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A quick look at Australia’s largest IT show . . . CeBIT 2009 by Ross Tester T o stand out from the crowd (and believe me, it can be very crowded at CeBIT) you need something different. Whether that is a “wow!” stand (and there were a few of those) or a “gee whiz!” product, you needed something to stop the passersby passing by . . . At the very least you need something to make visitors remember you, your stand, your products or at least your name. Bags displaying a name or logo (or both) are very popular, if only to carry home all the brochures before they’re put in the recycling bin. Last year, I recall one of the stands handing out monster-sized yellow bags. Everywhere you looked, you saw those bags. The smaller bags that everyone else handed out were stuffed inside the big bags! I also recall talking to the stand staff and their philosophy was simple: the guys with the biggest bags win. Yep, they won at least as far as exposure was concerned. While there was none of that this year (an edict from the organisers, maybe?), the NSW Government stand certainly took the prize for the bestbag-at-show. None of your Woolies and Coles bio-degradable politically correct bags here: your taxes went into a you-beaut, zippered (waterproof?) bag complete with compartments for your mobile phone and business cards. (And there were a lot of those bags with similar-sized bags crammed into them so I guess they won this year!). But of course, CeBIT is much more than bags. It’s about getting your message out to those who are interested (or might become interested if you’re a good talker) into buying your product or service. To be frank, I find it hard to comprehend the number of stands at shows like CeBIT all trying to flog the same type of products. There were countless 78  Silicon Chip companies selling countless software applications – it would appear that anything that started with an “e” was available: emarketing, ecommerce, elearning, etracking, epayments, ehr (how you can have e human resources is a bit beyond me) and so much more – even egovernment, courtesy of Kevin’s sales team. I noticed a lot more companies specialising in wireless – long range wifi figured prominently once again, as did several companies specialising in the “nuts and bolts” of wireless LANs and WANs, everything from the electronics right down to the connectors. And there were the ubiquitous “sign up now special CeBIT deals” for all manner of goods and services. Not the least was “only while show lasts” broadband special offers. I’m not convinced those people going to CeBIT would fit the demographic of wanting to switch ISPs etc but given If you look closely, you might notice the new “Shuttle X50” all-in-one PC... it’s due to go on sale at the same time as this issue of SILICON CHIP. the number of them and the fact that they come back year after year, they must figure it’s worth it. One such company I spoke to (who must, of course, remain nameless) said that they were definitely questioning their CeBIT attendance next year. They had already reduced the size of their stand to a quarter what it used to be, mainly because the number of leads had been steadily decreasing over the past three years. They had over 500 the first year and were even happy with the 350 the following year. Last year it was down to 250 and when I talked to them late on the second day, their follow-up book had just over a hundred entries in it. That’s a pretty expensive form of advertising, even if – and it’s a big if – those hundred are quality leads. It’s not just the floor space (expensive!) but building and fitting out the stand (expensive!) staffing it for the four days (expensive!) . . . you get the picture. CeBIT, held from May 10-12, occupied three halls at Sydney Convention and Exhibition Centre so it’s no small show! It’s broken down into quite a number of areas which specialise in certain fields – for example, VOIP, networking, wireless, telecoms, smart cards, RFID, POS, navigation, IT security, business software (almost a whole hall), data centres, IT hardware, financial services and so on. Then there were the various Government stalls (Australian, state and overseas) which, given their large budgets, mostly had the largest areas. Many of the big players in the IT game were present but many were conspicuous by their absence. One of the big boys that was there, raising my eyebrows at least, was Google. When a company name has entered the lexicon as a noun and verb in its own right (you don’t search on line any more, you Google!), one wonders which market siliconchip.com.au they were addressing at CeBIT! Newsprout, an ISP based on the north coast of NSW, had an interesting gimmick: handing out tiny plants (Vibirnum, a very hardy, easily grown shrub in any sunny or partly shaded position with moist well-drained soil, if you were wondering!) – in keeping with their name. A lot of their push was “green” but they also claimed to be able to keep up with the big boys when it came to service and speed. (www.newsprout.com.au). One of the most popular stands, at least at the time I was there, was Altech Computers. They had quite a variety of “new and unusual” products but the one that took my eye was the very new “Shuttle” X50 all-in-one PC. It’s a 15.6-inch LCD touchscreen with the PC built in. No keyboard, no mouse. It suits a wide range of applications including digital signage, kiosks, etc. It was so new at the time they only had one in the country – the one on display – but they expected stock to arrive around now (www.altech.com.au) The CSIRO had a rather interesting stand, not only because of the variety of applications displayed but also because of the experts they had on the stand to explain the applications and what the CSIRO is doing. Of particular interest was one of the Government’s big “pushes” at the moment, broadband to the bush: the CSIRO has developed a wireless system which uses existing infrastructure to deliver 12 megabit/s internet access up to 100km from the antenna. An upgraded system will deliver over 50 megabits/s. (www. csiro.au). One tiny stand (the smallest available!) had a real show-stopper, at least if the show crowds stopping were They reckoned this notebook case was rugged enough to go onto building sites and be walked on, even driven over! siliconchip.com.au any guide. Scinet are the Australian distributors for Dino-Lite handheld microscopes, which plug into a USB port. I was impressed with the veryclose-up display of PC board soldering. They had two models on display, both priced under $500 and they seemed to give a very good account of themselves. (www.scinet.com.au) IT security, both data and hardware, was featured heavily. With laptop/ notebook sales now far exceeding desktop machines, Trace Technologies were proudly showing off their “Laptop Cop” system which not only lets you find out where your stolen laptop is (they claim to within 15m via cell triangulation!) but lets you control it when the crook uses it on the ‘net for the first time – without the thief’s knowledge. So you can remotely delete or retrieve important or sensitive files, then get it back (and hopefully apprehend the thief). (www. tracetechnologies.com.au) Another “felon”-related application was the Federal Government’s “CrimTrac” system – the awardwinning crime-fighting tool. CrimTrac was established to allow police forces across Australia to share information, to solve crimes and catch criminals. It’s now evolved into a national automated fingerprint ID system, a national criminal investigation DNA database, a national Child Sex Offender register and a national Police Reference System providing rapid access to operational policing data. CrimTrac’s record is already very impressive and we hope to provide more insight into this system in the future. (www.crimtrac.gov.au) Data recovery was also a feature – and we plan to look at this area in significantly more detail in the future. One company was demonstrating its approach to the subject with a number of open, spinning hard drives. I don’t think Xyber Data Recovery expects them to ever work again but they looked impressive. As well as hard disks, they also extract data from bent flash, tape, RAID and so on. (www. xyber.com.au) Away from the halls was another part of CeBIT, the virtually continuous seminars and presentations by and for industry luminaries. We didn’t have the time to attend any of these but if the number of press releases they generated is any guide, they were well received. There were also numerous Scinet’s Dino-lite handheld (or in this case stand-held) USB microscopes. anyone-can-attend seminars held inside the CeBIT display halls, of particular note those of telecoms guru Paul Budde. We did manage to poke our head into one of these, if only for a few minutes. When deadlines loom, seminars are an unaffordable luxury. Overall? One of the main reasons we look at shows like CeBIT (and let’s face it, CeBIT is the largest such show in Australia) is to see where the IT industry is up to and to keep abreast of the latest and greatest products. From that point of view, CeBIT was, with some exceptions, disappointing this year. Sure, there was lots of razamatazz but there wasn’t all that much in the way of innovation. But as we said earlier, we go to keep abreast of the “IT” times and from that point of view, quite worthwhile. SC We spotted these earphones (?) on the Korean Business stand. They don’t go in the ear but on the ear, allowing you to still hear ambient sound (eg, sirens). They sounded good, too! July 2009  79