Monday, September 10, 2012
3:00PM - 5:30PM
Rochester Museum & Science Center

With Speakers:
Paul McManamon, Co-Chair, Harnessing Light II study; past president of SPIE; Technical Director of the Ladar and Optical Communications Institute (LOCI) at the University of Dayton.
Steve Anderson, Industry and Market Strategist for SPIE; former Editor-In-Chief, Laser Focus World.

Optics & Photonics, Essential Technologies For Our Nation
The Rochester Regional Photonics Cluster brings optics industry experts Paul McManamon and Steve Anderson to present research on the current state and commercial opportunities in optics and photonic science in the United States. The event marks the release of the 2012 update to the 1998 “Harnessing Light” report, commissioned from the National Research Council by the U.S. Congress. Both the 1998 and 2012 report are based on research and insights from leading Rochester optics experts, and are key to defining economic policy in countries around the world.

For background on this groundbreaking report follow this link.

“The report underscores that optics and photonics are huge contributors to the economy,” says SPIE CEO Eugene Arthurs. “The technologies enable applications ranging from the internet and the equipment it is both sent across and received on, to new tests for cancers and treatments for stroke and other brain disorders that transmit data from the body using beams of light. Very large numbers of direct and enabled jobs for the future depend on mastery of optics and photonics.”

 Because of the role as an enabling technology in multidisciplinary applications with electronics, chemistry, and other fields, the exact economic impact of optics and photonics is hard to measure, the report noted. Conservative estimates start at more than $500 billion in revenues and 1.5 million jobs in the U.S. that are directly related to or enabled by optics and photonics technologies. This includes numerous applications of lasers, computer chips, solar-energy panels, sensors, displays, and other technologies, in manufacturing, medicine, defense and security systems, lighting, bridge and highway structural analysis, and much more.

The report focuses specifically on opportunities in:

• Communications, information processing and data storage
• Defense and national security
• Energy
• Health and medicine
• Advanced manufacturing
• Advanced photonic measurements and applications
• Strategic materials for optics
• Displays.

Panel Discussion:                   
The Global Opportunity of Optics and Photonics, 2012

• Panel Moderator: Duncan Moore, University of Rochester

Steve Anderson, SPIE
Kent Gardner, Center for Governmental Research
Paul McManamon,Co-Chair, Harnessing Light II Report Committee
Ed White, Edward White Consulting
Xi-Cheng Zhang, University of Rochester Institute of Optics

• How has the vision of Harnessing Light changed since 1998?
  
• What is driving innovation in optics and imaging?
  
• What are the greatest challenges the industry faces going forward?
• How does the region capitalize on our strategic advantage in Optics?

Audience:    RRPC members, CEO’s and management;  economic development stakeholders; high technology
entrepreneurs and service professionals; investment professionals, CPA’s, attorneys,
economic & workforce development professionals.

Agenda:
2:30 – 3:00    Sign-in
3:00 – 3:30    Announcements & Speakers
3:30 – 5:00    Panel Discussion
5:00 – 5:30    Networking / refreshments
5:30 – 6:15    Annual Meeting Business
6:15 – 7:00    Adjourn / refreshments

Space is limited for this event, so register early!

Do you consider yourself a stakeholder in New York's Optics, Photonics and Imaging Industry? 
Do you want to participate in charting the course of that industry in the future?  We hope you will
be able to join us at our 2012 Annual Meeting and make your voice heard.

New York, and particularly the Rochester region have long enjoyed a strategic regional advantage
in Optics, Photonics and Imaging (OPI).  Can that advantage be sustained and consistently grown
through innovation, competition and a well-trained workforce?  Join us for a discussion of these
issues at the RRPC  / New York Photonics Annual Meeting.  If you consider New York's Optics, Photonics & Imaging Industry vital to our state's future, this event is for you.

Register Now