Getting customers to adopt a new product is always a big challenge for any product marketing manager.  Chris Delvizis, the Data Acquisition Product Manager for National Instruments’ new plug and play temperature sensor was so excited about the ease of adoption and use of his new NI USB-TC01 Thermocouple Measurement Device, he had his grandmother demo the installation and use of the product!
Of course you SHOULD be able to plug a new device into your PC and have it work out of the box, but that’s often not the case with data acquisition devices such as sensors of various kinds. Usually, you have to download a driver, select the Operating System, and then connect the sensing device to the application you want to use to log and analyze the data. This new temperature sensor from NI is the first in a series of NI InstantDAQ Technology devices that contains the driver within the device, but also includes the application for logging and viewing the data. And, you can download additional free applications and/or connect instantly to NI’s LabVIEW development environment and online community of developers.
The InstantDAQ Technology was invented by Chris Delvizis, the DAQ product manager, and Christer Ljungdahl, Director of Web and Direct Marketing, when they were looking to create products that would be easy to sell online and to use without training. Christer reported that his inspiration was the ease of use of FlipVideo camera which Cisco acquired in 2009. As head of direct Web marketing for National Instruments, Christer is eager to have even more NI products that people can buy directly from the Web site, plug into a USB port on their PC, and use it productively within minutes of receiving and unpacking with no need for a manual So, Christer and his colleague designed the prototype. Once the R&D group saw it, they loved it, and immediately productized it–which speaks volumes for the innovation-friendly culture of National Instruments. It sells for $99 and can be purchased here.
