We're gearing up for our 7th annual Tensoft Fabless Semiconductor Management (FSM) User Conference, which will be held at a new local venue next month.  For those of our Tensoft FSM customers who still need justification to attend, here's my Top Ten List of reasons to attend!

TOP TEN REASONS TO ATTEND MOMENTUM 2012:   

10) Hands-on product training on both days.

9) Learn what's new in Tensoft FSM and related systems, including all the enhancements that have been added as a result of your suggestions during Momentum 2011. 

8) Step back from the daily grind and discover new ways to approach your current processes.

7) Momentum 2012 is where your industry peers will be on May 21-22!

6) Influence the future direction of Tensoft products.  (Hint: So that - next year - you can take credit for those great enhancements at Momentum 2013).

5) Learn tips and tricks from Tensoft product experts - both those who work at Tensoft, and those who use Tensoft FSM every day.

4) Meet the Tensoft support and management teams, and put faces to those names.

3) Special guest appearances by Tensoft FSM's Technical Lead and Tensoft FSM's Vendor Integrations Lead.

2) The best line-up ever of informative, interactive sessions - all based on your suggestions from past conferences.

1) A chance to soak up all of this accelerated learning, get answers to all of your questions, brainstorm new ideas with the user community and Tensoft staff, and network with industry colleagues during breakfast, breaks, lunch and the Monday night reception - what a deal!

 I'm pleased to announce that registration is now open for the seventh annual Tensoft FSM International User Conference, Momentum 2012.  This customer-only event will be held on May 21 & 22 this year, in Campbell, CA.   Past conferences have provided a lively forum for worldwide users of Tensoft's Fabless Semiconductor Management (FSM), a leading semiconductor ERP manufacturing and supply chain product, delivered on-premise or as a cloud ERP solution.

This year, attendees will have the opportunity to learn from - and brainstorm with - Tensoft's developers and business analysts, as well as network and share best-practices with their peers from other semiconductor companies.  General sessions include "What's New in FSM?" and a group discussion that will be used to create the product enhancement roadmap for the next year.  For the first time, we will also be offering two "hands-on" training sessions each day, which will run concurrently with the break-out topic sessions. 

Here's what Tensoft President and CEO Bob Scarborough had to say about this year's Momentum: "We look at this annual event as a way to provide value and show appreciation to our Tensoft FSM customers.  We work at keeping the costs low, so more can participate. As a result, we've had the real pleasure of hosting Momentum for many repeat attendees, along with each year's newcomers. The exchange of ideas always seems to propel process and product improvements synergistically, which is great for everyone involved."

Please let me know if you have any questions about this annual event, or would like to sign up.  Hope to see you there!

 Effective January 1, 2012, the California Transparency in Supply Chains Act requires many companies doing business in California to provide information regarding their activities to ensure their supply chain is free from slavery and human trafficking.  This law affects all companies that do business in California and whose worldwide gross receipts exceed $100 million.  That includes a lot of semiconductor and high tech companies in our area, so I was curious to see how companies are complying.

I tried a quick search on "CA Transparency in Supply Chains Act semiconductor" and found the following on the first page, in order of appearance: Vishay, ON Semiconductor, Texas Instruments, Applied Materials, Cypress Semiconductor, Micron and Global Foundries.  I'd expected to find Apple there.  After all, Gartner just announced in a January 24 press release that Apple was the top semiconductor customer of 2011, moving up from third place in 2010.  And, they've certainly been in the news lately for the human rights issues that their supply chain audit uncovered.  

Checking back on the requirements of the law, I found that no specific language is required to be compliant, but it does require that the disclosure appear on the company's home page, and that it is conspicuous and easily understood.   Looking through the homepages of both the top 10 semiconductor customers of 2011 that Gartner identified and the hits on my initial search, Apple stands out as one of the best examples of compliance, while others don't appear to be in compliance at all.  Interesting.

Thinking the other day about our annual FSM User Conference, Momentum 2011, which wrapped up last month, I was struck by how absolutely energizing this yearly event is – not only for attendees, but also for everyone on the Tensoft side as well.  

Everyone has the opportunity to discuss ideas, meet with their counterparts in other companies and get away from day-to-day interruptions to simply work on productivity and improvement. It’s a chance to think about doing your job better with people who are of like mind, discussing topics that facilitate creative thinking and problem-solving.

We stretched the Momentum envelope a bit this year by inviting some suppliers and outside experts into our discussions.  We asked questions like: “What does the demand model look like for your end-customers?” and “What do the suppliers look like from your production side?” and “What does your planning rhythm look like, or what does your input to executive management from the operations perspective look like?”

Attendees and Tensoft staff were able to coalesce their own ideas, learn from other people and take this all back to their companies to make what they do better.  I think that’s why so many good things come out of Momentum every year, and this year was no exception.

We’ve recently posted a great new customer case study to the Tensoft website that beautifully illustrates the benefits of cloud deployment. Focusing on our customer, Syndiant, the four-page case study describes how this technology industry start-up has been able to leverage Tensoft’s industry-specific solutions in the cloud to quickly gain better visibility, control, and efficiency.  .

 Syndiant’s V.P. of Operations, Tupper Patnode, provided much of the commentary in the document, discussing in detail how Tensoft FSM and Microsoft Dynamics GP, running on a cloud platform provided by Tensoft partner SaaSplaza, enabled the company to comfortably plan and scale their growth from a $1 million company to $20 and up to a $60 million enterprise. Take a look at the Syndiant case study and tell us what you think by responding to this blog.

And, if you’re planning to attend Microsoft Dynamics Convergence in Atlanta on April 10-13, discuss the particulars of the Syndiant project or your own future project with our own Michael Chadwick and Sonam Thandi in the SaaSplaza booth #1316. They will only be at the booth part of the time, so contact me ASAP if you’d like to arrange a time to meet.

See you in the Cloud!