IBO 2001 Industrial Design Awards Announced

Los Angeles, CA - Instrument Business Outlook (IBO) today announced the winners of its eighth annual industrial design awards for analytical and life science instruments. The 2001 Gold Award for excellence in industrial design goes to Polymer Laboratories for the PL-PSDA particle size distribution analyzer. The Silver Award goes to Cambridge Scientific Instruments for the 200 Series Gas Chromatograph (GC), and the Bronze Award goes to Waters Corporation for the Breeze High-Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC) System.

IBO 2001 award winners (clockwise from top left): Gold Award winning PL-PSDA particle size distribution analyzer from Polymer Laboratories; Silver Award winning 200 Series Gas Chromatograph from Cambridge Scientific Instruments; and Bronze Award winning Breeze HPLC System from Waters.

To be eligible for a design award, a product must be an analytical or life science instrument that began initial shipping between August 1, 2000 and July 31, 2001. Award candidates are chosen from a wide array of new analytical and life science instruments that IBO monitors through trade shows, trade publications and press releases. The awards are solely based on an instrument's industrial design. The criteria include innovation, style, functionality, ergonomics and practicality.

In the case of each winner, the industrial design of the instrument improved the product, making it more visually appealing, user friendly and distinguishing the instrument from its competition. This year's winners define good instrument design with their streamline, simple, compact approach and emphasis on usability. They also illustrate the instrument industry's growing emphasis on design, reflecting greater attention to making an instrument sophisticated yet approachable.

IBO is published twice monthly by Strategic Directions International, Inc. (SDi), a management and marketing research firm dedicated to the analytical and life science instrument industry. SDi is the world's leading source of information on the market for analytical and life science instrumentation and equipment for laboratory and on-site applications. For moreinformation, visit www.strategic-directions.com or contact:

For the U.S. and Rest of World -
Ms. Tanya Samazan, Associate Editor
Strategic Directions International, Inc.
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Tel: (310) 641-4982
Fax: (310) 641-8851
E-mail: sdi@strategic-directions.com

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