April 9, 2020: You can’t keep a good man down. Or a woman for that matter. And as for BCI! The pandemic crisis may have forced the shut-down of the annual get-together this year at Las Vegas, but the bright sparks at BCI have come up with an alternative —a virtual convention.
The interactive video-conferenced meetings — a first for the industry — will be held on April 27. They will feature all the regular opening day favourites, starting with details of this year’s innovation award and announcement of the winners and runners-up.
Incoming EVP and general counsel Roger Miksad will then give the much-anticipated annual round-up of BCI’s regulatory activities and other details of the council’s work. Following this, five leading industry figures will speak to members and each videoed presentation will be followed by an interactive online Q&A session.
The line-up features Marc Zöllner, CEO of Hoppecke Batteries; CBI director Alistair Davidson; Davis Knauer, retired VP for automotive battery and diversified products engineering with East Penn; Gridtential chairman Ray Kubis; and the president of energy and industrial systems with Hollingsworth & Vose, Nicholas Starita.
“Our hope is to deliver valuable content to our members and for us as a community to engage in a new and innovative forum,” said Miksad. “In addition to engaging with the members who we will miss seeing at our in-person convention, we hope that others who might not have been able to travel to the convention will join the program.”
As usual, Batteries International has been working with BCI to produce the convention’s Yearbook, which will be distributed just after the virtual convention in printed and digital form.
It will contain full details of everything at the virtual event, as well as a comprehensive update of the work BCI has been doing behind the scenes.
To register for the virtual convention, visit here:
www.batterycouncil.org/VirtualConvention.
Registration is free for anyone that had registered for the 2020 convention and has transferred their registration to next year’s event, which will take place April 25-27, 2021 in Florida.
But despite the earnest pleas of some BCI members, the council says it has been unable to organize a virtual golf tournament.
“We know it will be a disappointment to some of our keenest golfers — especially those whose splices get the balls into the rough yet somehow land up near the hole (we know who you are) — but even 21st century technology couldn’t help here.”
