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Eike Waltz is one of those fellows, such as the inventor of the paper clip, who is unknown to the general public, but whose technical expertise is responsible for the workings of the modern world – in our case, the design of advanced computing form factors that can be found in both in our telecom infrastructure and in enterprise computer telephony systems. Those of us familiar with the “bus and board” industry know him well as a great inventor, “thought leader” and supreme technical expert in the electronic packaging and communications industries. When I recently heard that he had been retained as a dedicated technology consultant by Elma Electronic (News - Alert) Inc. (www.elma.com, a global manufacturer of electronic packaging products) I couldn’t help but think about him and his work in the industry.

The bare facts are as follows: He received his master’s degree in industrial engineering design in 1973 and began his career as chief engineer at ITT Components, UK, in 1975. Eike has been the chair for IEEE 1101.1/10/11 and USNC TA for IEC (News - Alert)-SC48D since 1996. He has been an active member for VME, VXI, VIPA, and PMC Standards as well as for T1E1.8 Project 41 Universal Telecom Framework. In addition, he has been a member of the Infiniband switch fabric specification and an active member of the various CompactPCI, AdvancedTCA (News - Alert), AMC, MicroTCA, and CompactTCA specifications. For example, he remains an active member of ANSI-UNSC (TA for IEC SC48D), AdvancedTCA, RES, AMC.0, MicroTCA, ATCA300, IEC SC48D and associated liquid cooling specifications. He used to be the senior advisor, global innovations management for Rittal (www.rittal.com) and worked as technical manager for companies such as Schroff and ITT Components.

I first met Eike in 1999 when he was senior electronics packaging specialist international for Rittal/Kaparel (News - Alert) Corporation. Even then, he was known as the chair for IEEE 1101.1/10/11, which defines all of the mechanical parts that serve as the basis for CompactPCI (News - Alert) computers, such as the connectors. (Those cPCI connectors required exacting design, since even a “normal” 6U high cPCI card with all connectors loaded has an insertion / extraction force of 118 lbs. A 9U high cPCI board needs 188 lbs of force. If it has 10 rows of connectors, it takes about 340 lbs. of force.) Indeed, Eike had already achieved legendary status years before as one of the creators of the VMEbus while he was working at Schroff (www.schroff.us). Eike had been instrumental in working out the technical details of the Eurocard mechanical specifications along with Ken Smith of VERO Electronics. Once that was stabilized a torrent of people and companies became involved in VMEbus technology.

When I first met him, he said it was obvious that the new CompactPCI would be a success.

“How?” I quizzed, wondering what secret method of divination he was using that had been overlooked by analysts and marketers.

His serene answer: “Board handles.”

“Companies like ours make board accessories, such as the front panel for the boards, and in particular the eject / injector handles, which are specified for cPCI,” said Eike. “Rittal was the first company to produce these handles, in 1995, long before the secondary suppliers came into the market in 1997 and 1998. Each handle you sell ultimately has a board behind it. From such a viewpoint you can judge pretty accurately how many cPCI boards are being produced, since it’s directly related to the sale of the handles. Presently, we sell as many handles per month as we did during all of 1998! Yes, there’s a few, say 15 percent, going into VME64X, but it’s a small number in comparison to what’s going into CompactPCI manufacture. So if people say that the market is not taking off, well, it’s relative. From 1995 to 1996 there was little movement, from 1996 to 1997 was also relatively little movement. From 1997 to 1998 was said to be a 160% increase, which is possible since one is dealing with such small initial numbers.”

I was stunned. Why hadn’t I thought about it? After I quoted Eike about this in the now-defunct Computer Telephony magazine, suddenly everybody was talking about “handle sales” proving the success of CompactPCI. Even Brough Turner got up onstage at a Natural MicroSystems (NMS Communications) developer’s convention in Florida and mentioned it to the audience.

Probably the greatest compliment ever paid to me by a European came from Eike, while I was talking to him at a Bus & Board Conference about three years ago. He mentioned how he had been interested in philosophy and literature as a university student, and repeated a favorite quote that I correctly identified as being from Stendhal’s 1830 novel, Le Rouge et le Noir (The Red and the Black).

“At last I have met an educated American!” exclaimed Eike.

Whatever Eike does at Elma, it will be technically sound, open in nature, and superbly designed. As long as people like Eike Waltz are working in this industry, the success of computing and telecom platforms are assured.

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Richard Grigonis is Executive Editor of TMC’s IP Communications Group. To see more of his articles, please visit his columnist page.