The Reading Room – What’s The SCOOP?

By Philip Spagnoli Stoten Founder of SCOOP

Now in a regular Friday spot, this is the Reading Room, a weekly roundup of what we’ve been reading, watching and listening to. You can see these updates even more regularly if you follow me on LinkedIn or Twitter.

• It’s the season of goodwill, but during that season supply chains and schedules can be less good. If it’s not pre-holidays deadline, it’s getting ready for CES, or preparing for Chinese New Year that’s stressing innovators, purchasing and supply chain managers. There is great advice, and ordering deadlines, from Nate Evans, CXO of Fictiv on EMSNOW, under the headline “A Heads Up for Chinese New Year”.
• On the same topic, my old friend and colleague, Ron Keith offers his insight on the pages of EPSNews, with “8 Supply Chain Steps to a Worry Free Chinese New Year”. Stellar advice from someone who has seen, and guided his customers through, his fair share of events.
• If CES is your deadline, you’ve probably barely looked up from your desk in recent weeks. The event is one of my favorites and I’ll be reporting from there again in January, alongside close to 2,000 other journalists. This year’s event has an exceptional keynote list, with Salesforce Chairman and co-CEO Marc Benioff and Unilever CEO Alan Jope announced just yesterday. The full list of keynotes is on the CES website.
• With a nod to CES, to the innovation on show, and the creative minds behind those products, Fictiv CEO, and brother of the aforementioned Nate, Dave Evans writes about the “Disrupting, Democratizing, & Demystifying Innovation”. According to Dave, “we’re seeing a major shift in innovation, in how it is carried out, how it is accessed, how it’s delivered, and even how we consume it”, adding, “bringing access, democracy, and even a little disruption to innovation is a passion of mine and has driven much of what we’ve done in our own startup.”
• Still with Forbes I have very much enjoyed reading more from the pen of Marco Annunziata. He’s had a busy week with “2020: The Year Ahead In 3D (Printing)”, and “How To Succeed In The Fourth Industrial Revolution: 5 Key Insights From Intel’s New “Accelerate Industrial”
• Good news, we’re going to be tidying up our solar system. Thomas Industry Update announced that “World’s First Space Junk Collector to Launch in 2025”
• And if you think everything comes and goes quickly. Check out this list from IndustryWeek, which they say is “The Definition of Durability: 10 Manufacturing Companies That Have Reached the Century Mark”
• In this week’s CircuitNet, IDC announced that “Wearables Top 300 Million Units in 2019”. Continued end-user demand, proliferation of devices, and declining average selling prices will propel the worldwide wearables market in the years to come.

PODCAST OF THE WEEK: Excuse the self-indulgence, but Mike Konrad’s podcast, Reliability Matters is a favorite of mine and has regularly featured in this column. I finally made it onto his guest list. Check out our chat from SMTAi in September, where we discuss frustrations with Industry 4.0, disruption to EMS in 2020 and plenty more. Thanks Mike!!

MORE FROM PRODUCTRONICA: We continue to edit and post more videos from Productronica, check out the Productronica 2019 playlist on our YouTube channel. Of those recently added I particularly enjoyed host “That SCOOPshow – the Aegis Special” with both Michael Ford and Jason Spera on screen together for the first time.

That’s it until next week! For more regular musing connect or follow me on LinkedIn or Twitter.

Read more, watch more, hear more, know more – that’s the SCOOP!