By GREGORY ZELLER //
From the Small World After All Department come a Long Island university, a Japanese multinational and a group of visiting South Korean college students, all sharing cutting-edge technologies and cooperative higher-ed ideals at a Melville mixer.
Canon USA, the domestic digital-imaging leader spun off the needs-no-introduction Japanese mothership, recently hosted 35 students from Stony Brook University’s Master of Science in Technology Management program – which unites SBU and the Seoul School of Integrated Sciences and Technologies – at the subsidiary’s Canon Americas headquarters.
Through the MSTM program, Stony Brook students take courses part-time in Korea, while Korean students travel to a three-week summer-study program at SBU – highlighted this year by the July 19 Canon USA visit, which saw an international cadre of future technologists enjoying a tour of the HQ’s showroom and exclusive demonstrations of Canon USA’s next-generation product line.
Behind the scenes: The MSTM students soak up the digital imagery.
Included in the visit were demos of AMLOS (for Activate My Line of Sight) and Kokomo – respectively, a hand gesture-controlled software-and-camera suite designed to promote collaboration across multiple locations and Canon’s first software application enabling face-to-face communications in a virtual reality space.
Canon USA officials were also on hand to discuss the subsidiary’s community-oriented programs – but far from showing off, the company and its employees were instead “reinforcing our commitment to higher education, collaborative solutions and virtual reality,” according to spokeswoman Lisa Chung.
Robert Ettl: Clear picture.
“Teaching about our proud history with a tour of our showroom and providing live demonstrations of AMLOS and Kokomo … hopefully provided strong insights into the industry for those interested in developing their professional skills,” added Chung, Canon USA’s director of talent acquisition, university relations and diversity and inclusion.
With the MSTM students – in hot pursuit of 36 credits that earn them both an MBA from the Seoul school and a master’s degree from SBU – enjoying rare first-hand experiences, the “outstanding” Canon USA presentation offered unique technological and professional insights, noted SBU College of Business Professor Robert Ettl.
More importantly, it exemplified international cooperation for the sake of education, according to the professor.
“The students were impressed at how the Canon representatives were able to take complex situations and technology and explain it in a straightforward and clear manner,” Ettl added. “It was amazing to see all the developments in the consumer and industrial markets.
“Our students learned a lot from our trip to Canon.”
