This is a summary of all of the blog posts we have written about Elektronik Journal up to December 2018.
Huethig strengthens editorial team with another new journalist
December 1st, 2016
Huethig Verlag has strengthened their editorial team with the addition of Dr. Nicole Ahner, who will work for elektronik journal, elektronik industrie and the website www.all-electronics.de, as well as contributing to AUTOMOBIL-ELEKTRONIK and emobility tec on specific projects.
Dr. Ahner is an engineer (Dr.-Ing.), who has previously worked in the industry. Editor-in-chief, Alfred Vollmer, tells us that her excellent writing skills were a key factor in her appointment.
It’s great to see a publisher investing in the editorial team: this must be a good thing in the long term. Coming on the back of the recent appointment of Dr. Ingo Kuss, it shows how serious Huethig is about creating content engineers will want to read.
Interview with Alfred Vollmer
October 27th, 2016
It has clearly been a very busy time for Alfred Vollmer since he was promoted to editor-in-chief at Hüthig. We finally managed to grab some of his time to talk to him about the promotion and his view of the future for the electronics media in Germany.
Yes, of course. I’ve now been editor in chief of four print magazines and one website for about half a year. I’m responsible for the print publications elektronik industrie, elektronik journal, AUTOMOBIL-ELEKTRONIK and emobility tec; as well as the website www.all-electronics.de.
Do you plan any changes to the publications in the next year?
Nothing major in mind, however, we constantly watch the market and react in order to meet the needs of our readership.
In cooperation with the VDMA (The German Mechanical Engineering Industry Association), we’ll launch a new congress on February 1 and 2, 2017 in Munich, Germany: Our new medical electronics congress is intended to be a kind of summit meeting for executive managers in the medical electronics community with focus on supporting networking along the entire medical electronics value chain.
In Germany, publications seem to be doing well. Why do you think there is more advertising support for electronics titles in Germany?
Let me ask you another question: why is Germany’s industrial and automotive industry so strong? May be one of the reasons is the German kind of mindset, and part of this mindset is appreciating print and reading the news and stories on paper. With print, it is much easier to get an overview of the latest technologies. While surfing you easily drift away. Our magazines provide carefully prepared content tailored to the needs of the individual readership of our magazines. However, when you search for a specific product that you need for a specific application, the web is a fantastic resource.
Germans like print media, so the reader response is high, which means that print advertising exactly meets the potential buyers of the products.
What do German engineers look for when choosing a publication to read? How do you plan to meet these needs?
German engineers are like engineers all over the world: they need facts and the inputs they really need in order to get their jobs done. The pressure on engineers these days is very high, which means that they need to get their updates in a very efficient way. Therefore, they rely on information sources they can trust. Information is available everywhere, but gathering and sorting information is very time-consuming. We help the engineers to stay up to date in a very time-efficient manner by providing the information they need.
This summer the market research institute “tele research” conducted a reader survey on behalf of our publisher. Tele research found out that 80.5% of the readers say that elektronik industrie provides extensive and complete information. This shows me that all the members of our editorial team really meet the needs of our readership: the design engineers; and we are very happy that 86% of the readers voice the opinion that elektronik industrie reports are objective and factual!
Most German engineers speak and read English to a very high level. Why don’t they just read English-language publications and websites?
The work load on engineers is very high. Whatever makes their work easier is much appreciated, and for a German native speaker reading German IS much easier to understand than any other language. Furthermore, most Germans learned English at school, however, most of them did not live in an English-speaking environment, specifically they were not raised in a country where English is the common language. Therefore, we quite often do not have the cultural literacy of a native speaker. Let me give you an example: When an American talks about some “plain vanilla technology” he just means a very simple technology without any frills, and all the native speakers know this. Germans learn a lot of idioms but at least the first time they read “plain vanilla” they don’t exactly know what it means, and may-be think of ice cream while simultaneously knowing that this doesn’t make any sense at all. Issues like this one are time-consuming to resolve and do not happen while reading German. This is also the reason why we sometimes restructure sentences while editing: in order to facilitate the reception of the contents.
Furthermore, a good German editor edits texts in a way that the reader can easily “inhale” the content of the text. The American journalist Jack Anderson once said about American journalism that it follows the following principle: “First, tell them what you are going to tell them. Second, tell them. Third, tell them what you have told them.” Good German magazine journalism is different as it just follows the “Tell them” and nothing else. We do not have to teach engineers about Ohm’s law anymore. They already know it. The magic of good German magazine journalism is to know what the reader exactly needs to read at a specific point of time. Two decades ago we also explained to our readership that “DSP” means “Digital Signal Processor” but now we take the knowledge about this TLA (three-letter acronym) for granted. And all those who do not already know it can look the TLA up in our abbreviation list at http://www.all-electronics.de/abkuerzungsverzeichnis/.
I am very happy that our editorial team really meets the demands of the readers; otherwise the reader survey wouldn’t state that “almost 60% of the readers say that elektronik industrie has such a high benefit for their work that they would not want to do without it in the future”. 96.1% of the readers find that elektronik industrie is easy to read and comprehensible! I think it will be difficult to get such a feedback from German engineers about English-language publications and websites.
You spent some time working in marketing. Why do you prefer being an editor?
Working in marketing is great, but I prefer being an editor as I can get a much better overview and I am able to meet with a lot of very interesting people.
Why have you been so busy? It has taken several months for us to arrange this interview.
We didn’t have an easy time in our editorial team. Dr. Achim Leitner, who used to be the editor in chief until March 2016, had worked really hard, and it took time to fill the gap just from a capacity perspective. Since October 1, 2016 we have another very experienced team member which is well-known in the industry: Dr. Ingo Kuss is now part of our editorial team and ready to systematically increase his responsibilities. Furthermore, Hans Jaschinski, who has been on sick leave for 2.5 years will be returning to work starting at electronica. And we are still looking for additional editorial talents with strong electronics engineering background in order to grow our editorial team.
What’s your favourite gadget?
My favourite gadget is my precise training heart rate monitor. It allows me to tailor my workout directly to my actual fitness level at the individual time of training. This makes training very effective, and with its GPS functionality and the web connection it is even more fun.
Hüthig publications announce automotive and medial electronics events for 2017
October 12th, 2016
German engineers continue to value conferences and exhibitions, so it’s good to see Hüthig expand its conference programme with the announcement that elektronik journal will – in cooperation with the VDMA (The German Mechanical Engineering Industry Association) – hold a medical electronics congress (www.medizin-elektronik-kongress.de) in Munich, Germany on February 1st and 2nd, 2017. Billed as something very different from the traditional congress for design engineers, this event aims to be a “summit meeting” for executive managers in the medical electronics community. Attendees will particularly be able to benefit from the opportunities to network along the entire medical electronics value chain.
In another announcement, elektronik journal’s sister publication AUTOMOBIL-ELEKTRONIK has announced that their automotive event, often called the “Ludwigsburg congress”, will be held on 27th and 28th June 2017 (unsurprisingly the conference will again be held in Ludwigsburg). This will be the 21st year for this event, which has built a reputation for attracting some of the leading figures in automotive electronics, who provide high-quality keynotes and papers.
Automotive specialist moves from Weka to Hüthig
October 8th, 2016
The move represents a return to elektronik journal for Ingo, because it was the first publication he worked for, when it was owned by Verlag Moderne Industrie. He has now followed this title in a switch to Hüthig.
It’s great to see Ingo continue in our industry, where he has build a strong reputation, and it’s particularly nice that he’s back working on elektronik industry. Although editorial teams are not as large as the peaks of about 20 years ago, the German publishers continue to invest in high-quality journalism, and I’m sure this move will strengthen the reputation and readership of Hüthig’s influential titles.
Fond Farewells and Exciting Handovers at Hüthig
February 24th, 2016
After almost 8 years at the helm of Hüthig’s electronics publication empire, Dr Achim Leitner has decided to leave behind the delights and perils of the publishing world, and head back into the industry he has so fondly written about. Although it is a great loss to journalism, we wish Achim every success in his new role of leading a systems engineering design team.
At the same time, we are equally delighted that Alfred Volmer will be taking over as Editor-in-Chief of AUTOMOBIL-ELEKTRONIK, emobility tec, all-electronics.de and Elektronik Journal, and joint Editor-in-Chief of Elektronik Industrie. With a degree in electrical engineering, Alfred has used his knowledge and experience to focus on writing for several electronics publications over the past 30 years, the last 20 of which have been for a number of the Hüthig flagships.
Napier would like to wish both Achim and Alfred all the very best of luck in their new roles.
New editor at elektronikJOURNAL
January 25th 2012
Editorial and advertising departures
December 21st, 2011
Stefanie Eckardt has decided to leave elektronikJOURNAL for a new challenge in the industry, whilst Teun van Hoesel has left his role as International Sales Manager of Elektor to work at an internet agency. The new international advertising contact at Elektor is Wisse Hettinga (w.hettinga@elektor.com).
Hüthig to cut frequency
September 27th, 2010
I understand that Hüthig is planning to cut the frequency of elektronikJOURNAL from monthly to just five special issues in 2011. These would each address specific topics: embedded, power, distribution & services, medical electronics and e-mech. The publisher also plans to cut Automobil Elektronik from six issues per year to five.
The German publications are struggling to make a decent profit in a very competitive market, so it’s not surprising that cuts are going to happen to print issues, and I would expect that Hüthig may not be the only company to take action in 2011. There is some good news, as I understand that the excellent Dr. Achim Leitner will be taking over responsibility for Hüthig’s online presence – all-electronics.de.
Richard Thompson now representing electronikJOURNAL in the UK
January 18th, 2010
Hüthig, publisher of elektronikJOURNAL, has appointed Richard Thompson as their new sales rep in the UK. It makes sense to add elektronikJOURNAL, which is positioned as the publisher’s horizontal title covering design, production and automation, as Richard already represents the three vertical titles: IEE, Productronic and Elektronik Industrie.
EJ and IEE to get new layouts
November 18th, 2009
Huethig Verlag has announced that both elektronikJOURNAL and IEE will have a new layout and design from January 2010. The new look is promised to be “lively”, and the publishers promise that his will mean the titles “stand out of the grey mass of magazines”. We’re promised that the yellow and black colour scheme of elektronikJOURNAL will stay, so it’s a fair bet that the title will continue to stand out!
It’s good to see continued commitment from publishers in the crowded German market, especially as this announcement follows on from an increase in IEE’s circulation from 20,000 to 26,000.
Editor layoffs
April 24th, 2009
Sad to report a couple of editors losing jobs within our industry. Recent layoffs include Phil Ling from Embedded Systems Europe and Marisa Robles Consée from Elektronik Journal. Rüdiger Hahn has also retired from EJ.
Editor interview – Dr. Achim Leitner
January 29th, 2009
What do you most enjoy about your new job?
As you know, I’m kind of returning to my roots: After studying electrical engineering, I spent over a decade in the IT field, especially software development, networking, and security. That provides me an interesting point of view into the electronics field. I’m curious about everything that’s going on in the electronics area and now, I’m able to satisfy that curiosity. The other nice aspect of my new job is that I’ve inherited a
great journal with a great team of journalists which I really enjoy working with.
Which areas of electronics interest you the most?
Hmm, if you really want me to pick some, then I’d choose processors, microcontrollers and DSP, FPGA, as well as all the hard- and software tools.
Do you have any plans to enhance the magazine or website over the next year?
I focus on developing the printed magazine right now, so you can expect to see a stream of enhancements over the upcoming issues. The website is a joint effort of five journals in the electronics field and it has its own project manager, but still I have a heap of ideas how to enhance the service of the website as well.
What is the main factor that makes a press release interesting?
It has to carry real news and needs to be honest. As a journalist, I want to have the facts at hand without digging through a pile of marketing language. So if your write a release, please use clear language and get to the point quickly.
What do you enjoy doing in your spare time, when you’re not editing elektronikJOURNAL?
Well, I enjoy travelling, meeting friends and go clubbing. And there’s always something to fix in our appartment or some new device that I want to own.
Do you personally prefer to get information in print or online?
That depends. Researching for an article, I basically get information online. Easy to access, up to date, nearly unlimited amount of data and no paper to waste are clear advantages. On the other hand, when I want to explore a new field, read an article or a story, then I clearly prefer print. It’s so much easier to read, portable, independant from light and electricity that I can’t imagine to read everything on a computer screen.
What is your favourite gadget?
That’s a tough one as there is too much stuff to choose from. My all time favorite is the aged handspring visor (a palm clone) that has served me really well over a decade or so and still does. Currently, I’m eager to find a really usefull netbook that has a readable, high-res display, usable keyboard, all kinds of network connectivity, long battery times and still small, ultra portable and affordable.
Stefan Böck leaves Elektronik Journal
April 27th, 2008
Stefan Böck is leaving as editor-in-chief of Elektronik Journal to take over at Austrian monthly publication, die Wirtschaft. Stefan is also bringing the current editor of the Austrian section of EJ, Stefan Strzyzowski, to die Wirtschaft. Rüdiger Hahn will be stepping in as a temporary replacement until a new editor-in-chief can be found. As he ahs previously held that role at EJ he should feel right at home!
E Journal joins E Industrie
August 10th, 2007
Süddeutscher Verlag has decided to consolidate the publishing of electronics titles by moving elektronikJOURNAL from the Österreichischer Wirtschaftsverlag (Austria) to the Hüthig Verlag. Hüthig already publishes Elektronik Industrie, Productronic, IEE and Automobil Elektronik.
The initial reaction to this move might be concern that either elektronikJOURNAL or Elektronik Industry might close, removing duplication. At Napier, however, we think that the reasons for the move are much less threatening: there will probably be some consolidation of sales teams, the main benefit the main benefit will be the reduction in cost of developing online presence for the magazines.
The costs of developing two independant online media platforms that can complete with sites such as Elektroniknet.de is likely to be prohibitive. By creating a single online presence for all the titles, Hüthig will save money and generate more traffic through the promotion of one site in all their print titles. Our prediction is that the two titles will continue to be published the very competitive German market, and the cost savings and increased revenue online will make this a very astute business decision.
New ed for E Journal
January 10th, 2007
Marisa Robles has joined Elektronik Journal to cover manufacturing and Test & Measurement for the magazine. Although still technically a freelancer, this is a long-term arrangement that will enhance the magazine’s existing editorial team.
Changes at elektronikJOURNAL
September 26th, 2006
Elektronik Journal has just announced that the respected ex-editor of the title, Rüdiger Hahn will remain a Senior Consultant beyond 2006; Robert Unseld is the new Managing Editor; and that Stephan Strzyzowski is the new Editor for Austria. All good news. They have also finally announced that Stefan Böck is the “new Chief Editor” as of July 1. Who says that the Internet has reduced the lifetime of news in this industry?
On a more serious note, the changes are all positive for the title, and is an effective use of the talent that exists within the editorial team. We just can’t resist questioning the German approach to food, however, as Rudiger Hahn claims in the press release that he was “brought up on Silicon as a child”.
Another magazine birthday
August 4th, 2005
This year there are lots of magazines promoting anniversaries. We guess that publishers are celebrating the fact that the magazine is still in business, despite the incredibly tough market. The latest is Elektronik Journal, which is publishing a special issue in October and offering a reduced rate of 4,040 euros (rate card 13,400 euros) for a double-page company profile. Contact Napier for more information.
Star media to represent Elektronik Journal
February 7th, 2005
Star Media, the representatives of CMP’s EXE, Embedded Systems Europe and MWEE has been appointed to represent Elektronik Journal – the central-European magazine with the funkiest imagery and also the unique local sections for Germany, Austria and Switzerland. We’ve been waiting a few days to post this, as Star wanted to provide some extra information, but as it hasn’t arrived, we thought we would make something up!
“I’m really pleased to be representing Elektronik Journal,” said Tim Anstee. “The magazine has great editorial, and advertisers like the ability to target Germany, Austria and Switzerland either with the same advert or with specific local ads. I’ll also really enjoy the chance to practice my German – something I’ve not really done since earning my PhD in German grammar.”
