AltiumLive 2022: Learn, Connect, and Get Inspired

In this episode, Zach chats with Lawrence Romine, Altium’s VP of Marketing. AltiumLive 2022 Virtual Summit is fast approaching, and we wanted to deliver to you some important information and reasons why you should not miss it. Lawrence gives an exciting overview and details about AltiumLive 2022’s new immersive experience! 

Listen to the Podcast:

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Show Highlights:

• AltiumLive 2022 connecting the ‘User Community’ (Designers and Engineers)
• 2 Events in the Calendar
  • AltiumLive 2022 Connect Americas: Wednesday, January 26th to  Friday, January 28th
  • AltiumLive 2022 Connect EMEA: Wednesday, February 2nd to Friday, February 4th
• FREE registration and remote accessibility worldwide
• This year’s AltiumLive is in collaboration with IPC, the Association Connecting Electronics Industries
  • Adapting the hybrid model (full virtual event) to get the whole world to connect and get involved
  • Bringing some of the finer points of the upcoming IPC Apex Expo 
• NEXAR Partnerships
  • What NEXAR Ecosystem can bring to the participants
  • Altium 365, bringing the rest of the industry at large
• Altium’s real focus on the user community and its uniqueness with other CAD companies
• The real mission and purpose of AltiumLive 2022
  • A non-commercial event
  • All about Learning, Connecting, and Getting inspired
• Industry expert, Eric Bogatin will be one of the speakers at AltiumLive 2022

Links and Resources:

AltiumLive 2022 Connect: Now open for registration
        AltiumLive 2022 Connect Americas
        AltiumLive 2022 Connect EMEA
IPC, the Association Connecting Electronics Industries
IPC APEX EXPO 2022
NEXAR
Previous Podcast Episodes with Eric Bogatin
        Signal Integrity Evangelist Eric Bogatin, our Expert Insider to DesignCon 2020
        Why You Should Stop Hanging on to Legacy Design Rules
        Bogatin’s “Practical Guide to” Book Series
        Pathological Design Features
Connect with Lawrence Romine on LinkedIn
Connect with Zach Peterson on LinkedIn
Watch Zach’s latest Altium Academy courses on Youtube
Read Zach’s articles on Altium’s resource hub
 

Full OnTrack Podcast Library
Altium Website
Download your Altium Designer Free Trial
Learn More about Altium enterprise solutions

Altium 365: Where the World Designs Electronics

Transcript:

Zach Peterson:
Hello everybody. I'm Zach Peterson and I'd like to welcome you all to this very special edition of the Altium OnTrack podcast. Today, I'm here with Lawrence Romine, VP of Marketing, here at Altium, and we kind of wanted to get on to the podcast real quick to drop an important announcement. So Lawrence, why don't you tell us all what's going on with Altium Live this year?

Lawrence Romine:
Well, look, this is exactly something near and dear to me. Altium Live is ... People use this term halo event, but this is really a halo event that we've now been doing. I believe this would be our fifth year and it's something that's near and dear to my heart. If anybody's ever attended an Altium Live or frankly heard me speak either on a webinar and met me at a trade show, just generally know anything about me, would know how near and dear the user community.

    And when I say user community, I'm referring to really just people like yourself, Zach. And not necessarily Altium designer users at that. Engineers and designers are near and dear to our hearts here at Altium. That has been and maintains, and it continues to be our singular vehicle for success. And that's our closeness with the user community, the engineers and designers specifically, and that's unique Altium. And Altium Live has been our vehicle to really, I don't want to say give back, because that also sounds cliche, but it allows us to get very cozy with that community and really provide an event that is a non-commercial event and really provide valuable information that our community needs, wants and desires.

    And this year's no different. So Altium team live, we've got two events on the calendar. So we have January 26th through the 28th, which would be the North American or the America's event. So timezone wise, and then that first week in February, we're going to be doing the exact same show just as we always do in Europe. So Central European time, you can go to altium.com/summit. Register, get all the details. It is absolutely free. It is absolutely digital, and it is absolutely brought to you in concert with our friends at IPC, which is the new wrinkle or new exciting element to Altium Live this year.

Zach Peterson:
Yeah, I'll be honest. I was really looking forward to getting back in person again. I went to PCB West in person and I was open to get over to this conference in person. However, I think this is pretty cool because it's going allow a much broader range of people in the audience to attend and really benefit from all of the technical sessions and the networking and everything else that happens. I remember last year it was actually really fun and to kind of commiserate over Zoom and talk to everybody at Altium and talk to some other designers, even though we were all technically quarantined.

Lawrence Romine:
Sure.

Zach Peterson:
But you know, like you say, it was a successful event and I think it's going to be great for the community and really broaden the scope of the audience.

Lawrence Romine:
Yeah, and look expect more of that, that you saw last year, Zach, with the virtual rooms where people get together. I was also very impressed with, now we have a new platform this year, which is a little more streamlined, a little more self-contained. Whereas last year we had a separate platform for where everybody would get together, the virtual happy hours and all those things we did. Which look, I was not that bullish on until I saw it in action. I'll be honest with you. I was, I was pleasantly blown away, not this pleasantly surprised. I was blown away with the sort of closeness we were able to achieve in that virtual event, which is what's motivated us to do it virtually again this year. Now there are, as I said, it's very much brought to you in concert with IPC and we are very much bringing the IPC Apex show. That's happening that same time here in San Diego, January 26th to the 28th.

     I believe it actually has a bit of a head on it. It happens a couple days before, but we'll be bringing that to you, some of the finer points of that to you virtually as well. So we're really excited about doing a repeat performance of what we did last year, which was so very successful that allowed us to touch so many people worldwide. That was really, really gratifying. But also bringing to you some new content and some new sort of partnership stuff that we've been working on. That's very exciting.

Zach Peterson:
Yeah. We talked about the partnership angle, especially with Nexar the last time you and I were on the podcast, and I think that's something that's really interesting, especially as it continues to evolve. And I'm sure the user community is going to want to hear what the Nexar ecosystem can bring to them, whether or not they're all user's.

Lawrence Romine:
That's absolutely right, and that's that digital bridge that we speak of Zach. We talk about, Altium has really made their success with that closeness that we have with the engineering and design community. And now just, this is the next evolution of it, which is bringing the rest of the industry at large, namely, as we've talked about. the supply chain and the manufacturing bits of the industry, closer to those engineers and designers through Altium 365, and if you're using Altium designer, right there in the context of Altium designers. So it's very exciting stuff.

Zach Peterson:
Yeah. Yeah, and you mention how Altium has a real focus on the user community. I would totally agree, and I'm a little biased here because people see me on the block and stuff. But I think this is one thing that really makes Altium unique. When you look at the other CAD companies, they don't really engage with the user community so much or if they do, it's kind of ham-fisted?

Lawrence Romine:
Yeah.

Zach Peterson:
Turns always turns into a big sales pitch. But I think the one thing that's great about the Altium Live event is that it's not just a constant Altium sales pitch. It's literally teaching you how to solve your technical problems, and whether you're an Altium user or not, the knowledge is what's important.

Lawrence Romine:
Look, as the guy that is the sort of final reviewer of the content, and obviously the guy that hosts the event every year, I can tell you that I am very direct with team and with the partners that provide the content and do the content. We go out of our way to make this a non-commercial event. This is not meant in any way shape or form to be a sales pitch in any way. And it is absolutely about learning. And this is where we talk about learning, connecting, and being inspired.

    I know it's easy to say, but I'm the guy that puts his name on it, that absolutely insists that is what the takeaway is. You're there to learn. You're there to connect with your peers in the industry, and this year, the new element is we're connecting even deeper to the industry at large, and to be inspired. And really look, that's why I think most of us got into this business in the first place that I was inspired by my father who was an engineer. I know we've talked a little bit about it, but most of the folks in the audience have a similar story. They were inspired by somebody and they knew early on that this was the career path for them. And this is really a celebration of that, Zach.

Zach Peterson:
Yeah. That's excellent. That's excellent. And I'm really excited. Again, I'm slightly disappointed that I wasn't able to travel to San Diego for this, but I'm sure it'll happen in the future. And in some ways it's okay because I've got other conferences lined up. It'll be easier to make time for this. And I think it'll be really cool to see who else in the community who might not have ever attended an Altium Live event because they couldn't get there in person, now you have this opportunity. So I think it's great.

Lawrence Romine:
Well, that's what we saw last year Zach, was just the sheer numbers of people we were able to connect with and the feedback was resounding and that's a big part of it. Which was namely our colleagues in Europe, felt sort of slided. So we made the decision, "Look, we're going to, we're going to go full virtual." And that then allows us to really get the whole world involved.

Zach Peterson:
Yeah. Amazing what technology can do. In fact, I see a lot of conferences now adopting the hybrid model specifically for that reason. It gets people who may not be in that country or who may not be able to make the time to travel or maybe can't afford to travel. Whatever the reason is, they can now attend that conference.

Lawrence Romine:
Well, and look by us going full virtual, this was a concern I had from the very get-go, which was I think we've all had an experience where we've seen, attended a virtual event or maybe seen recordings of live trainings. Because again, this is really predominantly training content and the content wasn't created for a virtual environment. It was created for a live audience. And those on the virtual end of things, I think kind of get a raw deal, because you're not speaking to the camera, the Q and A is not ideal. Whereas when we go full virtual, the content is optimized exclusively for a virtual, so the delivery is really tailored to those in the audience. And then as I said, primarily, the motivation for me is we can touch just way more people this way.

Zach Peterson:
Absolutely. Yeah and I get exactly what you're saying about optimizing the content for virtual.

Lawrence Romine:
Yeah.

Zach Peterson:
Having had to kind of cut my teeth on conferences with doing virtual content, I get exactly what you're saying compared to being in person. So I'm excited to for it. It sounds like you're excited for it. I know you're passionate about this.

Lawrence Romine:
Oh, I'm excited. Yeah. Yeah.

Zach Peterson:
And I've talked to some other folks in Altium who are excited about it as well. So I think it's going to be great.

Lawrence Romine:
Yeah. I'm looking forward to it.

Zach Peterson:
Yep. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for coming on and telling us all about this and communicating your passion for Altium Live, and I hope anyone that is listening to this brief version of the OnTrack podcast, that you will go into the show notes and you will click on altium.com/summit and go register for the virtual event for Altium Live 2022. I think it's going to be great. And I think anyone who hasn't attended an Altium Live event in the past, now's your chance to do it. Easy, without having to travel, without having to stress. I think it's going to be a lot of fun.

Lawrence Romine:
Look, you won't regret it. We get the best names in the business. Many of these speakers I've heard speak many times. So even if you've been to Altium Live and you see a name that you might be familiar with, I've seen them all, because I've been to every Altium Live, as you would imagine, and I still learn something new each and every time. And a great example of that, Eric Bogatin. I've probably heard him no less than 10 or 12 times now and it never gets dull and it's new each and every time. So I promise you your free registration won't go to waste. You will absolutely not regret having signed up and attended Altium Live.

Zach Peterson:
That's a great point. It's a free registration. So talk about broadening the base. Yeah and speaking of Eric Bogatin, we had him recently on the podcast and I think what we'll do is we'll link his podcast in the show notes, because he actually had some really interesting results that he was going to show at Altium Live, relating to some of the tools in Altium designer.

Lawrence Romine:
Yep.

Zach Peterson:
Again, not to make this a commercial pitch, but it is to kind of show how you can rely on CAD tools to really get some accurate results when you actually go and do your board build. Yeah.

Lawrence Romine:
Yeah, yeah. Look, we're looking forward to it and he's just one example. He's a legend for sure. But look at the agenda and I promise you, you won't regret it.

Zach Peterson:
Absolutely. So Lawrence remind us real quick, what are the specific dates for all Altium Live coming up?

Lawrence Romine:
Absolutely, so first show will happen in the America's time zone. That's going to be January 26th through the 28th. And then we're going to turn right around the following week and do it for our friends in Europe. And that's going to happen February 2nd through the fourth in local European time zone.

Zach Peterson:
Well thank you again. I think we're going to wrap this up, but I just want to say thank you so much for coming on here and making this announcement. Everybody, if you're listening, go to altium.com/summit or click the link in the show notes and go register for Altium live coming up in January. Thanks everyone. Thank you, Lawrence, and don't stop learning and stay OnTrack.