Abbas Mohaddes is back in the tech transportation business.
The former chief executive of Santa Ana-based Iteris Inc. is the new president and chief operating officer of Econolite, a unit of Anaheim-based Econolite Group Inc., which designs and manufactures traffic management control systems and sensors, and develops, installs and integrates traffic control software and communication systems.
Mohaddes consulted for the company for over a year before taking the post, attending strategic planning meetings and assisting in the development of its connected and automated vehicle game plan.
“I felt at home and can contribute to an organization poised for moving to the next level of growth, leveraging the strong sales and technical assets with infusion of advanced technologies and business discipline,” he told the Business Journal. “The culture of the company was also very attractive, private, focused on high-performing talent acquisition and retention with great reputation in the industry.”
The Econolite Group, established in 1933, employs more than 750.
Mohaddes resigned from the top post and the board at publicly traded Iteris in February 2015 to “pursue other opportunities” after an eight-year stint with the company. After his departure, Iteris expanded its business model from providing primarily transportation data to selling agriculture and weather insights.
OCs Absent
The Electronic Entertainment Expo at the Los Angeles Convention Center featured several big names in the video gaming industry but very few from Orange County, marking the second straight year locals opted to opt out.
Atlus U.S.A. Inc. in Irvine, which shared a large exhibition space in the showroom with Sega as it has in years past, was among the exceptions. Aliso Viejo-based NCSOFT West, the North American unit of South Korean video gaming giant NCSOFT Corp., held private meetings.
Beyond that, it was largely mum from OC’s large contingent of video game makers, such as Newport Beach-based inXile Entertainment, publisher Little Orbit LLC in Santa Ana and Irvine-based Blizzard Entertainment Inc., the county’s largest software maker.
Blizzard throws its own annual fanfest, Blizzcon, at the Anaheim Convention Center.
This year’s big draws at the world’s largest video game trade show included “Super Mario Odyssey,” which many insiders have positioned as Nintendo’s comeback; the XBOX One X console reveal; a teaser for “Metroid Prime 4;” another Nintendo title; and “Spider-Man,” an exclusive for PlayStation 4.
This year’s showcase allowed the general public to attend for the first time in its 22-year history, leading to crammed halls and concourses at nearly every turn, and lines of an hour or longer for fans to test new games.
Transportation Confab
Sustain OC will hold its fourth annual advanced transportation symposium this week at the trade group’s headquarters at the University of California-Irvine’s Applied Innovation Center.
Driving Mobility 4, scheduled for June 27, will feature panels in several areas, including next-generation vehicles, trends in clean fleets and renewable fuels, fuel cell adoption and commercialization, developments in the connected and automated vehicle market, and updates on the much-hyped Hyperloop.
Sustain OC, which had been known as CleanTechOC since 2009, changed its name last year.
