The Acer Guy

Yesterday I was in a meeting and the Aspire Idea came up.

All the usual arguments were discussed: positioning, competition, product development, marketing material, that sort of thing.

It’s a great product because it’s a giant step towards realizing the digital convergency dream. And that makes it an easy product to write about.

But I bet none of you know where the name came from.

Allow me to illuminate you…

When I received the brief to create a name for this new Media Centre way back in February 2006, I first took a look at the existing Acer product lines to see how the new product fitted in.

The new media center was clearly a considerable step forward for Acer in the Audio/Video market, and was more an integrated Audio/Video device than a PC with Audio/Video functions.

The product name therefore had to help the device distinguish itself from traditional Acer products while at the same show that Acer was on the convergency ball.

With that in mind, I wrote down a (very long) list of the intrinsic characteristics/properties of the new product which, after a lot of crossing out, ended up looking like this:

Integrated
Technology
Digital
Entertainment
Access
Vision
Power
Energy
Media
Home

If you take the initials of some of these key characteristics, you can transform them into useable words.

If you take the first, third, fourth and fifth characteristics (“Integrated”, “Digital”, “Entertainment” and “Access”) and combine their initials, you get the word “IDEA”.

And the rest, as they say, is history.

So, if you’re ever wondering what the Aspire iDea actually is… well, it’s name should help you out:

Integrated Digital Entertainment Access

Clever eh?

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It’s been a slow week from my desk as far as Acer is concerned. Don’t get me wrong there are an awful lot of new and exciting products on the way, and things are definitely on the boil, but this week everyone has been focussing on the 30th anniversary celebrations in Taiwan.

There were several reports I read over the event and, as you see from the comments, it was very much a business celebration. This one from Forbes, and another from Techworld show just where the emphasis was.

Business may look good, but I’m all pumped up for the new products. The end of the year is always an exciting moment, as the next-generation solutions due for launch at the beginning of the year start to show.

There’s so much same-ness about IT today, it’s great when the mould gets broken and Acer’s usually pretty fast at getting things to market.

I’m also glad to see that Acer’s desktop PCs are beginning to make their presence felt. There have been some pretty good innovations and ideas over the years but unfortunately these haven’t been getting the attention they deserve. Now things are changing and the ultra compact Veriton 1000, Aspire iDea and integrated Media Gateway in some of the LCD televisions are a perfect demonstration of the jump in quality innovation in this segment.

The Veriton 1000 is not only a technological work of art, it’s also drop dead gorgeous, while the Aspire iDea really has taken digital convergency several generations forward.

So here’s to next year. Can’t wait to see what’s in store.

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