UBM Canon and Design News to Honor Lifetime Achievement in Engineering

SANTA MONICA, Calif., Jan. 29, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- UBM Canon, the world's leading advanced design and manufacturing industry resource, and Design News, will announce three major engineering awards on Tuesday, February 10 at the Pacific Design & Manufacturing event in Anaheim, CA. The awards will be announced in addition to their Golden Mousetrap Awards, a program that celebrates the companies, products, and people who are energizing North American design, engineering, and manufacturing.

Lifetime Achievement
Babak Parviz will be honored for Lifetime Achievement, although, at age 40, Parviz still has years of achievement to come. The former professor at the University of Washington came to the world's attention when he developed Google Glass, and the Smart Contact Lens, which can display the wearer's blood glucose level. He started experimenting with contact lenses as both a display device and a biomedical sensor as a professor. Parviz surprised many with a move to Amazon last summer, and is now heading a project that is being kept under wraps at this point. Parviz is a keynote speaker at MD&M West, which is co-located with Pacific Design & Manufacturing. He will be speaking about the future of wearable technology.

Rising Star Engineer
Design News will be presenting an award to the Rising Engineering Star, Manish Bhardwaj, a systems application engineer at Texas Instruments. Bhardwaj, 30, has contributed to the development of a software-based frequency response analyzer for power conversion systems and a reference design for motor control systems. He has also been involved in several solar power developments. The Rising Engineering Star award has been presented for the past three years, in partnership with Mouser Electronics.

Gadget Freak of the Year
Gadget Freak of the Year will be presented to a group of Colorado State University engineering students, who devised a DDV-IP, a robotic remote-controlled drink delivery vehicle. Doug Swift, Tyler Reedy, Rob Harvey, and Michael Habel will receive a $6,000 prize for their school project that went far beyond the classroom. A video of their device in action can be found here. The Gadget Freak of the Year award is sponsored by Allied Electronics.

All of the awards will be presented on Tuesday, February 10, 2015, at the Anaheim Marriott Hotel, adjacent to the Anaheim Convention Center, at 5 p.m. in the Platinum 5 Ballroom.

About UBM Canon
UBM Canon is the leading B-to-B event producer, publisher, and digital media company for the world's $3 trillion advanced, technology-based manufacturing industry. Our print and electronic products deliver trusted information to the advanced manufacturing market and leverage our proprietary 1.3 million name database to connect suppliers with buyers and purchase influencers. We produce more than 50 events and conferences in a dozen countries, connecting manufacturing professionals from around the globe.  UBM Canon is part of UBM plc (UBM.L) a global provider of media and information services for professional B-to-B communities and markets.

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SOURCE UBM Canon