T&MW announces winners of 2012 Best in Test awards

Test & Measurement World honored the test industry with an event held during the 2012 DesignCon show.

-- Test & Measurement World, 2/1/2012 11:41:51 AM

See photos from our 2012 Best in Test ceremony.

On the evening of January 31, at a ceremony honoring the test and measurement industry, the editors of Test & Measurement World announced the winners of the 2012 Best in Test awards. The annual awards program, which recognizes excellence in electronics test and measurement, comprises the Best in Test, Test of Time, and Test Engineer of the Year awards. The awards ceremony took place in Santa Clara, CA, during the 2012 DesignCon show.

Jim Dempsey, brand director for Test & Measurement World, opened the evening by welcoming the guests and observing that this year marks the 30th anniversary of T&MW's involvement in the test industry. "Since the inaugural issue of T&MW in the fall of 1981," he said, "Test & Measurement World has been established as the hub of the electronics test, measurement, and inspection community."

Dempsey then turned the podium over to Patrick Mannion, director of content for T&MW, who made the awards presentations. Mannion took time to thank all the test engineers who make this industry work, noting, "If it weren't for your perseverence and diligence, none of the technology we now take for granted would have made it past the prototyping board."

The winners gathered for a group photo at the end of the evening. Click image to enlarge. See more photos.

Mannion announced the winners of the 2012 Best in Test and Test of Time product awards, while senior technical editor Martin Rowe presented a plaque to a representative of each winning company. (See photos of the winners.) The Best in Test awards recognize innovation in test products that were introduced during the past year; the Test of Time award recognizes a test, measurement, or inspection product that continues to provide state-of-the-art service more than five years after its introduction.
 
T&MW announced the finalists for these awards on November 1 and invited readers to vote for the winners. The Test Product of the Year is the Best in Test award that receives the most overall votes. (Read more about the awards program and all of the 2012 finalists.)

The winners of the 2012 Best in Test awards are:

• ATE/Production Test: RFEM, Aeroflex
• Bus and Logic Analyzers: Beagle USB 5000 SuperSpeed Protocol Analyzer, Total Phase
• Data Acquisition: USB-2408 Series, Measurement Computing
• Design for Test/Boundary Scan: SFX-TAP16/G, GOEPEL electronic
• Embedded Test: TR5001T Tiny ICT, Test Research
• Functional Test: TOSCA Testsuite, TRICENTIS Technology & Consulting
• LTE Test: VR5 HD Spatial Channel Emulator, Spirent Communications
• Machine Vision/Inspection: TR7600 SII Automated X-Ray Inspection System, Test Research
• Multimeters: iDVM iPhone and iPad Enabled Wireless Multimeter, Redfish Instruments
• Optical and Network Testers: IxLoad Attack, Ixia
• Oscilloscopes: MDO4000 Mixed Domain Oscilloscope, Tektronix
• PHY Test: PVA-3000 PhyView Analyzer, Sifos Technologies
• RF/Microwave Test: URT-5000 Software Defined RF Player and Signal Generator, Averna
• Semiconductor Test: T5773 NAND Flash Package Tester, Advantest
• Signal Analyzers: PXIe-5665 VSA, National Instruments
• Signal Sources: M8190A Arbitrary Waveform Generator, Agilent Technologies

• Source-Measure Instruments: B2900A Series Precision Source/Measure Unit, Agilent Technologies

 
The 2012 Test Product of the Year is the MDO4000 Mixed Domain Oscilloscope from Tektronix. The MDO4000 is the first oscilloscope on the market to include a built-in spectrum analyzer that allows design engineers to look at time-correlated analog, digital, serial, and RF data and gain a complete system view of their devices.

The 2012 Test of Time award winner is Spirent TestCenter from Spirent Communications, a unified performance test platform that can sustain growth across many fast-growing industries, including virtualization, cloud computing, mobile backhaul, enhanced packet core, and high-speed Ethernet. Introduced in 2005, TestCenter is employed by network equipment manufacturers, service providers, and enterprises that are employing the Layer 2-7 IP and Ethernet technologies required to deliver any application over any network and on any device.

After the product awards, Mannion announced the recipient of the 2012 Test Engineer of the Year award. This award honors a single engineer for his or her contributions to the art of test. We announced the finalists in T&MW's November issue, and readers voted for the engineer they felt was most deserving.

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Read more about the Test & Measurement World awards program.