Nuremberg is steeped in history, and while many of those attending European Microwave Week 2017 will take the opportunity to step back in time to enjoy the medieval spectacle of the city’s Old Town, it is the activity of the present and the promise of the future for the RF and microwave industry that will be of prime interest.
That interest should be easily satisfied by an excellent conference programme comprising more than 500 presentations, which is the result of the commitment of some 450 reviewers and the 100 members of the Technical Programme Committee. The regular programme, which is organised in 85 oral and six interactive sessions, is complemented by 38 workshops and five short courses covering a wide range of topics, ranging from millimetre wave circuits to 5G, from power amplifiers to automotive radar and from phased arrays to satellite communications.
Central to the week, the free-to-attend European Microwave Exhibition will be housed in hall 7A of the Nürnberg Convention Center from Tuesday, 10 October to Thursday, 12 October, where 349 exhibiting companies (correct at the time of writing) spread over 8000 square metres (gross) will be primed to showcase and demonstrate their latest introductions.
This year, in excess of 1500 unique conference delegates and around 4500 attendees are expected to descend on the conference and exhibition centre that visitors can also access virtually via the Rohde & Schwarz sponsored EuMW App, which is designed to be a digital companion leading up to and during the week. For the exhibition, it will enable users to navigate the show floor with the interactive map, filter and search for selected exhibitors and contact exhibitors directly to book a meeting. For the conferences, users can follow and build their own personal agenda, access abstracts, post questions and leave feedback.
Interactive, in the real rather than the virtual sense, the well established EuMW Welcome Reception, sponsored by Keysight Technologies, Horizon House Publications and EuMA, encourages industry and academia to communicate and network. On Tuesday, 10 October, the reception will take place in room Sydney and restaurant Vasco da Gama. The evening will begin with a cocktail reception at 18:30, when guests will be addressed by the 2017 EuMW chairman, Arne Jacob, who will hand over to the 2018 EuMW chairman for Madrid, Magdalena Salazar Palma, followed by an address by Keysight Technologies, after which a three course seated buffet for 1000 people will be served.
From the conference programme, through interactive sessions to new products on display, the main aim is to ensure a productive and informative week for all. To help visitors achieve these aims, the following quick reference guide is designed to complement the Conference Programme and Exhibition Show Guide, where you will find more detailed information.
THE CONFERENCES
Each with their own dedicated time slots throughout the week, there are three focused conferences:
- The 12th European Microwave Integrated Circuits Conference (EuMIC) takes place from Sunday 8 to Tuesday, 10 October
- The 47th European Microwave Conference (EuMC) extends from Sunday 10 to Thursday, 12 October
- The 14th European Radar Conference (EuRAD) ends the week and runs from Wednesday 11 to Friday, 13 October.
The conferences cover a wide range of subject areas, including: microwave, millimetre wave and submillimetre wave systems, antennas and propagation, wireless technologies and telecommunication, encompassing RF, microwave and optical. There is also specific focus on ICs, semiconductor materials and packaging, radar architectures, systems and subsystems, not forgetting sensors and remote systems and test and measurement. Many of these areas will also be covered by the workshops and short courses that start on Sunday, 8 October.
Registration, sponsored by Rohde & Schwarz, opened online on 1 June and remains open up to and during the event, until 13 October. There will be onsite registration from Saturday, 7 October, from 16:00 to 19:00, and from 07:30 each morning from Sunday, 8 October to Friday, 13 October.
The registration area will be located at the entrance to the conference centre as signposted. All those who have pre-registered should bring their badge barcode and confirmation to the conference, where they can print out their badge by scanning their barcode at the Fast Track desk onsite. For those who have not pre-registered, there will be onsite registration terminals located within the registration area, where delegates can enter their details and pay immediately by swiping their credit or debit cards through the card readers attached to the terminals. Alternatively, there is the facility to pay at the cashier desk for those who require a printed receipt.
Once in possession of their badge, delegates can collect their delegate bags, sponsored by Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH), which will include a USB stick, sponsored by UMS, containing the conference presentations.
EuMC
In 2017, the EuMC celebrates its 47th anniversary. Forty-seven marks an advanced age, where it is possible to look back on a long and successful tradition, rich scientific experiences and worldwide reputation. The EuMC also recognises that this is a golden age that symbolises the heyday of microwave technology, where wireless technologies in particular impact greatly on daily life, and innovation is evolving at a breathtaking pace.
The 2017 EuMC team has endeavoured to compose a conference programme to reflect those trends. The result is hundreds of high-quality conference contributions complemented by many topical workshops throughout the week, seven industrial session keynotes, two renowned plenary keynote speakers and eight highly reputed panellists.
The EuMC opening on Tuesday, 10 October, will feature the keynotes of Dr. Bruno Jacobfeuerborn, chief technical officer, Deutsche Telekom AG, and chief executive officer, Deutsche Funkturm GmbH, on “5G: The True Enabler of the Internet of Things,” and of Dr. Reinhard Ploss, chief executive officer of Infineon Technologies AG, on the development “From RF Signals to Smart Sensor Solutions.”
Also significant is a special event during the week on “Fully Automated Driving. Enabled by Microwaves. What else?” The EuMC closing session on Thursday, 12 October, will feature eight experts who will share their complementary views on the role of radar, chip technology, optical sensors, navigation, mobile communications, cyber security, test and evaluation and regulation for autonomous driving, arranged in a panel discussion directed by the TV editor and moderator Ulrich Bobinger.
EuMIC
The 12th EuMIC combines the conference’s long-standing and appreciated heritage with a range of innovative elements. The composition of the 13 technical sessions and six joint sessions with EuMC reflects the intention to stimulate the scientific discussion among experts from competing and complementary semiconductor technologies addressing the microwave to terahertz frequency regimes, encompassing all aspects from device technologies, modelling and characterisation to the application oriented design of integrated circuits.
The significance of Si-based microwave technologies alongside III-V and other compound semiconductors is reflected by the strong presence of related papers in the technical programme, as well as in the topics of this year’s distinguished plenary speakers. As a novel feature to all conferences of the European Microwave Week, EuMIC features four Industrial Session Keynotes from very prominent members of the microwave integrated circuits industry.
Communication in the interactive sessions will be raised by electronic media support, and the scientific programme will be complemented by attractive topical workshops running alongside the conference. The traditional Foundry Session, hosted by the GAAS® Association, together with a new special session on Funding for Research, is further evidence of EuMIC’s strong topical diversity.
EuRAD
The 14th EuRAD conference is the major European event covering the present status and future trends in the field of radar technology, system design and applications. It covers a wide variety of topics, ranging from radar components and systems, radar propagation and target modelling, advanced signal processing techniques, up to the most innovative radar architectures and concepts and the latest applications.
In the opening session on Wednesday, two excellent keynote speakers will address important aspects of spaceborne radar and space surveillance. Dr. Paul Rosen, manager NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, will present “The Renaissance in Radar Remote Sensing—Our New Vision for Earth and the Planets.” In the second keynote, Dr. Gerald Braun, manager DLR Space Administration, will give a talk on “Space Surveillance and Tracking: Operational Setup and Needs.”
The EuRAD opening session is held in conjunction with the Defence, Security and Space Forum (DSS). In contrast to the opening session, the closing session keynote is focused on consumer and industrial applications. It is entitled “Radar Systems: A New Emerging Market for Consumer and Industrial Applications” and is presented by Dr. Ludger Verweyen, senior director RF Mobile, Infineon Technologies AG.
This year, 151 papers were submitted to the conference and after a rigorous selection process, the 93 accepted papers were organised into 24 oral sessions and two interactive sessions. EuRAD delegates can also attend several sessions shared with EuMC. Two Industrial Session Keynotes will address recent innovation highlights of the radar industry, and attractive topical workshops running alongside the conference round off the EuRAD programme.
THE EXHIBITION
The exhibition hall will feature companies large and small, established and emerging, with the prospect of leading manufacturers utilising the exhibition as a platform to launch new products onto the European and global market. Of course, European companies are to the fore, with Germany, France and Spain having their own focused national pavilions. As always, the U.S. and Asia are well represented and the Chinese pavilion demonstrates the country’s continued and developing presence in the RF and microwave sector and its desire to reach overseas markets.
For the entire three days of the exhibition, the seventh annual European Microwave Week Microwave Application Seminars (MicroApps) will provide instruction with an industry focus. The National Instruments, Rohde & Schwarz and Horizon House sponsored free-to-attend seminars will take place in the MicroApps Auditorium, located within the main entrance to the exhibition floor. The intent of this open forum is for exhibitors to highlight products and techniques useful to engineers in their day-to-day design work.
Germany is at the forefront of automotive development, with RF and microwave technology playing a vital role in the industry’s advancement. That effort is being recognised and demonstrated to a greater extent than ever before at EuMW 2017, where the focus is on Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) on its way to Highly Automated Driving (HAD) in the Future, with four workshops and three sessions within EuRAD dealing with the subject.
Also, within the entrance hall of the Nuremberg Messe at NCC OST, there will be a special exhibition of technology demonstrators and test cars from Mercedes-Benz, Bosch, Hella and Valeo, which can be viewed during normal exhibition hours. Test cars equipped with radar (Bosch and Hella) will be provided outside the Messe for test drives in the Nuremberg urban environment, while an Intelligent Drive Simulator (Mercedes-Benz) in the entrance hall offers the opportunity for a hands-on operating experience. Last but not least, in front of exhibition hall 7A, automated parking trials (Valeo) can be observed.
Appealing to the practical nature of engineers, the popular exhibitor workshops offered by leaders in their respective fields—Keysight Technologies, Rohde & Schwarz and National Instruments—offer attendees the opportunity to see live demonstrations and gain hands-on experience.
This year, Interactive Sessions will see poster papers displayed on active presentation screens instead of the posters used in previous years. The sessions will be located in the conference area on Monday and Friday, and in the exhibition hall for the three days of the exhibition. CST will facilitate vital access to emails and the web through its sponsorship of Wi-Fi, while the exhibition hall will be the home of the Publisher’s Corner and the conference Coffee Breaks, sponsored by Copper Mountain. For the first time, water dispensers, sponsored by Keysight Technologies, will be located on all three conference levels to provide refreshment on-the-go to delegates.
Exhibition Opening Hours
Tuesday, 10 October:
09:30–18:00, followed by the Welcome Reception
Wednesday, 11 October:
09:30–17:30
Thursday, 12 October:
09:30–16:30
GETTING TO THE NCC, NUREMBERG
Nuremberg (shown in German as Nürnberg on signs, etc.) is located in the south of Germany and it is well connected to the European motorway, rail and flight networks, which allow easy access to the Nürnberg Convention Center. The NCC is connected by subway lines to the main railway station (about eight minutes) and to the airport (about 25 minutes).
By Car
Navigation systems will find the NCC by inserting the address: Karl-Schönleben-Strasse, Nuremberg, Germany or entering Messezentrum, Nuremberg as a special destination.
By Rail
Nuremberg is served by four different kinds of trains: ICE (Intercity Express), IC (Intercity), RE or RB (local trains) and the S (commuter train). ICE trains are the fastest and enable access to Nuremberg from Frankfurt am Main and Munich in two hours and one hour, respectively. For more information for connections within the German railway system (Deutsche Bahn), visit www.bahn.com. To obtain more information for local connections and subway lines in and around Nuremberg, visit www.vgn.de/home_engl/.
By Plane
Nuremberg Airport (NUE) offers numerous direct flights from nearly all major European cities—more than 50 European direct connections are available. From overseas, NUE is easily reached by international flights via Frankfurt am Main or Munich. Within Germany, there are also excellent national flight connections. To get more information for connections to NUE, visit www.airport-nuernberg.de/english.
Free Public Transportation
Public transportation will be free for all conference delegates during EuMW for the local traffic network (bus, tram and underground). Detailed information on the tickets will be provided prior to the conference online and by email.
The Nürnberg Card
For €25.00, the Nürnberg Card provides two days of free admission to all museums and attractions, as well as two days of free travel on all public transport services within Nuremberg and the entire region of Nuremberg, Fürth and Stein. The one requirement for anyone buying a Nürnberg Card is that they must stay overnight in Nuremberg or Fürth. For those with families at EuMW, the card is free for children age five and under; children up to age 11 pay only €5.00 (when at least one adult card is purchased). Cards can be purchased from any Nuremberg Tourist Office and are also available from reception at most hotels.
HOTEL RESERVATIONS
Horizon House has teamed with Connex Hotels and Events to offer a wide range of accommodation at competitive rates. To make a booking, simply visit Connex Hotels and Events’ booking page at www.connexhotelsandevents.com/eumw-2017-nuremberg.html or email sally@connexhotelsandevents.com.
SHOPPING & SIGHTSEEING
The Old Town of Nuremberg offers the experience of almost one thousand years of history. The city presents numerous shopping possibilities, whether it is on the Main Market Square, with its fruit and vegetable stalls under their red and white umbrellas, or the glass facades of elegant shopping malls. The inner city offers a unique shopping atmosphere with 500 shops in an historical backdrop that are open until 20:00 during the week.
The city has an active art and culture scene and for those with culinary aspirations, picturesque roast sausage “kitchens” entice guests to sample Franconian specialities, while star-rated restaurants offer gastronomic delights, even for the most discerning palate.
Locals suggest that one should not leave Nuremberg without having watched the Männleinlaufen clockwork on the facade of the Frauenkirche on the Main Market Square just five minutes before noon, looking down on the roofs of the city from the Imperial Castle or eating some of the famous Nuremberg roast sausages or a Schäuferle.
There are various tours and excursions organised as part of the Social Events & Partner Programme and www.nuernberg.de/internet/portal_e/kultur offers information on shopping and sightseeing.
Photos courtesy @nurnbergmesse.