Much of what we see in many types of media these days is the bad news. Bailouts. Layoffs. Despair.

But there is some good news about businesses out there, if you are willing to go find it.

Entertainment Engineering found some good news at the Pacific Design and Manufacturing Show in Anaheim last month. Although not as strong as it used to be, there are still plenty of companies in the US making medical devices, front-end loaders, airplanes, and lots of other manufactured goods. Our editors got the sense that, instead of whining, these companies were more interested in telling us about how the innovation, quality, and intellectual property in their products can help solve some of the problems we now face.

Innovation is still a major part of the design engineer’s job, and we found that a lot of R&D is still going on in some markets. New companies are cropping up as well, and distributors were at the show talking about their latest sales efforts. While the news harps on the bad news, we found good news coming from many corners of the Pacific Design Show.

It was also great to see Cirque du Soleil exhibit at the show – they’re looking for engineers who have specific backgrounds. In fact, there were several entertainment-related exhibits that have connections to the movie industry, as well as racing, sports and recreation, and theme park design. Even with an economic downturn people still find the resources to entertain themselves, whether with movies, video games, theme parks, or going to the races.

And while we were at the show, Walt Disney Studios announced it reached a distribution deal with Steven Spielberg’s DreamWorks Studios. DreamWorks was created in 1994 after Disney executive Jeffrey Katzenberg was passed over for promotion to president of Disney. Katzenberg resigned and then formed DreamWorks with Steven Spielberg and David Geffen.

We want to hear about your good-news stories, and if they’re related to entertainment all the better.

Write to us at bruce@entertainmentengineering.com

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Bruce Wiebusch

bruce@entertainmentengineering.com