REGION 10 DIRECTOR’S MESSAGE — JANUARY 2019
Greetings to All of Our Region 10 Members,
It will be my great honor and privilege this year to serve IEEE Region 10. Fortunately, I have an excellent predecessor, Prof. Kukjin Chun, as well as powerful Executive Committee members who have promised to work with me in support of Region 10 – and IEEE as a whole.
IEEE Region 10, established in 1967, has grown steadily and we now boast more than 120,000 members compared with only 2,509 at the start back in 1967. In fact, Region 10 is currently the largest Region comprising more than 30% of total IEEE membership (some 25% in terms of voting members). In addition, we possess notable strength via our geographical and cultural diversity throughout the Region.
When I first became a member of the Region 10 Executive Committee in 1995, we had only 35,000 members (IEEE total membership being just over 300,000 at that time) with 35 Sections. Today, Region 10 can pride itself on 58 Sections. In addition, 8 out of our 31 Subsections now represent individual countries expected over time to become Sections in their own right. This large Region is no longer easy to manage, but I will endeavor to do my very best with the help of the Executive Committee and the participation of all our fellow members.
We are pleased indeed that Toshio Fukuda has been voted President-Elect for 2019. Among 23 members of our IEEE Assembly (also chosen by universal vote) still only two of us hail from Region 10, namely the President-Elect Fukuda and myself as Region 10 Director. So Region 10 remains nonetheless underrepresented in the Assembly.
We very much hope that more Region 10 individuals will make themselves available to take up higher organizational roles in IEEE. The aforementioned diversity of Region 10 affords genuine opportunity for recognition and distinction, whether by committees of IEEE or MGA.
Our main areas of focus this year are slated to include leveraging the activities of some of our geographical units, upturning member retention rates (including students), and strengthening the quality of our conference content and organization.
I greatly look forward to the continuing enthusiastic support of each and every Region 10 member and thus to another rewarding year for IEEE Region 10.
Sincerely,
Akinori Nishihara
IEEE Region 10 Director