down as expected.

If any good at all come from this tragedy, can it be more attention paid to public safety?

Wine and Dine the Journalist. It's Just Smart Marketing.

It's reputed to be the best meat in the world. Jamón Ibérico de Bellota is the most famous ham of Spain. It’s the hind leg of a little black Spanish pig that eats nothing but acorns, giving it's meat the sweetest flavor and its fat...it's supposed to melt in your mouth like butter. The whole ham, displayed proudly at carving station in the finest restaurants, can fetch as much as $2500. Could this be what is on the table in front of us at a recent Microsoft event in Barcelona? I doubted it. Probably, a lesser grade of the ham. But journalists need to impress others with their perks. So, when this story is told, it will be Jamón Ibérico de Bellota.

Iberian ham over crusty bread. Jamon Iberico de Bellota is repudiated to be the finest meat in the ham in the world. Could this be it? I had to find out.

Microsoft’s reception was in the Fira Congress Hotel in Barcelona before the introduction of the HoloLens 2. Hors d'oeuvres were offered, champagne was poured. In addition to the Jamón Ibérico, there were little baby porchetta and tiny clams...with sea foam? Nope, it's "limona" gelatin. We're loving the lavish spread.

This is about as good as it gets for the press. Living the dream, I just heard from a member of the media.  

 

Edible art. You cannot afford places that serve this kind of stuff. Thanks, journalist job!

No doubt about it, being wined and dined is one big perk of being part of the media. Maybe the biggest. Definitely one the few. We don't do it for money. You really can’t get rich writing articles.

Oh, we do get “access.” That’s a perk, insist our editors. Meet movers and shakers of the industries you cover. For example, we hope to meet the CEO of Microsoft soon. Or a front row seat. Or a chance to ask a few questions. If we are called on. If he sticks around. I sometimes take a selfie with industry VIPs – if I'm able to summon the courage.

You do to get out of the office and have an excuse to be late on deadlines, away from your gruff and non-understanding editor, the rag or blog you attend to for pennies, often late into the night, no raise in sight. Sure, even going to Cleveland and Dallas can look good under those conditions.

Living the Life  

You, on your meager journalist salary, cannot afford this life. But if they’re buying, you’re eating – and drinking.  

Strange how, after you cover a big event, every press release from the company becomes important, every new product release significant, every PR person your friend, every marketing VP a star, every executive a thought leader…  

Tens of thousands of words pour out over the course of the year. It’s the best way to stay “on top of mind” so you are sure to be invited to the company's invitation only event for “selected” press. London, Amsterdam and Brussels, Belgium, Tokyo, Singapore, Paris... Shanghai may be hinted at (if you’re good).

While they're buying White Castle burgers back home, you are in Barcelona eating porchettas.

The Bottom Line  

You might be dazzled by the opulence and the attention. It's not love, though. It's business. It's simple math: ROI, or return on investment. Smart companies know all about it. There’s some smarties at Microsoft, for sure. You don’t spend a quarter million on a press event without knowing you’ll get it back. You, dedicated media professional and blogger, are going to write it up. More than once. A normal obligation is one article or post per event. But a lavish event, an overseas flight to a bucket list destination, a five-star hotel? You are going to just churn out articles. Because there’s so much you have seen and learned, right?  

The best cons leave their victim (the "mark") with no idea of being swindled.  

The cost of a sponsored post is $2500. That’s about the cost of flying and boarding a journalist on a junket. So, why would a smart company get one article when for the same price, they could get a year's supply? 

The press crowds the bar a recent event. It's what we do. If they're pouring, we're drinking. 

Feeling Out of Place in the Silicon Valley

Sunnyvale, CA - the beating heart of the Silicon Valley. Lobby of the Plug and Play Center

The Plug and Play Center, in Sunnyvale, CA, the beating heart of Silicon Valley, is the unlikely venue for a venerable CAE company’s conference. The demographic is all askew. If you are visiting from Mars – or almost anywhere else on Earth, the neighborhood looks like any industrial park. But inside, there are signs of the extraordinary. The building is abuzz. Ever one under 30 years old. There are so many Asians, Indians… Not that there is anything wrong with that!

The Plug and Play Center is painted in primary colors to set itself apart in the industrial park. It looks playful, but it’s not. Billing itself as an “the ultimate startup ecosystem,” it houses hundreds of start-ups all desperate to be the next big thing, to get the next round of financing, to be embraced, discovered, rich. To remind them of what they could become, posters of the two or three who have emerged to household name status adorn the walls (Dropbox, Paypal, the Lending Club, SoundHound). There is a 2nd tier who have at least achieved significant rounds of funding – probably in the millions. But most are hungry, anxious…

Plug and Play is 3rd in number of US VC deals in 2015 per the Silicon Valley Business Journal. To be housed there, you have to selected. The center provides desk space, services and a small ($25K to $500K) investment. So being there is already some measure of success, like reaching the base camp of Everest. Bu the peak still looms. Most of the companies, as genius as their youthful leaders are, will not make it to summit.

Venture capitalism is based on just one or two out a hundred making it. Big bets are lavished on eventual failures. VCs know this, even if the start ups don’t. Millions of dollars are being thrown at them, with the hopes of getting hundreds of millions back, but we only need one or two of you to make it.

Don't have a Tesla and you're not a VC? Park it in the back of the Plug and Play Center, Sunnyvale, CA.

A few old guys are here, the ones with a practiced casualness belied by expensive loafers. They are the venture capitalists, the princes of Silicon Valley. They park their Teslas in reserved spots in front of the building, saunter in to offer sagacious business advice to the young geniuses – and give interviews to the press.

The VCs are fond of saying they provide “adult supervision” to the startups. 'Twere it was so. Mostly they are there to check attendance, that their investments are still in house, which somehow equates into their investment being safe. Most startups get plenty of leash to flounder. VCs’ few pearls of wisdom do little to save start-ups, most with no solid business plan, no hopes of revenue, their eyes crossed by the last Pokémon Go or next killer app with the lifetime of a shooting star.

Still, at first glance, the Center will fool you into thinking it was built for your success. You get a receptionist, IT services, a really cool address in Sunnyvale. That last bit alone is bragging rights. The occasional VC is seen wandering down the aisles and you can probably bump into him. There must be daily elections for “hottest start-up” because just about every company is one, so say their banners in the lobby.

Good luck, one and all.

Rugs to riches. Saeed Amidi, head of the Plug and Play Center, was a rug merchant. From plaque that hangs on the Plug and Play lobby of San Jose Mercury News article.