I didn’t realize that I missed writing about this portion of the Wednesday General Session. Sorry for any confusion about there being a Part 1 and a Part 3 with no Part 2 in the middle.
Here are the SWUGN award winners announced during the General Session
User Group Leader of the Year
Rob Jensen, Southern Minnesota SWUG
User Group of the Year
Central MA/Northern CT SWUG, lead by Tom Cote
Lifetime Achievement Award (2 winners)
 Gerald Davis, Colorado SUG
 Dan Bertscki, Northeast Ohio SWUG
More Customer Stories
Two companies to keep an eye on in the near future are Terrafugia and Magenn Power. Both are taking to the skies, but for completely different reasons.
Terrafugia used SolidWorks to develop the Transition. Transition is both a car and an airplane. It transitions (dare I say “Transforms”) from one to the other quickly. This allows the driver/pilot to choose their mode of transportation. If they are on a business trip, and the weather is fine, they can fly via small local airports to and from the destination.  If the weather turns, they can convert their Transition to car mode and simply drive home.  In fact, they can convert it to drive to and from the airport as well. It is street legal.
Magenn Power is using SolidWorks to develop balloon based wind power turbines, called Mageen Air Rotor System (MARS for short).  The goal is to be able to place these balloons in areas where windmills are not practical. As stated on their site, “MARS captures the energy available in the 600 to 1000-foot low level and nocturnal jet streams that exist almost everywhere.”