It is certainly is conceptual. Despite what you think, there is meaning in things that encode meaning. The highs and lows on a circuit line are encoding something in a computer. To the transistor that encoded something is meaningless to it. Yet the high and low voltage are semaphores to the transistor to conduct or not conduct. It is this series of meanings that each designer inserts along the line to a finished communications system which is conceptual. So each transistor along the lines of a designed communications circuit does not give a whit about anything but conducting or not conducting. The designer(s) has(have) embodied the concept into a circuit. Does that circuit do anything? Not without power, it doesn't. When powered up does it do anything? It certainly consumes power, but it is the designer whose concept is embodied in the circuit that decides whether it does anything or not. The circuit may eventually simply transmit a single unmodulated frequency which acts as a beacon. The designer could have complicated the design in order for the beacon to modulate its signal to give directional information to a receiver. etc. etc. etc.
If we look at the example of sperm meeting egg, we see a creation of new information, without a mental process involved.
What? Sperm and egg randomly materialized into a suitable location?
True enough; however, where you're missing the point with regard to Shannon's work, is that it does not depend on the presence of meaning in the bits that are encoded and decoded. "Information" in his sense of the word, is about the sequence of bits only, and the accuracy with which they're decoded on the receiving end.
For the purposes of Shannon's work, "information" is nothing more or less than a specific sequence of bits, which is to be decoded. It makes no difference whether the bit sequence was encoded to convey a particular meaning, or if the bits were generated randomly. Either way, Shannon's work provide a means to assess the likelihood of reproducing that sequence of bits on the receiving end.
What? Sperm and egg randomly materialized into a suitable location?
I think you will agree that people have unique DNA -- the exact characteristics of that DNA are defined at the point where sperm and egg combine their genetic information. When that occurs, new, unique, and meaningful information is created. No "mental process" is involved in the creation of that information -- it is a strictly chemical process.
This is true, even recognizing the fact that this new information represents only a very small variation on the overall "theme" of the total DNA sequence. It's true even if the underlying "theme" was in fact the product of intelligence.
The problem, again, is that you are conflating the information (which here is transmitted by chemical means) with the manner in which the information chain is initiated.