ICES 4th Annual Conference in Stockholm
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Whether to go to the 4th Annual Conference by KTH’s Innovative Centre for Embedded Systems was not a tough decision to make, as the topic struck as as quite relevant – “New Businesses based on Embedded Systems – how to succeed!”
Indeed, several different approaches to the issue were presented, with speakers from both organizations and businesses old and new, those which introduced embedded systems decades ago and those which only recently took heart to this kind of stuff. Even though the starting point was different, the conclusion was universally agreed upon – embedded systems are the way to go, but it’s not so easy to make successful use of them.
What we liked about the presentations is how one important topic kept coming up in almost each and every one of them – and especially in that given by Christian Sandström from KTH – that it is critical to understand the needs of the customer and work closely with those who understand the market to succeed, otherwise even the best idea will be wasted.
One funny thing that came up during his presentation was an comparison he made between a network of smart embedded devices and… a swarm of ants! Their power lies in great cooperation, keeping one another informed and distributing jobs between many agents, which makes the task virtually fail-safe.
That is exactly the association we were going for. Christian was very positively surprised seeing our company’s name on our name-tags! We had a very pleasant chat with him.
The exhibitions held during breaks between talks were also very interesting, with some of the speakers giving additional information on what they were talking before as well as many current KTH projects. They were also an excellent opportunity to talk with the great guys at Freescale and EIS.
The food and drinks were very well chosen and simply delicious – we also really appreciate the concern the organizers showed for providing dishes according to everyone’s tastes and dietary recommendations – and as can be deduced from the photos, the venue was just as nice. Overall, it was an incredibly pleasant day.
At the conference we finally got a chance to meet Vicky from ICES in person, and it’s at her courtesy we use these photos. Thanks!
