MAHA Tech 2016 (with a rant)

Hey, last week I visited Maha Tech 2016, where I took a lot of pictures of all the cool tech that the electronics industry has to offer in Maharashtra, India.

For people who don’t know about MAHA Tech, it’s an Industrial Exhibition, Trade Show of Process Industry and Electrical Industry that happens in Pune, India, every year. Mostly it is visited by the product manufacturing companies but this here there were engineering students present too, It is the way companies find out about the new tools, components, and invention in their field of work.

It was a good experience at least for me (more on that after the images) to see and know where I can get stuff made and how it will be made.

Here are the shots of the latest and greatest 3D Printers, 3D Scanners, Different Motors, Custom machined gears and pulleys, Laser cutters which cut through wood, metal and basically anything you throw at it, also there where Laser welder, huge industrial size CNC, Segways, and Uni wheeler and much more…

But the best thing about these tools was that most of them were Made In India.

See to your heart’s content…

Start of rant

The exhibition wasn’t all roses, at least not my friends. Let me explain, When anyone enters the hall they are asked to wear a badge which had the persons name and information, which mentioned if the person was a student or representing a company, that is not uncommon in such event but most annoying was the way the people in the booth reacted to any question asked by students. See giving attention to your possible client is one thing but a senior member of the company dragging his junior member who was explaining to us their product towards other people while pointing at our student badge. That is enough to make anyone furious but we just moved on. Well I hoped that was the end but no there was more, there was a company called “3D Spectra” who brought their 3D printers we all where excited to see the prints but when we ask to see them they just say “NO” which was kind of okay, after that as we where about to go to next booth an elderly person who was in his late fifties arrived (looked liked he must be owner of few companies) and asked to see the prints and without wasting a single moment he handed him the prints in front of our faces.

We thought we had it all another incident occurred. There was special timing for student which is okay as the exhibition was primarily meant for the companies but timing given to student was just 2 hours which for such a big premises and with so many booths was too less, at the end of the allotted time few of the student where feeling just short to be dragged out of the exhibition.

It is okay to give importance to your possible clients but treating a student who sure as hell is the future of your industry is just idiotic. The student who visited the exhibition where excited, motivated, to know more about their industry, they took the extra effort to be there, they were humble and eager to learn more. Instead of motivating them more, informing them, they treated them made sure they never ask any question again, their treatment made sure they know they don’t belong there, made them feel they are not important.

There are companies who based their entire business on students, on people who are new to electronics like Adafruit and Sparkfun, there even Indian companies like Rhydolabz or MG Super Labs, this is the company who not only sell their product to newbies but encourages them, educate them and sure as hell are way bigger companies than who mistreated them. They should learn something from them.

I really hope this doesn’t ever happen to anyone in the future, we should always encourage everyone who is interested in electronics.

End of rant.