APEC

PSMA Meeting Schedule during APEC 2025

rev. 2/7/25                     Please note any changes to this schedule at the last minute will be posted on APEC monitors.

The 2025 PSMA Annual Meeting will be held in conjunction with APEC 2025 at the Atlanta Omni Hotel, adjacent to the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta, GA on Monday, March 17. A buffet breakfast at 7:30 a.m. will precede the meeting and individuals from member companies as well non-member guests are invited to attend and participate in a full agenda of topics of interest to the industry. At the meeting, you will have the opportunity to meet and interact with other PSMA members as well as with many of the students who received APEC Attendance Support to present their papers at the Technical Sessions this year. Regular member company representatives will participate in the election of four Directors to serve on the PSMA Board for a three-year term beginning immediately and ending at APEC 2028.

The detailed agenda for the meeting is available on the PSMA web site and includes reports from each of the technical committees and stimulating discussions on new PSMA initiatives for 2025 and beyond. The APEC 2025 Conference Chair will review the progress on APEC 2025 and there will be a report on plans for APEC 2026 in San Antonio, TX.

Members and guests are also welcome to remain for the Board of Directors meeting that will immediately follow the Annual Meeting. Participation in these meetings will provide you with the opportunity to network with colleagues from other companies and to influence the direction of the PSMA and the power sources industry.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, the active PSMA Technical Committees will hold open meetings during the week of APEC 2025. All are invited to participate or to just drop in any of these committee meetings to hear and provide input as the committee activities are being planned for the coming year. Visit the PSMA website to see the schedule of PSMA meetings and events at APEC 2025.

On March 15, the Saturday prior to the start of APEC 2025, PSMA and PELS will be sponsoring the tenth annual High Frequency Magnetics Workshop -"Power Magnetics @ High Frequency." 

Be sure to visit us at the PSMA booth in the APEC hub, at the exhibition area during APEC. PSMA is again sponsoring the popular PSMA/ APEC Passport Program in the Exhibit Hall. Visit the booths of participating PSMA members to enter a raffle drawing for some great prizes. Once again this year, the Passport will be part of the APEC app!

We look forward to a good turnout at the PSMA meetings and a very busy and exciting week.

For the latest information on all of the activities planned during APEC 2025, visit us at www.psma.com.

Since APEC 2016 was being held in virtually our back yard, Cherokee International founder and president Ganpat Patel and I drove to Long Beach to attend the 30th annual Applied Power Electronics Conference (APEC).

This year's event was held inside the Long Beach Convention & Entertainment Center (located adjacent to the Hyatt Regency Hotel). Having served as the APEC Publicity Chairman (1991-96 & 1998-2004) I wanted to meet some former committee colleagues and to see what new products are being developed and introduced. APEC, sponsored by the IEEE PELS and IEEE IAS Societies and the Power Sources Manufacturers Association, PSMA, is "recognized by many as the leading conference for practicing electronics professionals."

In addition to 21 3-1/2 half hour educational Seminars that commenced on Sunday, APEC 2016 offered over 500 technical papers in 45 different Sessions which started on Monday afternoon and concluded on Thursday March 24. 

APEC is truly an International Conference. 1212 Technical Session abstracts, received from 45 different nations, were peer reviewed last fall. Abstracts from 30 of these countries were selected for inclusion in this year’s record setting event. Case in point, engineers traveled from as far away as Australia and New Zealand to share their latest design concepts. Speakers from China, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan represented Asia. Representing South and Central America, speakers travel from Brazil and Columbia. From the Middle East there were presentations from Egypt, Israel, and Qatar. Representing Europe were speakers from Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, German, India, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland, Sweden and the Ukraine. Let me not overlook the speakers from Canada, Ireland and the U.K.

Complementing the technical presentations, the APEC exhibit hall contained 370 booths with a wide array of products. “Feed them and they will come” always works. APEC set up multiple serving stations with great entrees and beverages as well as ice cream stations for the 5,100 plus attendees to keep them from leaving the exhibit hall at the Convention Center.

And what was happening with the PSMA you might ask? A lot. There were 24 two to three hour technical committee meetings scheduled, ranging from a workshop on High Frequency Magnetics that started at 7:30 on Saturday morning to a three-hour session addressing Safety and Compliance issues and another three-hour session on Semiconductors advances that were held on Thursday. I would be remiss not to point out that the very popular Power Technology Roadmap Committee met for two hours on Tuesday. We did look into the Packaging Technical Committee meeting on Tuesday afternoon. Tuesday evening attendees could select from three desirable Rap sessions including: Future of Semiconductor Technology Development, Power Electronics for Internet of Things: Will it Happen and Advanced Refueling Technologies for EVs.

In quizzing some of the attendees we were told that the new hot item is Gallium Nitride semiconductors. Another area to be aware of is IoT. "Internet of things" where you will be told when you are running low on milk, your coffee is ready and other smart power alerts. "The Internet of Things” is the network of physical objects—devices, vehicles, buildings and other items—embedded with electronics, software, sensors, and network connectivity that enables these objects to collect and exchange data."

Larry Gilbert, Mohan Mankikar, and Pat Patel

Where is everyone from my past? We did find representatives from firms dating back to the 70s and 80s. Many of the others have merged, sold outright or folded in a very competitive environment.

Provided by Larry Gilbert,  former APEC Publicity Chair  (1991-96 & 1998-2004)