I am being deployed last minute to research metrology options for a purchase we need to make. I will be there tomorrow and Wednesday if anyone from here would like to meetup, maybe even see if we find some squirrel lasagna and side salad.
Howdy Y'all! What follows is the promised IMNSHFO summary of my experiences at the Hexagon convention. There will be a separate, technical post about the GD&T and Pc-Dmis sessions I attended. . . soon.
The tl:dr: Las Vegas is in the middle of the desert. It is very hot there. The hotels are absurdly luxurious, the casino is loud and smokey, the food good but $$$-$$$$-$$$$$. Hexagon has expanded their trade show to offer many presentations, hands-on training sessions, and key note megapresentations ranging from meh to freakin' fantastic.
When Hexagon began holding these events nearly a decade ago I was not interested in attending. The agenda appeared to be nothing more than a long series of sales pitches and I have never been inclined to visit Sin City for any of it's so called attractions. Just not my sort of thing. I never caught the gambling bug, which I attribute to understanding the mathematics of "odds" a bit too well; somewhat akin to my aversion to meat that is not fully cooked and my limited knowledge of microbiology. I manage to "sin" plenty no matter where I go. I never wanted to empty my bank account pretending to be the subject of a Robin Leach piece.
However my present employer is Zoox. We are building a full stack robotaxi service from scratch. For the past few months we have been using our Leica Tracker a great deal. Recent activities have revealed a need for expanded capabilities to the point that we are considering a second system, ideally one that will be even more versatile than our current system. So it was decided to send myself and a colleague to this year's event, mostly to research the newest offerings and make contacts with the some of the most knowledgeable folks for each platform we are interested in. We went armed with a set of needs and an Engineer's wish list of capabilities we do not currently have.
This was a bit last minute, but not as outrageously so as I first thought given Las Vegas is only a one hour flight from San Francisco and flights and hotels there are cheap, even at the last minute. Seeking to balance spending a sufficient amount of time at the event to achieve the main mission and also attend some sessions of extreme interest I found in the agenda against my need to keep up with my regular work and need to be at my desk/in the office, I decided to fly out early Tuesday morning, stay the night and return Wednesday evening. My accomplice chose the same schedule but a day later. The conference officially ran Tuesday thru Friday.
It worked out quite well, but I was pretty much on the go go go the entire two days, and with being out of the office for two days, the three days at work were also jam packed. That's all fine. Just saying that if I go again I will try to allow more time for talking to people outside of sessions & events. If one is only going for the trade show effect of seeing the newest tech in the area they call "The Zone", then one day is probably sufficient. However if you are interested in any of the Keynotes, presentations, or hands-on training sessions, then you will need more time. I think one could justify the cost of attending if there were at least 5 or 6 sessions of key interest. I would give a bit of extra weight given to the 'master class', 'hands-on', and 'training' sessions vs. the 'keynotes' and 'presentations'. The former are on a par with the formal Hexagon training offerings. The later tend to be more high-level and fewer technical details. If one of your goals is shopping research such as was my primary mission, I would allow for a minimum of 8 hours devoted to the Zone and for cost justification purposes I would consider it to be of equivalent value to 3 or 4 sessions.
Hexagon is more than just a CMM OEM. Much more. Their theme this year is "Smart" and all about the industry 4.0 concepts of all portions of the organization sharing data with each other to be leveraged in every which way possible. They had the Zone divided into the following sections: - Smart Buildings & Infrastructure - Smart Cities & Nations - Smart Autonomous Mobility - Smart Factories - Smart Mines - Smart Industrial Facilities
CMMs are in the Smart Factories section, but there was only one small shop floor model on display and it was really only there to show off the robot arm that was cleaning, loading, and removing parts from the CMM.
I did not attend Hexagon CEO & President Ola Rollen's keynote: "Your Data Can Save The World" but I have watched it on the innerwebz and you can too.
Clearly he did not get the memo that AlGoreythm duped the scientists. Ola thinks there is lots of money to be made as we attempt to change course before we hit the doomsday limit.
The Vennetian hotel is nothing but suites. I am pretty sure I was in the smallest cheapest 660sq/ft "Luxury King Size Suite". It was plenty plush. The place is diabolically laid out with three wings, the Vennetian, the Pallazio, & the Sands. My room was in the first, the restaurants are in the second, and the convention in the third. The diabolical part is that the casino is in the middle, so to get from anywhere to anywhere you have go schelp thru the casino. Definitely a sensory overload zone and oh the noise noise noise.
My wife bought me a very apropos t-shirt a few years ago with the text: "You have read my shirt, that's enough social interaction for one day." Yet ironically the highlight of this event for me was meeting and talking to two people. Rob Jensen the chair of the Y14.5.1 math standard and Rich P the fellow forum member and metrologist from Massachusetts. After the GD&T and Pc-Dmis hands-on trainings on Tuesday afternoon I had a lengthy conversation with Rob. Tuesday evening I chose to skip Ola's keynote to have dinner with Rich and his wife, followed by Rich and I having a few beers.
Lastly a few words about food. If you pay attention to schedules and locations most all of your nutritional and hydration needs can be met with Hexagon provided fare. However the serving windows are a bit narrow and without careful scheduling one finds oneself resorting to purchasing from one of the many establishments within the hotel/casino complex. The two places I ate at were both excellent in terms of service and food quality. First time travels to Vegas should expect some sticker shock when it comes to the pricing.
HTH & ymmv
Thanks for reading. I had hoped to be able to post the techy stuff by this time too, but I am behind my self-imposed schedule. Hopefully by tonight.
Howdy Y'all! What follows is the promised IMNSHFO summary of my experiences at the Hexagon convention. There will be a separate, technical post about the GD&T and Pc-Dmis sessions I attended. . . soon.
The tl:dr: Las Vegas is in the middle of the desert. It is very hot there. The hotels are absurdly luxurious, the casino is loud and smokey, the food good but $$$-$$$$-$$$$$. Hexagon has expanded their trade show to offer many presentations, hands-on training sessions, and key note megapresentations ranging from meh to freakin' fantastic.
When Hexagon began holding these events nearly a decade ago I was not interested in attending. The agenda appeared to be nothing more than a long series of sales pitches and I have never been inclined to visit Sin City for any of it's so called attractions. Just not my sort of thing. I never caught the gambling bug, which I attribute to understanding the mathematics of "odds" a bit too well; somewhat akin to my aversion to meat that is not fully cooked and my limited knowledge of microbiology. I manage to "sin" plenty no matter where I go. I never wanted to empty my bank account pretending to be the subject of a Robin Leach piece.
However my present employer is Zoox. We are building a full stack robotaxi service from scratch. For the past few months we have been using our Leica Tracker a great deal. Recent activities have revealed a need for expanded capabilities to the point that we are considering a second system, ideally one that will be even more versatile than our current system. So it was decided to send myself and a colleague to this year's event, mostly to research the newest offerings and make contacts with the some of the most knowledgeable folks for each platform we are interested in. We went armed with a set of needs and an Engineer's wish list of capabilities we do not currently have.
This was a bit last minute, but not as outrageously so as I first thought given Las Vegas is only a one hour flight from San Francisco and flights and hotels there are cheap, even at the last minute. Seeking to balance spending a sufficient amount of time at the event to achieve the main mission and also attend some sessions of extreme interest I found in the agenda against my need to keep up with my regular work and need to be at my desk/in the office, I decided to fly out early Tuesday morning, stay the night and return Wednesday evening. My accomplice chose the same schedule but a day later. The conference officially ran Tuesday thru Friday.
It worked out quite well, but I was pretty much on the go go go the entire two days, and with being out of the office for two days, the three days at work were also jam packed. That's all fine. Just saying that if I go again I will try to allow more time for talking to people outside of sessions & events. If one is only going for the trade show effect of seeing the newest tech in the area they call "The Zone", then one day is probably sufficient. However if you are interested in any of the Keynotes, presentations, or hands-on training sessions, then you will need more time. I think one could justify the cost of attending if there were at least 5 or 6 sessions of key interest. I would give a bit of extra weight given to the 'master class', 'hands-on', and 'training' sessions vs. the 'keynotes' and 'presentations'. The former are on a par with the formal Hexagon training offerings. The later tend to be more high-level and fewer technical details. If one of your goals is shopping research such as was my primary mission, I would allow for a minimum of 8 hours devoted to the Zone and for cost justification purposes I would consider it to be of equivalent value to 3 or 4 sessions.
Hexagon is more than just a CMM OEM. Much more. Their theme this year is "Smart" and all about the industry 4.0 concepts of all portions of the organization sharing data with each other to be leveraged in every which way possible. They had the Zone divided into the following sections: - Smart Buildings & Infrastructure - Smart Cities & Nations - Smart Autonomous Mobility - Smart Factories - Smart Mines - Smart Industrial Facilities
CMMs are in the Smart Factories section, but there was only one small shop floor model on display and it was really only there to show off the robot arm that was cleaning, loading, and removing parts from the CMM.
I did not attend Hexagon CEO & President Ola Rollen's keynote: "Your Data Can Save The World" but I have watched it on the innerwebz and you can too.
Clearly he did not get the memo that AlGoreythm duped the scientists. Ola thinks there is lots of money to be made as we attempt to change course before we hit the doomsday limit.
The Vennetian hotel is nothing but suites. I am pretty sure I was in the smallest cheapest 660sq/ft "Luxury King Size Suite". It was plenty plush. The place is diabolically laid out with three wings, the Vennetian, the Pallazio, & the Sands. My room was in the first, the restaurants are in the second, and the convention in the third. The diabolical part is that the casino is in the middle, so to get from anywhere to anywhere you have go schelp thru the casino. Definitely a sensory overload zone and oh the noise noise noise.
My wife bought me a very apropos t-shirt a few years ago with the text: "You have read my shirt, that's enough social interaction for one day." Yet ironically the highlight of this event for me was meeting and talking to two people. Rob Jensen the chair of the Y14.5.1 math standard and Rich P the fellow forum member and metrologist from Massachusetts. After the GD&T and Pc-Dmis hands-on trainings on Tuesday afternoon I had a lengthy conversation with Rob. Tuesday evening I chose to skip Ola's keynote to have dinner with Rich and his wife, followed by Rich and I having a few beers.
Lastly a few words about food. If you pay attention to schedules and locations most all of your nutritional and hydration needs can be met with Hexagon provided fare. However the serving windows are a bit narrow and without careful scheduling one finds oneself resorting to purchasing from one of the many establishments within the hotel/casino complex. The two places I ate at were both excellent in terms of service and food quality. First time travels to Vegas should expect some sticker shock when it comes to the pricing.
HTH & ymmv
Thanks for reading. I had hoped to be able to post the techy stuff by this time too, but I am behind my self-imposed schedule. Hopefully by tonight.
