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IMS 2008 Wireless Technology Show Sets Record, Launches Innovations

IMS 2008 featured 830 industry booths representing 548 companies and groups -- a record number of companies/groups for any IMS held on the East Coast.

          ATLANTA -- The International Microwave Symposium (IMS 2008), which took over the Georgia World Congress Center June 15-20, achieved strong attendance and also set a record.
          Organizers said the event, which is among the world’s largest wireless-technology conferences, had 830 industry booths representing 548 companies and groups -- a record number of companies/groups for any IMS held on the East Coast. The gathering also attracted more than 9,200 total attendees, which was termed an exceptional showing.
          “This was simply a terrific IMS from both a technical and a vendor standpoint,” said Professor Joy Laskar, General Chair for the conference. “It was a standout in both total numbers and favorable attendee response.”
          The IMS meets annually under the auspices of the IEEE, the world’s largest professional engineering society. The show is the IEEE’s largest wireless technical conference and vendor exhibit in the world.
          Wireless devices, and the microwave technologies that enable them, are the force behind cell phones, advanced sensors, radio-frequency identification (RFID) and the fast-developing mobile Internet.
          IMS 2008 received major organizational support from three academic and research groups at the Georgia Institute of Technology -- Georgia Electronic Design Center (GEDC), the Georgia Tech School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI).
          Laskar, who is director of the GEDC as well as Schlumberger Chair in Microelectronics in the ECE school, has worked with Georgia Tech teams from ECE and GTRI for eight years on the development and organization of IMS 2008.
          “Certainly one great feature of the event was that attendees could catch up on pivotal technologies via hundreds of panels, workshops and presentations,” Laskar said. “And on the show floor, they had the chance to review the latest industry developments first-hand.”

GEDC research partner Samsung was among the hundreds of corporations that participated in the IMS 2008 conference. Others included Agilent Technologies, DuPont, ITT, Mitsubishi, Rohde & Schwarz, Teledyne and Toshiba.

Industry-vendor booths at IMS dominated the entire A Building at the massive Georgia World Congress Center. In addition, extensive displays were devoted to microwave history and related topics.
          Dozens of IMS social events included a large kick-off reception, the Taste of Georgia dinner hosted by Samsung and Agilent Technologies, and a gala MTT-S Awards Banquet – all held at the Omni Hotel in downtown Atlanta.
          The IMS 2008 conference offered new amenities in an effort to increase attendees’ comfort and satisfaction, organizers said. New elements included increased availability of hot meals -- including a free breakfast area on the show floor -- and multiple prizes such as iPods and iTouch.
          “This year’s IMS was an enjoyable experience,” said conference-goer Gerald DeJean of Microsoft Corp. “It was well-planned as well as informative. Hopefully, future meetings can use this conference as a measuring stick for professionalism and organization.”
          IMS 2008 featured speakers of international renown, including Nobel Laureate Joe Taylor of Princeton University, and Mike Farmwald, founder of such companies as Rambus and Matrix Semiconductor and a leading venture capitalist.
          Among important topics addressed at the conference were the FCC’s latest wireless auctions, the open-access mobile Internet, multi-gigabit wireless technology and the rapid evolution of fourth generation (4G) wireless platforms.
          Among the hundreds of corporations participating in the conference were Agilent Technologies, DuPont, ITT, Mitsubishi, Rohde & Schwarz, Samsung, Teledyne and Toshiba.
          IMS 2009 is scheduled for June 7 - 12, 2009, in Boston.