T&MW Announces Award Winners

Grachanen, Willtek honored at ceremony

-- Test & Measurement World, 2/25/2004 2:00:00 AM

FEBRUARY 24, 2004--During a ceremony held this evening in conjunction with the 2004 APEX conference in Anaheim, CA, Test & Measurement World magazine announced the recipients of several test industry awards. The highlight of the evening was the announcement that Christopher Grachanen has been named the Test Engineer of the Year. Grachanen, who is manager of the metrology laboratory at Hewlett-Packard in Houston, TX, was introduced to the gathering of test industry professionals by Larry Maloney, publisher of T&MW. Rick Nelson, T&MW's executive editor, presented Grachanen with a medal, and Eric Starkloff of National Instruments (the company that sponsored the award) presented him with a plaque.


Eric Starkloff (left) and Rick Nelson (center) present the Test Engineer of the Year Award to Chris Grachanen

One of six nominees, Grachanen was selected by Test & Measurement World readers for this honor. In our September 2003 issue, we described the accomplishments of the nominees and asked our readers to vote for the winner. Among Grachanen's many accomplishments: He spearheaded an ASQ effort to develop a certification program for calibration technicians; he shepherded his lab through the National Voluntary Laboratory Accreditation Program (NVLAP) accreditation; and he has developed several shareware software tools for metrologists.

As the Test Engineer of the Year, Grachanen was given the opportunity to designate engineering programs to receive a total of $20,000 in education grants, courtesy of National Instruments. (Look for a profile of Grachanen in the March 2004 issue of Test & Measurement World.)

Also during the awards ceremony, Maloney announced the winner of the 2004 Test Product of the Year: The Willtek 9101 handheld spectrum analyzer. Russ Byrd, VP of North American Operations for Willtek, accepted the award plaque from Nelson.


Rick Nelson (left) presents the Test Product of the Year Award to Russ Byrd of Willtek

The Willtek 9101 was one of 12 winners of T&MW's annual Best in Test Awards, which we announced in our December 2003/January 2004 issue. We asked our readers to vote for the Test Product of the Year, and the 9101 came out on top. This portable instrument makes RF spectral measurements up to 4.0 GHz, so users no longer need to lug bulky test equipment into the field. (You can find a feature story about the 9101 in our March 2004 issue.)

Prior to announcing Willtek as the Test Product of the Year, Maloney introduced the entire slate of Best in Test Award winners, and Nelson presented a plaque to a representative of each company:

Sapphire NP SOC tester, NPTest (Rudy Garcia, Technical Advisor and Marketing Manager)
WBI-FOX precision x-ray inspection system, Feinfocus (Lance Scott, President)
CVS-1454 Compact Vision System, National Instruments (Eric Starkloff, Platform Manager for PXI and Modular Instruments)
EmiScope-II diagnostic system, Optonics, a Credence Co. (Israel Nir, President)
PT100 parallel tester, Intellitech (C.J. Clark, CEO)
E2960 Series PCI Express protocol analyzers, Agilent Technologies (Thomas Mattes, Product Manager)
Arendar Test Data Management software, VI Technology, (Chris Neil, Senior Engineer)
GX7100 3U/6U combination PXI chassis, Geotest-Marvin Test Systems (David Manor, VP of Engineering)
PowerDNA distributed data-acquisition system, United Electronic Industries
DL7400 Series digital oscilloscopes, Yokogawa Corp. of America (Gary Gartman, Western Regional Manager)
Model 3117 double-ridged waveguide horn antenna, ETS-Lindgren
9101 4-GHz handheld spectrum analyzer, Willtek (Russ Byrd, VP of North American Operations)

This is the 14th year that Test & Measurement World has conducted the Best in Test Awards program. We are already accepting nominations for next year's awards. To learn more, visit the Best in Test page on our Web site.

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