Tour to Northern California - Cutting Edge Technology in Entertainment and Industry

April 23-25, Northern California
Contact: New York Foreign Press Center
Telephone: 212-317-8325; email: nyfpc@state.gov

The New York FPC led sixteen journalists from ten countries on a tour of various institutions in Northern California to find out why the reion is so well known for cutting-edge technology in both entertainment and industry.  Day 1 involved a trip to Lucas film, where journalists heard from Howard Roffman, the President of Lucas Licensing, Jim Ward, President of LucasArts and Peter Hirschman, VP of Product Development of LucasArts.  In addition to addressing current projects, all of the speakers touted the Star Wars films' 30th anniversary taking place this month in L.A. and discussed the tremendous impact the genre has had on U.S. and international culture since 1977.

The following two days included trips to some of Silicon Valley's leading green/clean technology firms, where the group met a variety of CEOs, scientists, and leaders in engineering.  Journalists took advantage of numerous one-on-one interviews with high-level representatives, and learned more about biofuels, clean-air emissions, carbon footprint reduction, the legislation process (where lobbying for more environmentally-friendly laws are concerned), and an overall view of the Valley's evolution and future goals.