There was no blogging live from this year's media day at Automation Fair Tuesday because there was no wireless in the conference center. After leaving the day's activities, Jane Gerold and I headed over to the networking reception. We had a good chat with Rockwell CEO Keith Nosbusch. Like some politicians of recent note, Keith is much more charming and passionate about the business than he appears to be when delivering a set speech. He seems to be settling into the CEO role quite nicely.
His focus was on getting the company to be results driven. That seems almost trite, but Rockwell Automation had developed a "big company" culture with layers of management and many vice presidents, and so on. This focus seems to be catching on within the ranks.
Another organizational note is the development of a position known as "business manager." I figured that was a sort of bogus title to work around being called a marketing person. But I was set straight that this position actually has profit and loss responsibility for the business segment. I think that can be a good thing, too. If done properly (the position is rewarded according to company goals, and so on), this can drive entrepreneurial and small company zeal.
Then Wednesday and Thursday I had 9 hours of tours of different product/solution areas just of Rockwell. In addition I talked with many other companies at the show. There are so many new products that it will be impossible to do them justice. But as all of the "non-Rockwell" companies said, this is the only trade show worth going to. Why? I just saw the press release on attendance--14,000. That excludes Rockwell people--the attendance just for Wednesday was 13,000 including Rockwell people and others (like me). That's the number that most trade show organizers tout. Amazing.
6:12:01 AM 
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